Install Overview

Prior to installing eNewsViews, insure that you have PHP and MySQL working and it is a good idea to make a backup of your MySQL database if you are using it for another script.

1 - Unzip the eNewsViews file.
The extract will create a directory named /enewsviews/ and place the files and several directories there.

2 - Connecting to MySQL.
Open a text editor like notepad.exe and edit the file /enewsviews/mysql_con.php

You will need to fill in the server name, user name, password and database name for your MySQL server. The file looks like this:

$DB=mysql_connect ('localhost','mysql_user','mysql_password');
mysql_select_db('mysql_db');

Upload the files to your web site placing the enewsveiws folder in the root. I.e., http://yourwebsite/enewsviews/

3 - Create the database and tables.
Open the /enewsviews/index.html from a web browser. If the settings you added to mysql_con.php are correct, the tables will automatically be created the first time the index file is run.

If for some reason the tables are not automatically created, there is a MySQL query file in the /enewsviews/admin/ directory that you can use.

If you ever want to reinstall some or all of the tables, you will have to manually delete them so they can be automatically or manually created again. Only the missing tables will be created.

At this point, you should be see eNewsViews on the example test page /enewsviews/index.html Don't stop reading the install as there are still some things to do.

4 - Create the inline frames on you web page.
You should now be able to load the example page /enewsviews/index.html and login with:

Username = admin
Password = admin

You can place the two IFRAMES in the index.html example page anywhere within your web site and eNewsViews should appear as long as you have the path to the eNewsViews files set correctly.

Whether you place the in a CSS division or table does not matter.

You can leave the index.html example page in the directory and set that page as the default to keep hackers from listing the file contents of the directory.

<IFRAME name="menu" src="../enewsviews/menu.php" width="100%" height="58" scrolling="no" frameborder="0"></IFRAME>

<IFRAME name="main" src="../enewsviews/main.php" width="100%" height="400" scrolling="auto" frameborder="0"></IFRAME>

You can play with the iframe properties to make it fit into your page. The width can be set in percent or pixels.

5 - Host Setup for client email.
Login in using admin which has (Site Admin) rights. Next, click the Settings icon and then select Setup Host. You will need to fill out the fields so that eNewsViews knows how to send SMTP email to new subscribers and people that have lost their password. The Host setup looks like this:

Description
Value
Your Domain Name
Send From Email
Registration Number

This is also where you tell eNewsViews if you want to receive email alerts from posted views, Hacker Tracker, auto ban, etc. Go ahead and turn these features on during the install so that we can test the SMTP mail.

6 - Creating the CSS style sheet from the Skin Painter.
One of the reasons this script is so fast is that it creates two style sheets from the values you set with the Skin Painter. The CSS style sheets drive the elements without having to access the database each time. Our final step is to decide how you get the information written to the nv_body.css and nv_menu.css style sheets.

If you are like me and like to tinker with colors and fonts, you will want to use PLAN A .(direct write to disk) Otherwise, PLAN B (cut and paste) will get the job done but is slower if you plan to make a lot of changes.

PLAN A (Automatically writes the CSS style sheet.)
Temporarily set the /enewsviews/style/nv_body.css and nv_menu.css file rights to give the user EVERYONE MODIFY permissions. eNewsViews will then create both style sheets in the /style/ directory each time you click Save in the Skin Painter.

Here are the step by step instructions to temporarily change the rights on a Windows box.

  • Navigate to http://YOUR_WEB_ROOT/enewsviews/style/nv_body.css and nv_menu.css
  • highlight both files and Right click on the files then click Properties.
  • Click on the tab marked Security.
  • Click on the user named EVERYONE. Make sure that Modify has a check mark and Click OK.

    • NOTE - When you are done setting up the script, set the rights of the style sheets back to EVERYONE READ ONLY.

    PLAN B (Manually cut and paste the CSS style sheet.)
    If eNewsViews is unable to write to disk, a screen will provide instructions to manually cut and paste CSS style sheets that will be available when you click Save in Skin Maker.

    Instructions are given once you right click and view the source of the (FRAME NOT THE PAGE) that will only be available if eNewsViws can not write to disk. How you upload or write it to the style sheets is up to you. FTP, FrontPage - It' all good for writing the CSS text files to /enewsviews/style/

    Remember to refresh your web page on your browser in order to see the changes you made through the Skin Painter. If you can not see your changes, heres a quick checklist of reasons your changes are not being recognized:

    • The file rights of the /style/nv_menu.css and /style/nv_body.css are not temporarily set to EVERYONE MODIFY.
    • Your browser cache has not been cleared and temporarily set to refresh the page with each visit.
    • You need to click the page refresh button on the page that contains the IFRAMEs.

    If the following conditions are met, the Skin Painter should work just fine. If you still have problems, try the cut and paste method. If cut and pasting the CSS style sheet works, you have a file rights / write to disk problem. Otherwise, you have browser cache clearing problem.

    eNewsViews Copyright © 2004-2005 Ray Wiltfong