This the note I kept while trying to get scoutTrak going on my SuSE9.3 box. I suspect the experience would be similar under other linux distributions, and hope this note helps in setting up scoutTrak on your linux box. o get the scoutTrak zip file and unpack on your box. Say you downloaded the lastest scoutTrak1_0_5.zip from the web and save it under your home directory, /home/smith. Then you become the user that owns the apache DocumentRoot. On my box, the DocumentRoot for apache2 server is at /srv/www/htdocs, and the user who owns it is w3. So I unpack the zip file there: # su - w3 # cd /srv/www/htdocs # mkdir scoutTrak # cd scoutTrak # mv /home/smith/scoutTrak1_0_5.zip . # unzip scoutTrak1_0_5.zip o get mysql on your box ready. If this is the first time you use the mysql database on your box, you need to set a root password first. Note this root is not related to the root account of your system. Become superuser first: # su - Then set the root password for mysql database: # mysql -u root -p password> (enter the password) mysql> create database scouts; mysql> grant all privileges on scouts.* to 'scoutuser'@'localhost' identified by 'password-for-scoutuser'; mysql> grant all privileges on scouts.* to 'scoutuser'@'%' identified by 'password-for-scoutuser'; mysql> quit Here we created the 'scouts' database, and gave user 'scoutuser' from your machine and anywhere from the net all the rights for all the tables under the database. The password for user 'scoutuser' is 'password-for-scoutuser'. You can obviously choose any name instead of scoutuser, and something sensible for the password. o populate the database 'scouts'. Under the directory where you unpacked the scoutTrak zip file, there's a sql script that you can use to populate the database 'scouts' which you've just created: # cd /srv/www/htdocs/scoutTrak # mysql -u scoutuser -p scouts < demo.sql | more password> (enter the password you assigned for 'scoutuser') A lot of text will scroll by. In the end you've created some 15 tables under 'scouts', with some of them, such as award, requirements, filled with appropriate contents. It also sets up 5 users: Scribe, Advancement, Librarian, Browse, and Admin, with the password being the username in lower case, for example, 'admin' is the password for the all-powerful user "Admin". Once your system has been tested with the demo data, and is ready to go live, browse to setup.php and click on "Reset Database Tables". This will remove the demo data and you will be ready to add your own data. o prepare the php codes for database connection. Become the owner of your apache DocumentRoot (w3 in my case): # su - w3 # cd /srv/www/htdocs/scoutTrak # vi connection.php edit $hostname, $username, and $password with appropriate values. Here's what it looks like on my box: # vi prefs.php change $ST_ROOT and $gTroopName. Here's what's on my box: "; // set f or background image or background color $gTitleColor = "#afafe0"; // table description row $gFirstBandColor = "#e9e9e9"; // first row after description $gSecondBandColor = "#ffffff"; // second row after description $gCalColor = "#ffFFFF"; // calendar background color $gTroopName = "Troop 65"; // troop name ?> # vi navBottom.php replace "mailto:your@email.address" with "mailto:your@email.address". o test the php codes. Assuming your httpd server is running, just surf to http://localhost/scoutTrak/php/setup.php and click on the "Test PHP" button. If you see a long list of features and configurations of PHP setup on your box, you're all set. Chances are though you'll not, especially on recent linux distributions. The php codes in scoutTrak used extensively a feature called "register globals". But this feature has been turned off by default from PHP 4.2.0 onwards. There're apparently some security arguments against this feature. (Read the PHP manual if you want to find out more.) It's not trivial to rewrie the scoutTrak to comform to the new PHP standard. So we need to turn "register global" on to use the scoutTrak code as they are. The least intrusive way of doing this is through .htaccess file under your scoutTrak directory. Here's what my /srv/www/htdocs/scoutTrak/.htaccess looks like: php_flag register_globals on php_flag register_long_arrays on And of course you'll have to fiddle with your httpd.conf for it to pay atention to this file. I added the following to /etc/apache2/default-server.conf Options None AllowOverride All HostnameLookups On # Order allow,deny # Allow from all "HostnameLookups On" takes care of the logging of client hostname upon connection. Now, restart your apache server. (Under SuSE, "rcapache2 restart" as root does the job.) Surf to http://localhost/scoutTrak/php/setup.php try "Test PHP". You should see a long list of stuff. "Test Database Access" should run fine too, showing current time. If not, check /srv/www/htdocs/scoutTrak/connection.php and make sure you've got correct username and password there. DO NOT run "Create/Reset Database Tables" for obvious reasons. You've already set them up. If you've come this far, you should either delete the setup.php file under /srv/www/htdocs/scoutTrak/php, or move it to somewhere else not easily accessible through the net. o login and start using scoutTrak. Surf to http://localhost/scoutTrak/ and login with password "admin". Go straight to "administration" and then "Account Administration". Change the password for all five users. If you want to add more users, you could do it there. Go to "Update Records" to add scouts, campout, etc. For my troop, I give the browse password to the scouts and parents so they can browse only. Scout leaders have either advancement or admin password so they can update info. I'm planning to gradually handing over some responsibilities to scouts, such as librarian, or scribe, so they can update certain information. Now everyone with the right password can surf to http://yourtroop.org/scoutTrak/ to track the status and progress. Here we assume your linux box is registered as yourtroop.org. I didn't bother to register my box, so I just use its IP instead: http://128.171.xx.xx/scoutTrak/ Well, that's all to it. Hopefully this guide is of some use to you, and I'd like to thank the developers of ScoutTrak for a great package. --Ruisheng Peng