INSTALLING UMBRACO

The text in this chapter, as well as the rest of the book, assumes that you have a PC running Windows Vista or Windows 7 and have user permissions sufficient enough to allow for administrative actions. If this is not the case, or if you are installing to a different environment (such as to a shared-hosting account) skip this section for now and refer to Chapter 14, which has troubleshooting tips. One important item to note is that Umbraco is best installed as a website root rather than as a virtual directory under a web root, so plan on running Umbraco from a web root. All current versions of Internet Information Server (IIS) support multiple web roots so running from a web root is not an issue unless you are using IIS5 on Windows XP. See Chapter 14 if this is the case.

Installing Umbraco using the Microsoft Web Platform Installer

The best way to begin your Umbraco installation is by using the Microsoft Web Platform Installer (a free installation tool developed and supported by Microsoft). Some advantages to using the Microsoft Web Platform Installer (shown in Figure 1-1) are that the tool can:

• Automatically detect and install required dependencies.
• Create a Microsoft SQL database or Microsoft SQL CE database prior to installing Umbraco.
• Create and configure new websites in IIS.

FIGURE 1-1

You can find the Microsoft Web Platform Installer at www.microsoft.com/web/ along with the latest versions of Umbraco and other web applications as well as any required dependencies. In addition, the Microsoft Web Platform Installer is available as an IIS extension at www.iis.net/extensions/WebPI/ and is integrated into web hosting control panels such as cPanel and DotNetPanel. Using a web host's control panel to install Umbraco in a shared hosting environment can greatly simplify the installation process.

Use the following steps to install Umbraco with the Web Platform Installer:

1. Launch the Web Platform Installer from the Microsoft Web Application Gallery (http://www.microsoft.com/web/gallery/Umbraco).
2. Review the list of files that the Web Platform Installer will download and install.

   The list of installation files that the Web Platform Installer presents may only include the Umbraco Content Management System (CMS) component if you already have the required dependencies, such as SQL Server and the .NET Framework, installed.

3. Select the Microsoft SQL Server CE database option as shown in Figure 1-2.

   FIGURE 1-2

   

4. Select New Web Site from the Web Site drop-down menu as shown in Figure 1-3.
5. Enter the site information for Site Name, Path, Port, Home Directory, and Host Name.

   The author recommends leaving the Umbraco CMS Application Name blank, as shown in Figure 1-4.

   FIGURE 1-3

   

   FIGURE 1-4

   

6. When the Web Platform Installer completes the installation process, click the Launch Umbraco CMS link to launch the Umbraco Installation Wizard.
7. When the Umbraco Installation Wizard loads in your browser, you see the Welcome screen (Figure 1-5). Click the Let's get started! button to complete the steps required to configure your Umbraco installation.

   FIGURE 1-5

   

8. To continue, read and accept the Umbraco license by clicking the Accept and Continue button as shown in Figure 1-6.
9. Because you selected Microsoft SQL CE from the Web Platform Installer, the correct database options will already be set. Click the Install button to complete the Umbraco database configuration as shown in Figure 1-7.
10. Once the database is installed and configured completely, click the Continue button as shown in Figure 1-8.

    FIGURE 1-6

    

    FIGURE 1-7

    

    FIGURE 1-8

    

11. Create an Umbraco user by providing a username, email, and password and then clicking the Create User button. You can also register for the Umbraco newsletter using the email address you provide by selecting the Sign up for our monthly newsletter check box as shown in Figure 1-9.
12. From the Starter Kits screen, you can browse descriptions of each of the Starter Kits by hovering over their icons. To install a Starter Kit, simply click one of the Install this kit buttons.

    If this is your first time installing Umbraco, the author recommends selecting the Simple Starter Kit as shown in Figure 1-10. You can find more detailed information about the Starter Kits in the “Utilizing Umbraco Starter Kits” section later in this chapter.

13. Once the Starter Kit is installed, you have the option of installing a skin from the Install a Skin screen. Umbraco Skins are a simple way to make your Starter Kit beautiful. You can preview a skin by hovering over the skin icon and install a skin by clicking the Install button as shown in Figure 1-11.

    FIGURE 1-9

    

    FIGURE 1-10

    

    FIGURE 1-11

    

14. Once the skin is installed you will see the You're done screen as show in Figure 1-12. From this screen click the Preview your new website button to launch the skin editor or the Set up your new website button to launch the Umbraco backoffice. This screen also has a collection of useful links to additional information about getting started working with Umbraco.

You're all done and Umbraco is ready for use, complete with a fully functional web site and beautiful skin! As you can see, when you compare the process to a manual installation as discussed in the next section, using the Web Platform Installer greatly simplifies the setup and configuration of the website and database requirements for Umbraco.

FIGURE 1-12

Installing Umbraco Manually

Although using the Microsoft Web Platform Installer to install Umbraco is strongly advised, cases may exist where a manual installation is desired. In such a case, you must manually complete the steps to create the IIS website, create the database, and set required permissions. The following are the steps to complete a manual installation of Umbraco: If you find yourself stuck on one of these steps, try installing Umbraco using the Quick Start steps first and then return to this section later.

1. Create a new folder with a unique name for your Umbraco installation on your local hard drive.
2. From IIS Manager create a new site and set the home directory to be the new folder; leave the remaining settings at the default.
3. Set permissions on the new folder to allow the new site's application pool identity (usually this is the Network Service or Application Pool Identity account) to Modify, Read & Execute, and Write.
4. From SQL Management Studio create a new database and assign a login to the dbo role for the database. Make a note of the SQL instance name (such as ./SQLEXPRESS), the database name, and the login name and password.

   You may skip step 4 if you want to use the Microsoft SQL CE option later in the installation.

5. Download the latest Umbraco release from the Umbraco CodePlex home Downloads tab (http://umbraco.codeplex.com/).
6. Copy the Umbraco files from the .zip archive into the new folder. Make sure to unblock the .zip file from the Windows File Property dialog before extracting the contents.
7. Open a web browser and navigate to the root of the new site.
8. When the Umbraco Installation Wizard loads in your browser, you will see the Welcome screen (Figure 1-13). Click the Let's get started! button to complete the steps required to configure your Umbraco installation.

   FIGURE 1-13

   

9. To continue, read and accept the Umbraco license by clicking the Accept and Continue button as shown in Figure 1-14.

   FIGURE 1-14

   

10. Select the Microsoft SQL Server option in the Database Type drop-down list and enter the Connection Details you created in step 4 (see Figure 1-15). Click the Install button to create and configure the Umbraco database.
11. Once the database is installed and configured completely, click the Continue button as shown in Figure 1-16.
12. Create an Umbraco user by providing a username, email, and password and then clicking the Create User button. You can also register for the Umbraco newsletter using the email address you provide by selecting the Sign up for our monthly newsletter check box as shown in Figure 1-17.
13. From the Starter Kits screen you can browse descriptions of each of the Starter Kits by hovering over the Starter Kit icons. To install a Starter Kit click one of the Install this kit buttons as shown in Figure 1-18. You can find more detailed information about the Starter Kits in the “Utilizing Umbraco Starter Kits” section later in this chapter.
14. Once the Starter Kit is installed you have the option of installing a skin from the Install a Skin screen. You can preview a skin by hovering over the skin icon and install a skin by clicking the Install button as shown in Figure 1-19.

    FIGURE 1-15

    

    FIGURE 1-16

    

    FIGURE 1-17

    

    FIGURE 1-18

    

    FIGURE 1-19

    

15. Once the skin is installed you will see the You're done screen as show in Figure 1-20. From this screen click the Preview your new website button to launch the skin editor or the Set up your new website button to launch the Umbraco backoffice. This screen also has a collection of useful links to additional information about getting started working with Umbraco.

You now have everything you need to successfully run, build, and extend Umbraco. Obviously not all Umbraco installations will fit into the preceding step-by-step instructions. The remainder of this chapter covers additional considerations for other installation scenarios and environments.

FIGURE 1-20

Tips for Installing Umbraco in Special Environments

One of the great strengths of Umbraco is its simple architecture, which enables it to adapt to a variety of installation and usage scenarios. Certainly the earlier quick start is a simple scenario intended for use on a single machine—most likely a web builder's desktop or laptop—but you can use this same procedure to install Umbraco on a netbook running Windows 7 or a web server running Windows 2008. This procedure is also appropriate for installing an evaluation instance, for an install used to “test” a feature or to reproduce a defect, as well as for a fresh start when building websites with Umbraco.

Debugging in a Development Environment

For web developers, especially those working with .NET user controls integrated with Umbraco, the ability to debug code while running Umbraco is important. You can easily do this debugging by installing Umbraco onto the same physical machine that has Visual Studio installed. This can be on a local development laptop, a virtual machine, or a remote development machine accessed via remote desktop. You can also debug .NET code in a running Umbraco instance on domain-joined machines with the appropriate debugging tools installed and configured, but that is beyond the scope of this book. For this scenario, check out the advanced developer sections of the Umbraco wiki (http://our.umbraco.org/wiki).

Security Settings in a Production Environment

When installing to a production environment, you must take some additional considerations into account, and not the least of these are the security and access settings for the Umbraco site and related files (see the earlier A Note on Security sidebar in the “Installing Umbraco Manually” section). In addition you will likely create a backup routine for your Umbraco instance. Including both your Umbraco database and your Umbraco files in your backup is important to have a complete snapshot. The author recommends reviewing the current backup documentation on the Umbraco wiki (http://our.umbraco.org/wiki).

Other Installation Scenarios

Of course, other scenarios exist in which you might install Umbraco, such as load balancing, cloud installation (Amazon EC2 or Microsoft Windows Azure), distributed publishing, and others. These scenarios are supported but are outside the scope of this book. For more information on them refer to the Umbraco wiki, the Umbraco forum, and Umbraco.tv for more information.