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To install ShopSite on your UNIX server, all you need is your favorite Web browser and ftp or telnet access to your server.

Table of Contents

I. Pre-Installation Considerations

II. Planning ShopSite Directories

III. Run the Install Program

IV. Installing on a Virtual Server

V. Configure the Web Server

VI. Upgrading

VII. Troubleshooting

VIII. Build Your Store!

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Pre-Installation Considerations

• Before installing ShopSite, make sure that your system meets the minimum hardware and software requirements.

• Be sure your Web server software is working correctly, including user authentication. If your Web server is not working, you cannot install ShopSite. If you do not have a Web server, a good one is Apache. It is free. ShopSite works with all NCSA compatible Web servers such as Netscape and Microsoft's IIS.

• You will need to have at least version 5.003 of Perl if you are installing ShopSite Manager or Pro. You can download the latest version at Perl's Web site. You will have to compile Perl for your server. It seems complicated, but just keep hitting "return" to accept the default configurations, and the whole process should go smoothly. Perl is also free.

Planning ShopSite Directories

The ShopSite SC install program will prompt you for the locations of five directories:

• Executable files are put in two separate directories, a "ShopSite Directory" and a "Shopping Cart Directory". These directories need to be aliased in your server and accessible through URLs.
  ® You should put these directories in or under your server's cgi-bin directory. As a security measure, you should configure your server to only serve CGI programs from the cgi-bin directories, not text files or HTML files.
• Graphics used by all ShopSite stores are stored in a separate directory that must be accessible by the Web server. The recommended directory is shopsite-images under your Web server's document root.
• Your store needs a "Data" directory to hold its databases of products and pages.
  ® Set the permissions on the "Data" directory so that your Web server can access it, but make sure that it cannot be accessed from a browser. In other words, do not put the "Data" directory under the Web server's document root directory.
• Your store also needs an "HTML Output" directory to store its HTML files, which are the generated pages for the store. The storefront URL must be aliased to the store's HTML Output directory.
  ® Put the HTML Output Directory wherever your existing HTML goes.

  Note that the images for each store are kept in a media subdirectory of the store's HTML Output Directory, and you may want to configure FTP access to the media directory.

Plan the directory locations before starting the installation. An example directory structure might look like this:

 home

  httpd

      cgi-bin

       ss = ShopSite Directory,

               aliased to URL of ShopSite CGIs, such as

               http://www.xyz.com/cgi-bin/ss

       sc = Shopping Cart Directory,

                 aliased to URL of Shopping Cart CGIs, such as

                 http://www.xyz.com/cgi-bin/sc

      html

       shopsite-images

       StoreName = HTML Output Directory, aliased to 

                      Store Front URL defined in store.auth file

          Store pages

          media - you may need FTP access

              Store images

      data

          StoreName = Data Directory

Run the Install Program

Once you have downloaded the compressed installation program, you can easily install ShopSite using just your browser.

1. If you have not already done so, download the compressed installation file and your store.auth file to the directory from which you will run the install. This must be a directory where CGI programs can execute and write. If you use FTP to retrieve the files, be sure to use a binary mode transfer.

2. Unzip the install file.

3. Set permissions on the files and the directory and in your Web server so that you can execute the wwwinstall.cgi and info.cgi programs from your Web browser.

4. Point your browser to the wwwinstall.cgi file in the installation directory.

5. On the first screen, click Install a Store if this is the first installation of ShopSite on this server. Click Upgrade if you have an existing installation of a previous version of ShopSite.

6. On the next screen, enter values in the various fields and click OK. You must fill in all of the fields or the installation program will not work.

7. The installation program begins installing ShopSite and shows you the results of the install. If there were any errors, change the appropriate fields and click the OK button again.

Installing on a Virtual Server

On most virtual servers, the directory paths that you can see from a telnet session are not the same as when viewed from a Web browser. Keep this in mind when specifying the paths used by the browser-based install program.

• Ensure there is a tmp directory at the virtual root, or tar will produce errors.
• Make sure that the Web Server has access to the tar executable.

Iserver (Verio) Install Issues

• The Web Server does not have access to the tar executable. Copy the tar program from /bin/tar to usr/bin/tar under your home directory. For example:

        cp /bin/tar ~/usr/bin/tar
        chmod ug=rx ~/usr/bin/tar
      

• As of this writing the default perl version on Iserver is 4.0. Find a 5.004 (or later) version and copy to ~/usr/bin/perl5 or similar directory accessible to the web server. Don't forget to make the file executable ('x'). For example:

        cp /usr/local/bin/perl5.004 ~/usr/bin/perl5
      

Configure the Web Server

Configure the Web server to recognize the new directories:

• Alias the ShopSite URL to point to the "ShopSite Directory".
• Alias the Shopping Cart URL to point to the "Shopping Cart Directory".

Upgrading from a Previous Release

The browser-based upgrade is very similar to the install, but much simpler. The process begins the same way as the install.

1. FTP the newest zipped version of ShopSite for your operating system into your CGI directory (or a directory where CGI's can be executed) and unzip them. Or, if you don't have telnet access, unzip them on your PC and FTP the components up separately.

2. Point your browser to http://yourURL/yourCGIdirectory/wwwinstall.cgi.

3. On the first screen, click the Upgrade button. The installation program will automatically determine the paths to your ShopSite and shopping cart CGI directories.

4. Unless you have made some very strange changes to your server configuration, you should not need to change anything; just click OK and your store will be upgraded.

The installation program will not only upgrade the CGI's, it will update your store's databases. If you have more than one store sharing CGI's, it will update databases for each one, and report the results to you. If you have a lot of stores, the upgrade process may take a while.

Troubleshooting

If your installation did not work, pay attention to the error messages you receive; they should point you in the right direction. If that fails, try checking the following:

• Are file permissions set correctly for all the directories that you specified? Not having file permissions and ownership set correctly is the number one installation problem that users run into. Specifically, the UNIX user account under which CGIs are executed needs to be able to write in those CGI directories.

• Is your Web server configured correctly?

• Did you enter the same store ID and URL that you told the salesperson when the store.auth file was originally created? If you've changed your mind, you'll need a new store.auth file.

• Was the store.auth file in the same directory as the installation program? If so, it should have created a new file called yourstoreid.auth in your store's data directory.

If you still can't solve the problem, search our Technical Support Knowledgebase to see if the problem you're having has been previously reported and if a solution has been posted or suggested.

Build Your Store!

Once you've installed the software, you're ready to build your store! Point your browser to start.cgi in the directory where you installed the CGIs. After entering your username and password, you'll see the first page of the ShopSite Store Setup Wizard, which will guide you through the process of building a store.

You can click the "?" in the upper right-hand corner of any screen to get help on that screen, and to access the searchable ShopSite help system and knowledgebase.