Installation of Joomla 1.5 at Kubuntu 7.10

[Donn]

Bas,
Andrew Jarrett gave you most of the answers.

On my system I have this installed for mysql:
libdbd-mysql-perl                               install
libmysqlclient15off                             install
mysql-client-5.0                                 install
mysql-common                                  install
mysql-server                                    install
mysql-server-5.0                                install
php5-mysql                                      install

I would say install: mysql-server-5.0 and php5-mysql, the rest should follow.

As for PHP:
libapache2-mod-php5                             install
php-doc                                         install
php5                                            install
php5-cli                                        install
php5-common                                     install
php5-gd                                         install
php5-mysql                                      install

Again, only php5 needs installing (I think)

Apache is a web server. The name is a pun on "patchy" because it was made from 
patches of code over time :) It should already be installed. Let us know if 
you get a page when you surf to:
http://localhost/~bas
If not, there are a few tweaks you need to do.

Mysql is a database server - it's what stores stuff.

Here's a quick tutorial for you. Caveat Emptor :)

The Internet works like this:
*Browser* (also called a 'user agent')
Hi I'm Firefox, I want "feathers.html"

*Web-Server* (Apache):
Here it is -> sends HTML text.

*Browser* (you clicked a link)
Hi, I'm firefox, I want "boobs_and_tits.html" :)

*Web-Server*
Here is is ... repeat.

*Browser* (you do a search for something)
Hi I'm Firefox, I want you to search for "chickens" at search.php
 Web-Server:
 Dear PHP, please run 'search.php'
  PHP:
  Okay, busy... Dear Mysql, please search your 'birds' table for 'chickens'.
   Mysql:
   Okay, here's the result.
  PHP:
  Loops around and builds HTML of the result. Dear Apache, here's the page.
Web-Server:
Thanks; sends HTML back to you.

And that's it in a nutshell :) 
HTML is the 'markup language' for describing web pages. Open a page somewhere 
and go to 'view source'. What you are seeing is (X)HTML. Don't even ask!

You can also see from that that the net is 'dumb' - the browser introduces 
itself *every* time and the server always says (quietly) "who the flying fcuk 
are you?". The way we get the two to remember the last time they met is to 
use those odd things called 'cookies' which act like business-cards that get 
passed back and forth saying "I'm number 7825345DEADBEEF, please look me up". 
Then the server looks that up and (quietly) says "Oooohhh, I remember you 
now."

Joomla:
Joomla runs on the "Server", a catch-all word meaning "big computer somewhere 
on the net". The Server is running a web-server (the word now means a process 
running all the time on that machine). It's also running a scripting language 
like PHP (or Perl, Python, (gasp) Aspx, Java, JavaScript (yes, on the server 
too) ) and you use those to program what gets done with what the browser asks 
for (a request) and combine that with images, data (from mysql) and text to 
return (via apache) (X)HTML text to the browser (a response).

Joomla uses PHP and you will use Joomla's gui to control how things work. As 
soon as you want it to do stuff outside of it's preset patterns you will have 
to get your hands dirty with XHTML, CSS and PHP. Up till that point I hear 
it's pretty flexible.

To get things working on the "Server" - your computer gives you a fake IP 
address called 'localhost' (127.0.0.1) that will 'loop back' to the local 
web-server (apache). That's how you can 'surf' to http://localhost/blah and 
get a response.
You will have to setup apache to allow certain things. (Not my dept. really)
You will also have to setup mysql-server too. You will need a username and 
password to login. Google around, this stuff is all over the web.

BTW - 'web-server' and 'database-server' mean exactly that: they 'serve' web 
pages and database results. Think of them as waiters waiting for an order, 
then they scurry off and fulfull it and return the results to you. And you 
don't even have to tip them :)

HTH,
\d