How to install a local server. Tutorial for PHPDEV

[dojo]

When doing some work with Php files and sites you need to have the server at your service. Since for many people it's not so easy to upload every time a change has been made or manybe they are on dial-up and every minute is pretious, it's better to have a local server, an emulator, that "fools" the browser into thinking he is online.

This is quite simple and everybody could have his own server on the home PC when working with PHP files and trying to grasp the way they function. I use a FREE program that is called phpdev. It's simple to run and install and it saves the headaches configurations give you. You can get it from Firepages.com.au. Download it, unzip if necessary and install it. You just tell the program to install in a certain place, I usually use my D:/ partition and name the folder phpdev. After I give it these details, the program takes care of everything and installs everything.

When I need to run the local Apache server I just go to D:/phpdev and chose 2K-NT-XP-phpdev_start.bat (for Windows 2000, NT or XP) or 98-ME-phpdev_start.bat (for Windows 98 or ME). It starts the server and it displays a browser page and the address http://localhost. This is the address you'll reffer offline when working with your sites hosted locally. In the Phpdev folder you'll have a folder named www. This is the place you'll move your site files and it would display the list when calling http://localhost

This is how my folder looks (I am using Total Commander)



This is a part of the page you get when typing: http://localhost



See the folders, corresponding to the sites you wish to publish. When I type for instance http://localhost/-nnn-/ the site you can find in the -nnn- folder will appear.

Now all you need to do is take the CMS you want to install or the forums, unzip and move the corresponding files in folders you create in www. Then just type http://localhost and see your ofline sites in the folders list and chose the right one.

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Thank you for your time and have fun with your local server. Now you can test every CMS, forum script or Php site at home, with no need to stay online. When everything is OK, you canupload the results on your host and be ready to receive visitors.

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For our Romanian visitors the article has been translated on Invatam.Net: Cum se instaleaza un server local: tutorial pentru PHPDEV