How to Install WordPress Manually on Your Server Without Fantastico?

Generally bloggers can use fantastico when they start their blog.
But after some days they should know how to install manually. This process will help you to understand how your wordpress works and where you enter database details etc. That details will help you when get messed up something in your blog or when your blog get hacked..
I strongly suggest every blogger should know what keeps working your blog in back end. If you do not learn those things in your free times, you will be learning when you get messed up something.

Most of the hosting providers offer cPanel with Fantastico software. Fantastico makes easy anything to install in your server. But what if you don’t have a Fantastico or similar one click installation software in your server? This tutorial helps you to install wordpress manually in your hosting server without Fantastico.

Before that you should know what is happening when you install wordpress through Fantastico. So that you will know what are all the processes you need to do when you don’t have Fantastico or other one click script installer. When you use Fantastico to install wordpress, it creates a database in your server and creates a user and links that user with the newly created database. Then it uploads the unzipped wordpress folder contents one by one into your root of the server. It creates wp-config and inserts the user username, password and database name in wp-config file. Then push the blog title,  email address into your wordpress dashboard.

Watch the full installation process in our Video.

So now assume you don’t have Fantastico in your server cPanel. Then you should do the following to install wordpress in your server.

Steps to Manual WordPress Installation in Hosting Server?

1. Make sure that your server has pre-requirements to install wordpress
2. Download wordpress zip file from www.wordpress.org
3. Login to cPanel and go to MySQL databases.
4. Create Database name, username and password.
5. Link User with Database and Give all privileges to user on database.
6. Unzip the wordpress zip file. Rename the wp-config-sample to wp-config.
7. Edit the database name, user name and password in wp-config file.
8. Upload the contents of wordpress unzipped file to root (public_html).
9. Go to www.example.com/wp-admin/install.php. Replace example.com with your blog domain name.
10. Fill up the blog title and tagline and click continue. WordPress will show successful installation message with wordpress admin username and password.

Server Requirements For WordPress:

1. To run WordPress your host just needs a couple of things:

From WordPress,

PHP version 4.3 or greater

MySQL version 4.1.2 or greater

That’s really it. WordPress recommends Apache or Nginx as the most robust and featureful server for running WordPress, but any server that supports PHP and MySQL will do. Most of the servers have these things, but better you can contact your hosting support to make sure.

2. Download wordpress zip file from www.wordpress.org

Go to www.wordpress.org.  Click on the download button. Then Click on the download button to download the zip format. Downloading is going on in my computer. Until download completes, we will do next step.

3. Create  Database Details in MySQL in cPanel.

Go to your hosting account cPanel. There you have already provided MySQL databases option. Click on it. Create a new database. Giving database name as “wordpress” is not compulsory but it is good.  I created as “wordpress”.

How to create Database in MySQL in Hosting Control Panel?

Then click on “create or Add user” option. Create one database user with the name of “wordpress”. But my Hostgator allows only 7 characters. So I created “wpress” as database user. Then I gave password for user.

Create Database User and Password in MySQL

Now go and check the MySQL databases again and check whether the created one available or not. Yes. There it is. But it is not in the same name I gave when created. As I have multiple blogs in same hosting account, my hostagator MySQL database automatically rename it as follows

Database Name: redisred_wordpress

Database User: redisred_wpress

No change in password.

Database name and database user for WordPress

Note down the above names so that we can use them in our next steps.

Once I created the database name, database user and password, now I search the option for adding the user to the database. There it is, “Add user to database”. Selected user “redisred_wpress” and database “redisred_wordrpess” and click add. Now MySQL asks what privileges to give for user over database. Select all and give privileges on all actions. Then click on “make changes”.

Database Privileges to User in MySQL for wordpress

Note: If you have PhpMyAdmin in your cPanel, you can create the above things there instead using MySQL. For help, read wordpress install guide.

4. Unzip and Configure wp-config file.

The download which I gave on step 2 completed.  Now unzip the wordpress download. Unzip completed. Now I can see the folder “wordpress”. Just open the unzipped folder and search for “wp-config-sample” file. Rename it as “wp-config”.

Now open the wp-config file in notepad.

There you will see the following:

// ** MySQL settings – You can get this info from your web host ** //

/** The name of the database for WordPress */

define(‘DB_NAME’, ‘putyourdbnamehere’);

/** MySQL database username */

define(‘DB_USER’, ‘usernamehere’);

/** MySQL database password */

define(‘DB_PASSWORD’, ‘yourpasswordhere’);

/** MySQL hostname */

define(‘DB_HOST’, ‘localhost’);

/** Database Charset to use in creating database tables. */

define(‘DB_CHARSET’, ‘utf8′);

/** The Database Collate type. Don’t change this if in doubt. */

define(‘DB_COLLATE’, ”);

You should add your details for database, database username database password and hostname. Hostname is ‘localhost’ in most of the cases. Check here some possible host values as per your hosting provider.  Leave the next two things charset and collate as unchanged.

See how I did it.

// ** MySQL settings – You can get this info from your web host ** //

/** The name of the database for WordPress */

define(‘DB_NAME’, ‘redisred_wordpress‘);

/** MySQL database username */

define(‘DB_USER’, ‘redisred_wpress‘);

/** MySQL database password */

define(‘DB_PASSWORD’, ‘******‘);

/** MySQL hostname */

define(‘DB_HOST’, ‘localhost‘);

/** Database Charset to use in creating database tables. */

define(‘DB_CHARSET’, ‘utf8′);

/** The Database Collate type. Don’t change this if in doubt. */

define(‘DB_COLLATE’, ”);

Now you have to give authentication keys for security. These security keys are protecting your wordpress from hackers.

You will see the following in wp-config file.

define(‘AUTH_KEY’, ‘put your unique phrase here’);

define(‘SECURE_AUTH_KEY’, ‘put your unique phrase here’);

define(‘LOGGED_IN_KEY’, ‘put your unique phrase here’);

define(‘NONCE_KEY’, ‘put your unique phrase here’);

Then go to key generator: https://api.wordpress.org/secret-key/1.1/

It will generate random keys for you. Just copy and replace them with the above. I have changed them as follows.

Security Keys for WordPress

Now you have successfully configured wp-config file.

5. Upload the contents of unzipped wordpress folder to your server via FTP.

Now we are going to upload the contents of wordpress folder to our server. You can use FTP software or cPanel File manager. I tested the both ways. CPanel File manager was very speed when compared to FTP. But here I am explaining FTP method. I am using FireFTP which is an add-on for Firefox browser. You can use this or any other FTP client like FileZilla.

You should upload contents of the unzipped folder to your root (public_html) not the folder(directory). You should open the wordpress unzipped folder and upload the contents one by one or select all click upload. For more help, visit our videos. It helps you more than enough without messing anything.

6. Run the Install script.

Type the url http://pascall.co.cc/wp-admin/install.php. Here replace pascal.co.cc with your blog domain name. You will be asked to enter blog details like blog title, tagline, email etc. Once you finished all the details, you will be provided username as admin and temporary password for wordpress.

Now you can login to your wordpress in www.pascall.co.cc/wp-admin . Replace your domain name with pascall.co.cc.