Recently in DreamHost Log Category

Now PHP 5.2.3 is installed on Dreamhost. If you don't know how to do it, just refer to my previous post, Install customized PHP5 on Dreamhost.

Let us see how to add Zend Optimizer support on your own PHP installation.

1) Go to Zend official site. http://www.zend.com/

2) Find and download the Zend Optimizer 3.3. You may need sign an account to download it. To install it on Dreamhost, you may choose Linux x86 (32bit) (TAR.GZ) | 9.74MB | 3.3.3 package.

3) I suggest to download it through SSH.
wget http://downloads.zend.com/optimizer/3.3.3/ZendOptimizer-3.3.3-linux-glibc23-i386.tar.gz

4) Decompress it.

tar xvfz ZendOptimizer-3.3.3-linux-glibc23-i386.tar.gz

5) cd ZendOptimizer-3.3.3-linux-glibc23-i386

6) We use complied ZendOptimizer so file.

cd data/5_2_x_comp

7) There are two files.
ZendOptimizer.so is the complied file.

8) Copy this file to the PHP installation folder.

cp ZendOptimizer.so ~/jiuan4/php5/lib/php/

Now ZendOptimizer 3.3.3 installation finished.

9) To enable ZendOptimizer, you need to edit your domain's php.ini file.

cd php5/etc/php5/youdomainname

10) Edit php.ini file.

vi php.ini

Install a customized PHP5 on Dreamhost can help you to make php work better and work more. That means you can add more extension on it.

Let's go to the details of installation.
Install/Compile PHP 5
1) Copy the PHP5_installscript (see the last portion of this post) into a text editor and replace YOUR DOMAIN HERE on the 4th line with your site's domain name. For example your domain is abc.com, you need to add it same as it.
2) Copy the new contents to your clipboard.
3) Log in to your account using SSH, create a new folder as temp and cd temp.
4) Create a new file in your SSH by entering the command:

vi installscript

5) Hit i for insert mode, then right-click to paste your clipboard (the install script) contents, then hit Esc, type :wq (that's 'colon', 'w', 'q'), and press Enter to save and exit.
6) Make the file executable by entering the command:

chmod +x installscript

7) Run the script by entering the command:

./installscript

8) After it has finished you will need to edit your htaccess file appropriately. Add the following:

Options +ExecCGI
AddHandler php-cgi .php
Action php-cgi /cgi-bin/php.cgi

<FilesMatch "^php5?.(ini|cgi)$">
Order Deny,Allow
Deny from All
Allow from env=REDIRECT_STATUS
</FilesMatch>

to a file called .htaccess and place it in the root folder of your domain you specified above (/home/YOUR USERNAME/YOUR DOMAIN HERE/.htaccess)

I have a post tell you how to install PHP 5.2.0 on Dreamhost in Chinese last December.

I have a script file used in cron jobs.
I create and edit this file on Windows 2000. The editor is UltraEdit.
When I finished editing, I upload the file to Dreamhost by FTP.

I tried to use it through SSH command.
It failed with following error notes.

:bad interpreter: No such file or directory

I double checked the file by vi editor. It looks OK.

Do you know why? Let's go back to today's topic. Dos format and Unix format of text file.
The file I created is DOS format. The script running well on my Dreamhost when I convert it to Unix format.

It is all DOS format fault.

I have two news, one good, one bad.
The bad news is Dreamhost has no PEAR default.
The good news is we can install it by ourselves.

Let us go through the steps of install PEAR on Dreamhost.
1) SSH to Dreamhost.

2) Enter the command

pear config-create $HOME .pearrc

3) Enter the install command

pear install -o PEAR

Now you can enter pear help to see the information of PEAR you just installed.

The PEAR environment is installed.

This blog has some error last week. Some pages were not build correctly.
I diagnosed it and found the template was broken. A bunch of codes were missing.

I want to find the backup of MySQL database.

Go to Dreamhost Web Panel > Goodies > Manage MySQL

Next to the database name, there are four links. One of them is Restore DB.

Click Restore DB, and go the following page.

When I add a new domain on the control panel of Dreamhost, Google's logo catch my eyeball.

Now users can Set up calendar.domain.com, docs.domain.com, sites.domain.com, and start.domain.com, free with Google.

And use Gmail as email provider.

And the last is Google Page Creator for hosting. All free.

If you want better email service, not he simple web mail interface, I suggested you use Gmail. It is part of Google Apps services. Google Page Creator is good for new site owner without HTML knowledge. It is easy to use and similar to word processor.

I mentioned that I have the error or warning of the Joomla! 1.5.2 on Dreamhost.

Now I know what happened.

My previous upgrade steps are:
1) Upgrade the Joomla! 1.5.1 through Dreamhost one-click installation.
2) Manually upgrade it to 1.5.2.
So problem comes.

I use this way to upgrade Joomla! 1.5.2 without problems.
1) Restore the .old installation of Joomla! 1.5.0. It works perfect without problems.
2) Download the Upgrade Patch from 1.5.0 to 1.5.2 from official site.

My Joomla! 1.5.2 is OK now. I think the Dreamhost One-Click upgrade of Joomla has some issues.

Dreamhost has a One-Click installation facility including Joomla!.
It has Joomla! 1.5.1 upgrading already.

But the 1.5.2 released last week.

The problem I met is the One-Click upgrade does not work. I tried many times on different domain/site.

Yesterday, I manually upgraded it.
It is very easy and simple.
Just download the upgrade pack and decompress it, upload it.

Download it.
I chose the Joomla_1.5.0_to_1.5.2-Stable-Patch_Package.zip

Dreamhost announced A Fistful Of One-Click Upgrades

The following software can be upgraded through OneClick facility.
* ZenCart 1.3.8
* Pligg 9.9.0
* Moodle 1.9
* Joomla 1.5.1
* MediaWiki 1.12.0

Dreamhost also said, WordPress 2.5 is testing and will be available later.

From now, Dreamhost start to provide ZenPhoto in its easy One-Click! installation.

Based on the official letter from dreamhost, zenphoto is more better than Gallary.

I may try it later this week. See how good it is. I also know it has a wordpress plugin. That means it can be integrated with wordpress.

Dreamhost has a one-click install function. It is easy to install a new program. Now I will go through the Joomla! 1.5 installation.

In the Web Panel of Dreamhost, choose googies > One-Click Install
Choose the Joomla! 1.5 and site/directory to be installed, and also give the name of database.

Later, I receive an email tell the steps of installation. I added some screenshot on it to make it vivid.

Site: http://www.yourdomain.com/

Now visit the site to finish your installation with these settings:

1 : Language
select 'en-GB - English (United Kingdom)' and click Next

2 : Pre-installation Check
click Next

3 : License
click Next

I have some site on the Dreamhost. To monitor the traffic and performance, I have Awstats on site and runing many cron jobs every day. I have the experience of how to install AwStats on the Ubuntu server.

The cron job is runing well on the Dreamhost server. The problem is I will receive tons of email about the job status.

Actually, I don't need these emails. If the job is completed successfully, the Awstats report should be updated. I checked the report often. So the fail of job is not my concern.

To disable cron emails, just add one line code as shown below:
First SSH server.

add this line to the top of your cron file:

That's simple. No more cron emails coming.