How to set up a Zikula sandbox

This page explains how to set up a Zikula installation on your local system. You can use this for testing packages or other content before deployment.

Instructions updated for latest Zikula that runs only on PHP 5.3

The Zikula package is being updated, in the meantime you can use the scratch build RPM.

Package installation

1. Switch user to the root account:

   su -

   Provide the system administrator password at the prompt.
2. If you have not already done so, install the Apache web and MySQL servers:

   yum groupinstall 'Web Server' 'MySQL Database'

3. Install the Zikula package, the PHP mbstring package, and any other modules needed:

   yum install zikula php-mbstring <zikula_module_pkg...>

The php-mbstring package is not strictly required but may be helpful for some content or modules.

4. Install the Zikula modules selection. As of December 2009, we use every packaged module on Fedora Insight.

   yum install zikula-module-\*

5. Finish the installation of Scribite (the visual editor module)

   yum install xinha
   cd /usr/share/zikula/javascript
   mkdir scribite_editors
   cd scribite_editors
   ln -s /usr/share/js/xinha-0.96-0.1.b2 xinha

System setup

1. If you have not already done so, configure and start the services you just installed:

   chkconfig httpd on
   chkconfig mysqld on
   service httpd start
   service mysqld start

2. Make sure that the firewall allows traffic on port 80 (HTTP). Use system-config-firewall to perform this task if needed.

When you are finished, you should be able to open a Web browser, visit the URL http://localhost, and see the Fedora test page.

Pre-existing Apache server
If you didn't follow the steps above, because you already have a working Web server, you may need to run service httpd reload for the Zikula configuration file to be loaded by Apache.

Set up database

1. If you have not already done so, set up the MySQL database server. First, provide a root password:

   mysqladmin -u root password $PASSWORD

   

   Do not use root account password
   Do not provide the system administrator's password for your Linux system here. Use a different strong password, since this is a separate authentication for a MySQL user called "root."
2. Create a database for Zikula:

   mysqladmin -u root -p create zikula

   

   Database creation
   You will be prompted to enter the MySQL "root" password from the previous step. By installing the database here, you don't have to give your Zikula application the password for the MySQL "root" user.
3. Grant rights for a zikula user on this database:

   [root@publictest1 ~]# mysql -u root -p
   Enter password: 
   Welcome to the MySQL monitor.  Commands end with ; or \g.
   Your MySQL connection id is 5
   Server version: 5.1.41 Source distribution
   
   Type 'help;' or '\h' for help. Type '\c' to clear the current input statement.
   
   mysql> GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON zikula.* TO zikulaadmin@localhost IDENTIFIED BY 'ZIKULA_PASSWORD';
   Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)
   
   mysql> FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
   Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)
   
   mysql> QUIT;
   Bye
   

   The zikulaadmin account and the ZIKULA_PASSWORD you used above are the ones you will use in Zikula's installation process shortly.

Zikula installation

1. As root, make the Zikula configuration file writable by changing its SELinux context:

   chcon -t httpd_sys_content_t /etc/zikula/config.php

2. Open a Web browser and point it at http://localhost/zikula (or the appropriate host name if you're running the Web browser on a different system).
3. Click the link for the install script.
4. Follow the prompts. First select the appropriate language (e.g. English) and select Next.
5. Read and then accept the license by clicking the Accept license button.
6. The checklist should be completed. Click the Next button to proceed.
7. Use the following database information:

   Database type:   MySQL
   Table type:      MyISAM
   Host:            localhost
   Username:        zikulaadmin
   Password:        <password>
   Database name:   zikula
   Table prefix:    zk
   

   Do not check the box for Create database, because you have already created it! Click Next to proceed.
8. For installation type, select Complete, and then select Next to proceed.
9. Now you will create a Zikula administrator account. This is the information that a user types into the Zikula web interface to log in, and is separate and distinct from the database account you created earlier. Fill out the form, using a real email address (which you can change later), and select Next to proceed.
10. The Tour module is an appropriate start page for now. Select Next to proceed.
11. Select a theme and Next to proceed.
12. Read the credits if desired, and then click the Go to your Zikula site link.

Move install and update bits

FIXME -- this seems like a bug and a hack. What's actually going on here? Why is this necessary?

• These directories contain scripts that are used to do an installation, but Zikula won't run if they remain accessible afterward because of the security risk. Not sure whether there's any way around that. --pfrields 21:31, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

When you try to manage your Zikula sandbox, Zikula will complain unless you make the following changes, still using the root account:

cd /usr/share/zikula
ls -d install* upgrade* | xargs -i mv '{}' '{}-orig'
chmod 444 /etc/zikula/config.php

Install AuthFAS for FAS Authentication

The purpose of the zikula AuthFAS module is to allow users to log into Zikula using their FAS credentials. If they have not logged in before, they will be registered on the Zikula system as default users. Any users in the cmsadmin group on FAS will automatically become administrators on any and every instance of Zikula.

Install the following package (currently available in the infrastructure repository - if you are doing this on a publictest machine you should be able to just yum install it):

zikula-module-fasauth

Once the package is installed, the two plugins involved must be activated. First we will activate the AuthFAS module.

1. Log into your Zikula instance using the zikula administrative account.
2. Go to the administrative panel. Go to the "System" tab, then click the "Modules" module.
3. You will see a list of modules. Find the AuthFAS module.
4. Click the link to initialize the AuthFAS module.
5. Click the link to activate the AuthFAS module.

Then we will activate the AuthPN module.

1. Still in the administrative panel, in the "System" tab and in the "Modules" module, find AuthPN in the list of modules.
2. Click the link to initialize the AuthPN module.
3. Click the link to activate the AuthPN module.

We will next do some configuration of the AuthPN module.

1. Still looking at the AuthPN section in the administrative panel (in the "System" tab and in the "Modules" module), look for a text field called "AuthPN string."
2. Replace the current value of the text field with "AuthFAS,AuthPN" (without the quotes) and save the form.

You may log out of zikula at this time.

Finally, we will make a configuration file on the server.

1. ssh into the server zikula is installed on.
2. move modules/AuthFAS/config/personal_config.php to config/personal_config.php.
3. if this is a non-production instance, you are finished with this section.
4. if this is a production instance, edit the config/personal_config.php file to comment out the section for the debug version and comment in the section for the production version.

Once you have completed these steps, installation of AuthFAS is complete and you should be able to login using your FAS username and password.

Keep a non-FAS admin account
We recommend keeping an administrator account which is not tied to the FAS system, so that should FAS go offline for any reason, the Zikula instance admin panel can still be accessed..

Short URLs System

To get the fancy directory based URL scheme (such as http://www.example.com/News/2009/06/03/my_cool_article.htm) you will need some directives in either a .htaccess placed in the root directory of your Zikula instance, or alternatively the same ruleset added to your Apache .conf file. Short URLs can then be switched on through the administration interface. Click the 'System' tab, then the 'Settings' tab.

Congratulations, you're done!
Now you can log in to Zikula with the administrator account you just created, and start learning.

Applying the Fedora Insight theme

This theme is known to have some problems. The instructions below describe how to activate the theme; the instructions will work and the theme will apply, but the theme will have visible bugs in it.

To apply the Fedora Insight skin, install the package

zikula-fedora-theme

And then activate it with the following steps:

1. Log into zikula as an administrator.
2. Click on "Administration" > "Theme"
3. You will see a list of themes. There should be one called "Fedora" with a green checkbox in its "Options" column. Click the green checkbox.
4. You will see a dialog come up saying "This will set Fedora as the active theme for all users of your site!" Click the green checkbox again.

The theme will be applied.

Fedora Insight specific modules

To set up a Fedora Insight specific instance, you'll need the following packages (some of which are already detailed in the list above).

These are in repos.

zikula-module-crpTag-0.1.3-3.el5
zikula-module-fedora-fasauth-0.2-2.el5
zikula-1.1.2-3.el5
zikula-module-News
zikula-module-pagemaster
ziula-module-filterutil
zikula-module-EZComments
zikula-module-scribite
xinha

You'll also need this package for the theme.

zikula-fedora-theme

The package is available on the Infra repos for use on publictest machines. The package for Fedora 11 and 12 can be found here

To take a publictest instance to live or staging

FIXME -- This documentation needs to be far more clear and step by step.

1. Take a dump of the publictest zikula database, and import it into a new database on your staging machine (instructions below) (if you do this, you do not need to run the install script below)
2. Copy the contents of /usr/share/zikula/config/templates to your staging machine.
3. Copy /usr/share/zikula/themes/fedora to your staging machine
4. Visit the site in your browser (probably at /zikula) and check it's running ok. If it is, you need go no further in your setup. Importing a publictest instance skips most of the setup. Note: all customisations should be stored either in the theme, or in the config directory. Excluding the installation of scribite, copying the contents of these directories and the database should be enough to replicate the publictest instance