Documentation for installation on shared hosting

[overint]

It seem that lot of users are interested in installing this on shared hosting, which is pretty easy if SSH is supported, but still possible if not.

I'm creating this issue to keep track of progress in creating these docs.

[ryanjgillies]

I (unsuccessfully) had a go at installing 2.3.0 to shared hosting (with Hostinger) this evening and thought I'd share my experience so far.

All of the prerequisites are met, with the exception of the webserver being Lightspeed and there officially being no way to alter the document root. I followed the installation guide successfully until the following:

Shared hosting/other. Hostinger state that you cannot change the document root without their VPS plans. Instead with SSH:

• I removed the standard root of /home/username/domains/yourdomain.tld/public_html and created /home/username/domains/yourdomain.tld/polr
• I then symlinked public_html to /home/username/domains/yourdomain.tld/polr/public.
• I can now traverse the public directory through my browser.

No issues with database creation, I uncommented the MySQL connection details in .env.setup and inserted the connection details for my new db.

Option 1: Run the automatic setup script I'm now falling short at this point. I assume from the $ cp .env.setup .env command that the new .env file should rest in the polr root folder, not the website home directory (public). However regardless of where I place it, navigating to /setup simply returns a 500 Internal Server Error. I'm unsure what my next step should be, and since Option 2 (manual) is not recommended I would prefer to try make this approach work first.

Thoughts?

[ryanjgillies]

After checking the logs, I realised for some reason composer hadn't installed the dependencies at all. After doing so again, the issue resolved and I reached the /setup gui installer.

I did however get a Whoops, looks like something went wrong error upon completion, and the admin account was not created.

I registered a new user with the intention of amending the user in MySQL to grant admin privileges. I again received a Whoops, looks like something went wrong error. However the user did insert into the table.

I suspect there is an issue with my SMTP server settings because I'm not receiving any emails to validate accounts or recover passwords. That said, the SMTP credentials supplied are definitely correct, so I'm still working on it.

[ryanjgillies]

It was something to do with my SMTP server, I'm unsure what the issue was because the credentials and connection were all as they should be. Switching to Mailtrap.io verified that and resolved the last remaining issues. I've switched to a free sendinblue account for the timebeing. Any particular reason sendmail isn't an option?

So, after a not-so-lengthy install process, I can confirm that Polr 2.3.0 can be installed successfully onto Hostinger shared hosting services.