Installing Wordpress, The Automated Method
We are super close to getting our first blog up and running. All the pieces are in place except the last one... the Wordpress application itself. So, let's keep moving and install Wordpress!
Step 1
First, we need to make sure the domain is pointing to the hosting servers. This means, when someone visits your domain, in this case www.climbershang.com, they are directed to the A2 Hosting servers. The screen shot below is showing us an A2 default page, so everything is good. If you are unsure on how to make domain changes, a new tutorial is on the way to address this issue.
Step 2
Next, we need to login to the cPanel application at our A2 Hosting account. The instructions to access cPanel should be in your welcome email when you signed up for your A2 account. Or, enter /cpanel to the end of your domain name. You may run into one screen that asks if you are behind a firewall. Just choose the option with port 2083. Also, you may get a warning about the SSL certificate not being valid. Just click through these error messages.
Step 3
Once logged in to the cPanel area, you should have a screen that looks like the screen shot below.
Step 4
To install Wordpress automatically, we need to find the area which allows us to install various applications. We will find this at the bottom of the page in an area called "Softaculous Apps Installer." Go ahead and click the Wordpress icon to start the install process.
Step 5
Here we are on the Softaculous landing page for Wordpress. At this point, all we need to do is click on the "Install" button at the top of the page.
Step 6
Now this is an important page! There are a lot of options that need to be configured before Wordpress is installed. This step my look confusing, but we will take it one step at a time.
Step 7
Error!!!! What the heck is gong on here, I thought this was going to be easy! Okay, so the install bombed out. We need to read and fix the error at the top of the page. The error is asking us to delete the index.php file. This means there is already a file named index.php sitting in the directory we are trying to install to. What we need to do is fire up WinSCP, connect to the server and delete the file.
Step 8
Once you are connected to the server, navigate to the www directory. The folder says www with a little arrow icon on it.
Step 9
Now we are sitting in the base folder of your new blog. Just right click on the index.php file and choose delete! Once that is complete... go back and continue with the installation process again.
Step 10
Hey it worked! Softaculous is geving us a success message. This is great news. All we need to do is check out the web address to see if the blog is actually there. Navigate to www.yourdomain.com.
Step 11
Ta Da! There it is! Your first blog... live on the internet! Congratulations... give your self a high five!
Closing
In this tutorial we walked through the entire setup process for installing and publishing a blog on the internet. In future tutorials we will discuss how to further manage our blog.
Until next time, please leave a comment if there are any questions. Thanks for visiting Pro Media Publishing!
Step 1
First, we need to make sure the domain is pointing to the hosting servers. This means, when someone visits your domain, in this case www.climbershang.com, they are directed to the A2 Hosting servers. The screen shot below is showing us an A2 default page, so everything is good. If you are unsure on how to make domain changes, a new tutorial is on the way to address this issue.
Step 2
Next, we need to login to the cPanel application at our A2 Hosting account. The instructions to access cPanel should be in your welcome email when you signed up for your A2 account. Or, enter /cpanel to the end of your domain name. You may run into one screen that asks if you are behind a firewall. Just choose the option with port 2083. Also, you may get a warning about the SSL certificate not being valid. Just click through these error messages.
Step 3
Once logged in to the cPanel area, you should have a screen that looks like the screen shot below.
Step 4
To install Wordpress automatically, we need to find the area which allows us to install various applications. We will find this at the bottom of the page in an area called "Softaculous Apps Installer." Go ahead and click the Wordpress icon to start the install process.
Step 5
Here we are on the Softaculous landing page for Wordpress. At this point, all we need to do is click on the "Install" button at the top of the page.
Step 6
Now this is an important page! There are a lot of options that need to be configured before Wordpress is installed. This step my look confusing, but we will take it one step at a time.
- Choose Protocol. I chose the www option. I just prefer this method. You could have your blog configured with no www, but what if you add a subdomain in the future? You may prefer www. just for consistency.
- Choose Domain. Left as is, no changes.
- In Directory. The "wp" was removed. Instead of having www.climbershang.com/wp/index.php as the default page, I chose to have www.climbershang.com/index.php.
- Database Name. This is important. The default name was changed to something more meaningful and easy to recognize.
- Table Prefix. Leave as is. This will allow you to install other applications in the same database in the future by keeping the table names separate.
- Site Name. Make it very relevant to your site. Search engiens will be indexing the Site Name attribute, so give it some thought!
- Site Description. Again, make it relevant.
- Enable Multisite. Leave this blank, or unchecked. We will not be using Multisite in this tutorial.
- Admin Username. Change this and write it down!
- Admin Password. Change this and write it down!
- Admin Email. Make sure this is an email you are going to keep for a long time. Very iimportant field here.
- Select Language. English.
- Email Installation details to: I put in my email address just to have the details delivered to me.
Step 7
Error!!!! What the heck is gong on here, I thought this was going to be easy! Okay, so the install bombed out. We need to read and fix the error at the top of the page. The error is asking us to delete the index.php file. This means there is already a file named index.php sitting in the directory we are trying to install to. What we need to do is fire up WinSCP, connect to the server and delete the file.
Step 8
Once you are connected to the server, navigate to the www directory. The folder says www with a little arrow icon on it.
Step 9
Now we are sitting in the base folder of your new blog. Just right click on the index.php file and choose delete! Once that is complete... go back and continue with the installation process again.
Step 10
Hey it worked! Softaculous is geving us a success message. This is great news. All we need to do is check out the web address to see if the blog is actually there. Navigate to www.yourdomain.com.
Step 11
Ta Da! There it is! Your first blog... live on the internet! Congratulations... give your self a high five!
Closing
In this tutorial we walked through the entire setup process for installing and publishing a blog on the internet. In future tutorials we will discuss how to further manage our blog.
Until next time, please leave a comment if there are any questions. Thanks for visiting Pro Media Publishing!
