Stand-Alone WordPress Installation

by: Bruce Burns

Intention: The following reference is intended to guide you through a step-by-step process to build a “stand-alone” WordPress website.  ”Stand-alone” defined as a WordPress website that doesn’t have it’s root url as wordpress.com.

Tools

Internet Access

PC or Laptop

Some iDevices and other portable internet devices may not provide full compatibility or functionality for your webmastering tasks

Web Hosting account to include ftp access and database creation and management

Godaddy.com

Hostgator.com

Apache Server (self-hosting is for advanced web developers only)

SSH interface/client

Filezilla http://filezilla-project.org/download.php?type=server

PuTTY http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/download.html

PuTTYgen http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/download.html

FTP Client

Filezilla http://filezilla-project.org/download.php?type=server

Text Editor

JEdit http://www.jedit.org/index.php?page=download

Notepad

A list of other fine open source resources http://lifehacker.com/385929/best-text-editors

Implementation

Purchase a Domain

Host the Domain Name

Jot down the subdirectory you have linked to this hosted domain or determine it through your webhost backend

Create an FTP Account on your Web Host

Download the latest version of Wordpress: http://wordpress.org/download/

Extract the Zip File you just downloaded

Contact your Web Host and request SSH access

Determine your domain name’s IP Address

Install Filezilla

Install PuTTY

Install PuTTYgen

Generate an RSA-2 Key from PuTTYgen

Be vigilant where you store your private and public key

Setup PuTTY

Login to your web host through PuTTY

The first time this will require your main (for hostgator.com) username and password

Once logged into your webhost through PuTTY type “ls -lst .ssh”

if the #ssh response = “No such file or directory”

then type “mkdir .ssh”

then type “cd .ssh”

then type “touch authorized_keys”

then type “nano authorized_keys”

then copy-paste your public-RSA2 key into this file

then hold the CTRL-X keys down and save-quit

if the #ssh response = something suggesting the directory exists (no error messages)

then apply the above skipping “mkdir .ssh”

Setup Filezilla

You will need your URL’s ISP (see above step)

Your “type” of protocol will be SFTP

Your “port” will = 22

Your local dir will = wherever you wish to upload and download files FROM YOUR PC/LAPTOP

Your remote dir must be specific to where your URL is linked

Create Database

Jot down Hostname

Jot down DBname (database name)

Jot down username

Jot down password

You DO NOT want to access the database externally

Login to your web host via filezilla using the SFTP protcol

Upload the Wordpress files you extracted earlier to the root directory linked to your URL

In the root directory you will find a file named wp-config-sample.php

Either edit this directly on your webhost (if possible)

or copy the file you have on your local pc to a file named wp-config.php (notice the new file doesn’t have the word sample in it)

Edit wp-config.php

define(‘DB_NAME’, ‘database_name_here’);

define(‘DB_USER’, ‘username_here’);

define(‘DB_PASSWORD’, ‘password_here’);

define(‘DB_HOST’, ‘localhost’);

go down too the set of 8 lines where the first line begins with define(‘AUTH_KEY’,         ‘put your unique phrase here’); THESE LINES ARE OPTIONAL

the last line to edit looks like $table_prefix  = ‘wp_’; you want to add something to ‘wp_’; like ‘wp_food’; or anything to make this websites table relevant to you

save file (and upload via filezilla if you didn’t edit it directly on the webhost

IF YOU HAVE FOLLOWED THE ABOVE STEPS SUCCESFULLY YOU SHOULD NOW BE ABLE TO GO TO YOUR URL (ie. mydomain.com) and WORDPRESS WILL TAKE YOU THROUGH A VERY VERY SHORT INSTALLATION PROCESS AND YOU ARE DONE.

If you do not succeed the first time, then you will be required to do a little trouble shooting on the config file or perhaps change permissions (though this is not likely)

WHEN YOU SUCCEED BE VERY VIGILANT OF THE USERNAME/PASSWORD EMAIL you first use to create your first ADMIN ACCOUNT.