Installing TWiki, a crib sheet

These notes are very out of date. We need to update them!

Read, or at least skim, the official version 4.2 install instructions, as well as these notes and references.

• Useful instructions for installing twiki on Red Hat, Fedora & Cent OS:
  • discusses which CPAN modules to install for twiki
  • cron job setup
• Check your /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf file for the User and Group name that the httpd service is being run under, and make sure you use the same user/group name as chosen when Apache was installed. CIS security guidelines recommend that you do not call it "apache". You need to use this name when setting ownership for certain files and directories later in the installation process.

• We do use configure, however, we then replace their generated apache configuration files (twiki.conf, mod_perl_startup.pl, all that stuff, with ones we create.) The reason for this blended approach is that their configure process nicely manages their extensions, but our apache configuration files are far more sophisticated than theirs. So do the following:
  1. from our subversion? server, check out a copy of the apache configuration files for the most similar twiki server we have at the time you do your installation. If you don't know what the apache configuration files are, read through the info in Lab Best Practices? on Managing Apache first so that we aren't starting from scratch and then hunt one of the senior lab folks down for a crash course in apache config files. You'll need this knowledge, so let's get you started on it.
  2. follow TWiki's configure process, supplying your best approximation based on your reference apache files. In the background, In the background, TWiki is managing preferences, etc., for the extension system.

• create a /etc/httpd/conf.d/twiki.conf file
  • open the corresponding file (note that it might also be called twiki_lab.conf) in your browser that is pointed at the SVN, and copy and paste the contents into these new files you've just created in your new twiki installation (note you'll need to back out a little with your browser, and go up into the /etc directory).
  • You'll need to read through the file and change it as appropriate for your install (i.e. paths, appropriate security settings, and possibly more).
• create a /etc/httpd/conf.d/ssl.conf /etc/httpd/conf.d/mod_info.conf and /etc/httpd/conf.d/mod_status.conf if you do NOT ALREADY have them
  • open the corresponding files in your browser that is pointed at the SVN, and copy and paste the contents into these new files you've just created in your new twiki installation
  • You'll need to read through the file and change it as appropriate for your install as needed

If you need to use the configure script to setup your twiki, here are some notes:

• URL: http://YOURDOMAIN/twiki/bin/configure
• follow step 9 in TWikiInstallationGuide?
• note that the file twiki/lib/LocalSite.cfg should not exist if you are attempting a fresh install. If LocalSite? .cfg exists, configure script will behave differently then mentioned in the following points.
• make sure you have temporarily commented out the configure file access restriction in twiki_lab.conf file to allow access to the configure script
• restart apache
• regarding general path settings... if you have installed twiki in var/www/twiki then leave the settings it guessed alone, click next, you will then be able to set a password for configure
• click the "yes i've read all the documentation button"
• look through the settings and some of them you may want to change per your judgment. Some settings we feel should be changed for sure and those are listed here:
• in SECURITY SETUP - PATHS, we set SafeEnvPath? to /bin:/usr/bin as recommended, fyi
• in SECURITY SETUP - PASSWORDS, min password length - set to at least 7
• in SECURITY SETUP - PASSWORDS, {Htpasswd}{FileName} - set to something besides data, preferably something outside of twiki and even www
• in ANTI-SPAM MEASURES - this is an important thing to keep in mind: Standard TWiki incorporates some simple anti-spam measures to protect e-mail addresses and control the activities of benign robots. These should be enough to handle intranet requirements. Administrators of public (internet) sites are strongly recommended to investigate the BlackListPlugin
• in ANTI-SPAM MEASURES - {AntiSpam}{EmailPadding} - if your site is open to the public on the internet (as opposed to an internal lab wiki) you'll want to set some random capital letters for email padding
• in ANTI-SPAM MEASURES - {AntiSpam}{RobotsAreWelcome} - set it if you are fine with google and other crawlers in there
• in LANGUAGES - {UseLocale} - we set to "use locale" (this is about internationalization)
• in MAIL & PROXIES - {WebMasterEmail} - set it
• in MAIL & PROXIES - {MailProgram} - if you are using sendmail, you can leave it as it is: /usr/sbin/sendmail -t -oi -oeq
  -t read message for recipients, and also deletes bcc's
  -oi reads option i (ignore dots on lines on themseleves) which is the next line...
  -oeq who knows... :p
  If you are using postfix, change this line to: /usr/sbin/sendmail.postfix -t -oi -oeq
  (postfix is much more secure than sendmail, easier to administer, just generally a better choice)
• in MISC SETTINGS - {Stats}{TopicName} - we set to "HotSpots" to de-geekify
• in MISC SETTINGS - {LinkProtocolPattern} - original line: (file|ftp|gopher|https|http|irc|mailto|news|nntp|telnet)
  changed to: (https|http|mailto|news|nntp)
• in MISC SETTINGS - {MimeTypesFileName} - original line: /var/www/twiki/data/mime.types
  changed to: /etc/httpd/conf/mime.types
• in PLUGINS - note the following test FYI: The plugins listed below were discovered by searching the @INC path for modules that match the TWiki standard e.g. TWiki/Plugins/MyPlugin.pm.
• when finished, click next, enter password and save changes
• configure should have created a bin/LocalLib.cfg file

twiki.conf and mod_perl_startup.pl files

• There is a page that TWiki recommends you use to set up you /etc/httpd/conf.d/twiki.conf file and /var/www/twiki/tools/mod_perl_startup.pl file which should be:
  http://twiki.org/cgi-bin/view/TWiki.ApacheConfigGenerator
• click using mod_perl for it to generate the mod_perl_startup.pl text
• You may want get these files from SVN as they have been manually looked over and come with stronger security.
• for mpdl, we decided to use TemplateLogin? , and so we used TWiki:ApacheConfigGenerator