There are quite a few forum questions on installation of CS in a shared hosting environment. How about adding an item to the Install FAQ to address the topic?
A recommendation for a quick but important change to the Web Install doc follows below.
In my typical shared hosting environment, I have access to a single MS SQL 2005 database with a fixed name. I already have a few small sites running that access the database that use ASP.NET 2.0 membership, etc. Each site uses a distinct application name to differentiate membership information. Every database object is prefixed by a site prefix (such as cs_) to clearly identify the objects by application/site and eliminate naming collisions.
I am a pre-install CS newbie that has had to poke around quite a bit to determine if a CS installation is compatible with my very common setup. Without having performed the installation yet, it looks like I will not have a problem.
According to the Web-based Installation Process Doc, it looks like I can:
It looks like I cannot set a prefix to appear at the front of the name of each CS database object (without making extensive manual changes to the database scripts). However, after browsing the CS2.1 Database Schema (kindly provided by J-O Erikkson in the Downloads - Community Downloads - Documentation area), it appears that all/most CS database objects are already prefixed with "CS_". As a result, I don't anticipate a naming collision.
Recommendation for change to the Web Install Doc: state clearly that CS database objects are prefixed with "CS_" to avoid collisions with other database objects in a shared database environment. Users like myself need to know that we won't be overwriting existing database objects during our install (as long as they don't begin with "CS_".)
FYI, DNN 4 provides the capability to change the database object prefix through a web.config "objectQualifier" attribute of the SqlDataProvider. I don't know that this capability is important to have, but the web.config section where this is set in DNN 4 is shown below:
<data defaultProvider="SqlDataProvider"> <providers> <clear /> <add name="SqlDataProvider" type="DotNetNuke.Data.SqlDataProvider, DotNetNuke.SqlDataProvider" connectionStringName="SiteSqlServer" upgradeConnectionString="" providerPath="~\Providers\DataProviders\SqlDataProvider\" objectQualifier="dnn_" databaseOwner="dbo" /> </providers></data>
Hi irelandk,
Thanks for taking the time to give us the feedback. I agree that we need to better call out this fact as it will ease some tensions for folks installing into a hosted environment with access to only a single db. While we'll likely update our documentation to call out this fact, it's definitely too late in the game to support a prefix...at least for our upcoming release of Community Server 2007.
Again, thanks for the feedback...
One is glad to be of service...
Can you please elaborate on how you have setup the CS on the shared hosting platform. I have searched the forum, watched the websinstall video, but still don't have a clue what to do first.
I am at Orcsweb and don't want to install CS on my desktop, but immediately at the shared server website. I have ftp-access and have a SQL database at Orcsweb.
What to do now?
Can you point me in the right direction?
Thanks,
Bart
Just some extra information and hope somebody will be able to respond. So far I am not happy at all with CS and are even considering to move back to the open source community software.
I only want something very simple. I have a professional hosting package at Orcsweb and have a full license for CS. I now want to install CS at Orcsweb without installing it on my local desktop at all.
Am I the only one who has serious problems to understand the whole installation process.
I only want something very simple. I have a professional hosting package at Orcsweb and have a full license for CS. I now want to install CS at Orcsweb without installing it on my local desktop at all. Now what?
Anybody?
Hi Undutchable,
Undutchable:I have a professional hosting package at Orcsweb and have a full license for CS
Which version of Community Server are you trying to install? (2.0, 2.1, 2007 Beta)
Undutchable:The file-name of webinstaller is for sure not meant for a Shared Hosting Platform....
Not sure if this is a question or a comment. If you are in a Shared Hosting Environment, you should be able to download one of our web packages (not the MSI) and unzip locally, ftp to your host, and then run the web-based installer. If this didn't work for you, which download failed? (url)
Awaiting your reply...
Hi Jose,
I did download the webinstaller 2.1 and unzipped it. In that zip-file no installer directory is present at all. Only when I install the Windows (msi) installer I am able to find the installer subdir?
Hi Bart,
I hate to ask, but can you try again?
I just downloaded both of our Web Install packages (ASP.NET 1.1 and ASP.NET 2.0), opened the zips, and found the Web\Installer directory.
Perhaps something happened with your download? Are you getting the files from here?
Thanks...
I did not download it via your link but via the frontpage: http://communityserver.org/content/GetCommunityServerNow.aspx
I have now downloaded a new file and here the installer directory is present under the web folder. In the version I got (with the same file name) it was not present, only a couple of folders. So that is all the confusion.
Thanks for this addtional link, will now try to install it again.
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