ntroduction
To sum it up in one sentence: XAMPP, which stands for Cross-Platform (X) Apache, MySQL, PHP and Perl, is a popular, free and open source web server package that you can use to install a web server onto your desktop.
XAMPP allows you to develop PHP and Perl-based server-side scripting applications without the need for a remote web server, offering you the opportunity to work faster, develop stuff more securely, and work on your apps without an internet connection.
In this tutorial – you’ll see exactly how XAMPP can do splendid things to your development cycles.
We’re going to use a simple xampple (sorry, I had to get that out of the way, been thinking about saying that for a long time): we’re going to install XAMPP and WordPress with some test data to have WordPress right on our desktop.
This tutorial is for Windows Vista, so you’ll have to tweak the steps involved depending on your operating system. Here’s what you’ll be doing in this tutorial:
Objectives
* Downloading and Installing XAMPP
* Starting up your Apache and MySQL services
* Installing and configuring WordPress locally
* Creating a MySQL database for WordPress
* Creating a MySQL database user for WordPress in phpMyAdmin
* Importing some test data for WordPress using an XML file
This tutorial covers installing XAMPP in Windows Vista, so you’ll have to tweak the steps a little bit if you’re using a different operating system.
Obtaining XAMPP and choosing a version
1 Obtain a copy of XAMPP for Linux, Windows, or Mac OS X at the apache friends XAMPP web page.
http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html
2 Choose the package you want: for normal web development, just go with the Basic Package.
The Basic Package comes with a host of useful applications, libraries, and extensions such as phpMyAdmin (which we’ll use to set up WordPress later on) and eAccelerator (a popular PHP caching application to optimize and improve PHP script performance). For this tutorial, choose the Installer version.
Download it (Save File) onto your computer.
3 Open up the executable (for Windows users, it’s called xampp-win32-1.7.1-installer.exe).
4 Pick a destination for the installation.
Note: XAMPP suggests not to install it in the Program Files folder (i.e. C:\Program Files\xampp), so just install it in the root of your drive (C:\xampp)
5 Configure your options in the XAMPP Options dialog box. For this tutorial, just go with the default installation options.
That’s it for the installation, quick and painless wasn’t it? Let’s fire up Apache and MySQL.
Starting up your Apache and MySQL services
6 After the installation, you should’ve been presented with an option that asks you to open the XAMPP Control Panel. If you didn’t get that option, do one of the following:
Option 1: Navigate to it using the Windows interface
Start > All Programs > Apache Friends > XAMPP > XAMPP Control Panel
Option 2: Open the XAMPP Control Panel directly
If you didn’t select the "Create Shortcut" option in the installation, then navigate to the XAMPP installation folder and open the file called xampp-control.exe.
7 The XAMPP Control Panel should look like the following figure:
8 Click the Start button beside Apache. If you’re on Windows, you’ll get a Windows Firewall warning: choose Unblock.
9 If all goes well, you should see the XAMPP Control Panel log updated with "Apache Started", and "Running" with a green background right beside the Apache service.
10 Start the MySQL service using the same method as step 8.
Testing to see if it works
11 With your Apache and MySQL services started, open up a web browser and navigate to localhost using the following path:
http://localhost
12 You should see the following screen:
Congratulations, you now have your very own locally hosted (localhost) web server!
Depending on your operating system, you’re now the proud owner of a WAMP (Windows users), MAMP (Mac OS X users) or LAMP (badass Linux users) server right there inside your computer.
Now let’s move onto installing WordPress on your machine. First, we’re going to set up your WordPress MySQL database and create a MySQL database user for it. That’s the topic for the next section.
Setting up your MySQL database for WordPress
The easiest way to create a MySQL database using XAMPP would be to use phpMyAdmin, which comes with the Basic Package that we installed.
13 Navigate to phpMyAdmin through your web browser. The URL is:
http://localhost/phpmyadmin/
14 Create your WordPress database by entering in a name and pressing the Create button.
In this tutorial, we’ll call it wordpress_db. You’ll need to remember this value for a later step when we configure WordPress.
Creating a WordPress database user
In real-world scenarios, you should never use the default root user because it has all privileges and you don’t want a simple WordPress bug or v