Document: Overview and Setup

Section: Overview

LnBlog is a web-based weblog program that is written in PHP 4 and stores data in text
files.  It aims to be full-featured, flexible, and configurabe, but still remain easy to
use and keep software requirements low.  It is designed to work well on inexpensive shared
web hosts.

In terms of functionality, LnBlog includes support for all the basic blogging features,
such as user comments, TrackBacks, RSS feeds, and file uploads.  LnBlog also allows you to
create multiple independent weblogs with multiple user accounts.  This feature is ideal
for managing multiple sub-sites on the same web site.

One of LnBlog's main design goals in flexibility.  To this end, it includes a theme system
and a plugin system to allow user extensions.  The theme system is powerful, allowing you
to change virtually every element on a page, yet flexible enough that you can simply
override one file for one blog without having to change or copy anything else.  Various
page elements, such as the sidebar, are provided by plugins and can be removed or
rearranged simply by moving or renaming plugin files.

Section: Requirements

The only hard and fast requirements for LnBlog are PHP 4.1 and he ability to write files
to the web server.  LnBlog *does* support running with *safe_mode* enabled by using FTP
for file writing.  You can also choose to use the standard file writing functions.  

You can use any web server or operating system.  LnBlog is tested on Windows XP with IIS
and Linux with Apache.  No database is required.  It currently works with both PHP4 and PHP5 
and should be able to run under pretty much any PHP configuration.  The only required PHP
extensions are PCRE and XML_Parser, both of which are enabled by default in PHP 4.2 and greater.
If you want to use LnBlog in a language other than English, then the PHP gettext and iconv 
extensions are highly recommended, but not strictly required.  The CURL extension is also 
recommended for Pingback and TrackBacks, but this is not required either.


Section: Installation

The setup process for LnBlog is entirely web-based and mostly painless.

1) - Unzip the LnBlog archive into a directory on your hard drive.  You should remove the version
     number from the directory name to make upgrades easier in the future.
2) - Upload the LnBlog directory to your web server.
3) - Point your web browser to the LnBlog directory on your web server.  This will start the setup 
     process.
4) - Pick the type of file writing you want.  If you have PHP *safe_mode* enabled on your
     web server, then you *must* use FTP.  If you use "native" file writing, make sure
     that the LnBlog "userdata" folder and all the files in it are writable for all users.
     You will also have to  make the folder where you will be creating blogs writable. 
     See the <fsconfig.php> documentation for details.  If you are using a shared hosting
     account or if you don't have root/administrator access to the server, FTP is recommended.
5) - Create a user account.  This initial user will be a system administrator.
6) - Log in with the account you just created.
7) - Start creating new users and weblogs.

Section: Upgrading

Upgrading LnBlog is normally pretty simple.  Assuming your LnBlog installation is in a folder named
"LnBlog", then you would do the following to perform a clean upgrade.

1) - Rename your old LnBlog directory on the server to LnBlog-old.
2) - Upload the new version into a folder named LnBlog.
3) - Copy the contents of your LnBlog-old/userdata folder into LnBlog/userdata, overwriting 
     any existing files.

If you keep all your non-standard plugins and themes in your userdata folder (which is recommended),
then this will result in a clean installation of the new version with all your settings carried over.
If for some reason the new version does not work as expected, this method will allow you to revert
to the old version by simply deleting the new LnBlog folder and renaming LnBlog-old to LnBlog.

Alternatively, you can perform a "quick and dirty" upgrade by simply uploading everything
*except* the userdata folder from the new version to your existing LnBlog folder.  This method is 
useful if you have added any custom files outside the userdata folder, e.g. to the themes or plugins 
directories.

In some cases, a new version of LnBlog will incorporate changes to the directory structure used 
for blog storage.  In these cases, it is necessary to upgrade existing blogs to use the new structure.
Note that this is normally not required, so you do *not* need to perform an upgrade unless the release 
notice specifically directs you to do so.  The upgrade steps are as follows.

1) - Go to the LnBlog administration page and log in as an administrator.
2) - In the "Upgrade Functions" section of the page, select your blog's path in the 
     "upgrade to current version" drop-down box.  
3) - Click the "Upgrade" button and wait until the page has finished loading.
     When it completes, you should see a status message.
4) - Repeat for each blog you created using LnBlog.

Note that upgrading your blog is not required for every version upgrade of LnBlog, although 
doing it anyway won't hurt anything.  

Section: License

LnBlog: A simple file-based weblog focused on design elegance.
Copyright (C) 2005 Peter A. Geer <pageer@skepticats.com>

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU 
General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, 
or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even
 the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General 
Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, 
write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.