Fatal error, admin setup, during installation

In the last step of the installation, creating the admin account, I get this error after clicking ok.

An unrecoverable error has occurred and has been logged. Contact the site administrator with the following information: Exception #1357221371.

 

I have tried 3 times, with the same results. Deleting the entire ftp folder each time and uploading it again and starting over.

  • I just installed another Elgg putting it in a subfolder, no problem (that I haven't learned how to fix now).

    iionly - the write permissions are 755 rwxr-xr-x and the folder is created with the ftp browser itself (Coda).

    Matt Beckett - elgg: /home/www/domain folder/  it sounds like the siblings directory means a subfolder for the elgg while the data acts like a subfolder itself. I would really like to have people browse the domain.com rather than domain.com/subfolder/

    iionly - yeah that's the kind of thing I was fishing for. I'm waiting for a reply from the support.

    DhrupDeScoop - I mentioned earlier that I'm not allowed by the host to put it in the parent folder, only the "grandfather folder", so that won't work unfortunately.

     

  • brian, it should be as followed:

    elgg install directory: /home/www/songwriterworkshop.com/
    data directory: /home/www/data/

    data should have 777 permissions

  • @Brian - I don't think you fully understand

    /home/BrianF/public_html would be your root folder - if elgg is in this folder it's not in a subdirectory, it is publicly accessible at your domain name

     

    /home/BrianF/elggdata would be next to, adjacent to, a sibling of public_html - this is where the data should go.  It is not publicly accessible.

  • @matt is right, I completely forgot about the public_html directory for shared hosting lol

  • the distro <rhel, centos, ubuntu, other) & vhosts configs -- may well be using home/www/... directory naming - but we do not know.. yet. he needs to post more details of his 'cpanel' (cPanel, WHM, Plesk, other) file manager's dir structure so we can see and (guess) work it out better.

  • Cim - I am not allowed to put folders in /home/www/ — only in /home/ — (mentioned earlier)
    I tried to change the permissions to 777 and the Elgg installation still tells me the folder does not exist.

    Matt Beckett - wait, I just realized something. While I can't make a siebling folder via the ftp, I can go to my host and "add a domain" with the click of a button. I never comprehended this could be what you were talking about. now I get it! (please tell me I get it) lol
    I've never come across having to set up a system in this way before, but I think I see the security bonus.

    I've learned a lot here, now let me go test it out. 

  • aaaaaand it works!

    I think this finally concludes the horror-noob-saga-farce that was mixing Elgg with me :).

    I don't think I would have made it this far without each and every one of you. THANKS!

    I hope development has been taking notes on what confuses an elgg noob.

    ...watch out world ......

  • Glad you got it working, but adding a new domain is not what I was talking about.  I'm not sure what you did, just make sure that data directory is not publicly available.

  • I was not clear, sorry.

    On my host I can: Add domain name / Transfer domain / Order domain

    I don't know why "Add a domain name" isn't just "add a new root folder" or something like that.

  • "Add a domain" sounds to me like you just added a second "document root path" (= root folder of the domain) that's linked with this second domain. Is the new folder something like /home/www/<domain name> and you now use this folder as data directory? Then you wouldn't have gained anything - basically you are right at the starting point again...

    If you don't understand what it means: this folder is publically accessible in the same way as /home/www/songwriterworkshop.com. Exactly this is a potential security issue and you simply should not install Elgg this way.

    If you don't know how to create a folder that is outside the document root structure of your domain then simply ask you hoster exactly this: "How can I create a directory that is outside from the document root path of my domain and is not publically accessible?" Please, simply ask them!

    You can also mention (better you should tell them in any case) that you created the folder /home/data-folder to be used as the data directory but it wasn't visible to the Elgg installer. Ask them: "Is the reason why the folder is not visible due to the configuration of the "open_basedir" php variable? If this is the reason, can I - or could you - add the folder /home/data-folder to the list of folders for the open_basedir variable?"

    As a sidenote: with 755 permissions for the folder /home/data-folder it might not have worked if the ownership and group of this folder does not correspond to the username and group the webserver is running as. If you changed the permissions to 777 (which you should only do if you are 100% sure that this folder is outside the document root folder!!!) and it still did not work, then it is surely (I'm sure at least) due to open_basedir.

    Sorry, I think this will be my last posting here. It has taken long enough and I don't see any progress here. Please, ask your provider to help you and to answer the questions at least. If they can't help you or tell you that you can't create a folder outside the document root folder ---> change yout hoster! Elgg really isn't that difficult to install and if does not work out on this hoster it's rather not suitable for Elgg. Simple as that...