Accounts OnlineTM
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Setup Guide
1. Planning
Before installing Accounts Online package you must decide on the following:
1.1. Scripts Directory
The directory to hold all *.cgi and *.pm files. Your web server must be able to execute scripts from this directory.
Please refer to your server documentation for instructions how to allow scripts execution for a directory.
1.2 Data Directory (Base Directory)
The directory to hold Accounts Online database. Accounts Online scripts must have read/write access to this directory.
Setting 777 access mode under UNIX is a sure bet.
For security reasons it is highly recommended to place data directory outside of web server document root.
1.3 Configuration File
The file to store all Accounts Online configuration variables. Accounts Online scripts must have read/write
access to this file. By default Accounts Online will try to create this file in the scripts directory. This
could create problems on certain web servers - some servers do not allow setting 0777 mode for scripts directories,
some servers even disable cgi directories upon detection of attempt to write data into the directory by a script.
To override default behavior you must provide Accounts Online with complete pathname to configuration file, which
is located outside of scripts directory.
If you are not sure whether your server allows 0777 mode for scripts directories and writing to scripts
directories, we would suggest to name configuration file as config.cgi and store it under data directory as per
1.2 above.
1.4 Passwords File
The file to store operator passwords. Scripts use this file to authenticate your employees authorized to access
management functions of Accounts Online. This file also stores access rights info for all authorized users. You
may select special location for this file in order to eliminate unauthorized access. If unsure name it passwords.cgi
and store under data directory as per 1.2 above.
1.5 Images directory
Accounts Online use GIF images to display menu items. By default these images will be stored under
scripts directory as per 1.1. Unfortunately some web servers may be configured to disable serving images from
cgi directory. In such a case you may have to place all .gif files into separate directory on your server.
1.6 Maximum account ID length
By default Accounts Online software does not allow account IDs longer than 10 characters. You can override default
settings, but you can do it only once upon initial setup.
In order to speed up transaction lookups Accounts Online maintains index file. The file is being used to
resolve transaction ID into account ID and consists of fixed length records. The length of each records is
N bytes, where N is the maximum account ID length. Thus every time Accounts Online software registers a transaction
(invoice or receipt), the index file grows N bytes longer. Unreasonable long accounts IDs could result in huge
index file. Keep this in mind when deciding on maximum account ID length.
We suggest to prepare the following table before proceeding to setup
| Scripts Directory |
|
| Data Directory | |
| Configuration File | |
| Passwords File | |
| Images Directory | |
| Maximum account ID length | |
Here is a sample table. We assume the following server configuration:
Domain name: www.domain.com
Home directory: /home/www.domain.com
Document root: /home/www.domain.com/htdocs
| Scripts Directory | /home/www.domain.com/htdocs/cgi-bin/billing |
| Data Directory | /home/www.domain.com/htdata/billing |
| Configuration File | /home/www.domain.com/htdata/billing/config.cgi |
| Passwords File | /home/www.domain.com/htdata/billing/passwords.cgi |
| Images Directory | /home/www.domain.com/htdocs/images/billing |
| Maximum account ID length | 20 |
2. Setup
2.1. Unzip accnts.zip. You should get the following files:
cs.cgi - Diagnostic & Customer Support script
admin.cgi - Admin tools script
accmgr.cgi - Account Manager script
accview.cgi - Account viewer (customer entry)
lookup.cgi - Invoice Lookup utility
accutil.pm - account managing subroutines
produtil.pm - product managing subroutines
ecgway.pm - eCommerce Gateway module stub
dateutil.pm - date conversion subroutines
logutil.pm - log files managing subroutines
aolapi.pm - Accounts Online API module
cartapi.pm - Accounts Online Shopping Cart API module
tax.pm - tax calculation subroutines
subsutil.pm - subscription management subroutines
rebill.cgi - standalone script for automated recurring billing
ssirebill.cgi - ssi script which starts rebill.pl
*.gif - image files
There are a number of files within samples.zip file. These are sample scripts and html templates and are not
required for installation.
2.2. Edit *.cgi files if needed: the very first line contains full pathname to Perl. Default settings should
be OK for most systems, but you should check with your administrator if not sure.
2.3. Create configoverride.cgi file (skip this section if you will use default location for configuration
file - see 1.3 for more details). Use plain text editor like Notepad. This file shall contain single line
with a full pathname of configuration file. Do not create the configuration file - it must be created by
Accounts Online. You only name it (that is provide configoverride.cgi file, which contains full pathname
of config file).
For our sample site (see Planning section) we would create configoverride.cgi file with the following contents:
/home/www.domain.com/htdata/billing/config.cgi
2.4. Create Scripts Directory (if does not exist) on your web server. Make sure web server can execute
scripts from this directory. Set mode to 0755 (or to 0777 if you do not use configoverride.cgi).
2.5. Upload all *.cgi and *.pm files (including configoverride.cgi if exists) to the scripts directory on your
web server in ASCII mode. Please note, you should use ASCII mode when uploading scripts to your
web server.
2.6. Set 0755 mode for all *.cgi and *.pm files you have uploaded as per 2.5
2.7. Upload all *.gif files to images directory (as per 1.5) in BINARY mode.
2.8. Make sure, directory under which you decided to store configuration file (as per 1.3) exists and
scripts have read/write access to the directory. Create the directory and set proper access rights if needed.
2.9. If you decided to override default settings for maximum account ID length, please skip this section and
proceed to 2.10. Enter URL of admin.cgi script into your browser address string (considering our sample it shall be
www.domain.com/cgi-bin/billing/admin.cgi) and hit Enter key. You should see System Setup form. If you see something
else, please refer to Setup Troubleshooting section for more info. Proceed to section 2.11.
2.10. Enter URL of admin.cgi script into your browser address string followed without spaces
by ?maxaccid=N. Substitute N with maximum account ID length (considering our sample it shall be
www.domain.com/cgi-bin/billing/admin.cgi?maxaccid=20) and hit Enter key. You should see System Setup form.
If you see something else, please refer to Setup Troubleshooting section for more info.
2.11. Check and edit if required values for major variables. Please leave other fields intact.
basedir - enter absolute path to data directory (as per 1.2), no trailing slash
Image directory url - enter URL (please note, URL is not the same as file system directory) of image directory
(as per 1.5), no trailing slash
pwdfile path - enter full pathname of passwords file (as per 1.4)
Example:
basedir = /home/www.domain.com/billing
Image directory url = /images
pwdfile path = home/www.domain.com/billing/passwords.cgi
Scroll down and assign login and password to system administrator (fields Login, Password, Repeat password).
Click [Save Configuration].
You should see Saving configuration message followed by setup log. If no errors
encountered click "Staff logon" link below setup log to enter Accounts Online. You will need to provide system
administrator ID and password you have just selected.
In order to continue configuring Accounts Online click System Setup menu. Please refer to
System Setup Variables Section for more info.
To create users click "User Management" button. Please refer to Operating Manual for
more info on user management.
2.12. (optional) Recurring billing activation.
Normally rebill.cgi is to be run once every day by crontab. If you do not have access
to crontab on your server or do not know what crontab is at all use ssirebill.pl instead.
Place the following html code
<!--#include virtual="url-path-to-accounts-online/ssirebill.cgi" -->
on the page which gets reasonable number of hits per day. Every time this page being accessed ssirebill.cgi will
check last time rebill.cgi was activated and run it if necessary.
3. Setup troubleshooting
You have entered URL of admin.cgi into browser address string and...
3.1. Saw Page Not Found 404 Error
That means you either made a mistake typing the url or the scripts directory (as per 1.1) must be accessed
via another URL - please refer to your web server documentation to find out how URLs map to file system
directories on your server.
3.2. Browser began download the admin.cgi script
That means your server does not recognize admin.cgi as executable script. Please refer to your web server documentation
to find out how to configure web server to recognize *.cgi file extension as executable script.
3.3. Saw Internal Server Error page
There could be multiple reasons for this error including but not limited by using binary mode to upload file,
wrong path to Perl (the very first line of any script), failure to make executable either script file or
script directory. Please refer to contents of your server error log file for error description. Please note,
that one error usually generates 2 or more lines in error log file and the last one, which reads "Premature end
of script headers" does not contain useful info. Before contacting us please obtain at least 10 last lines
from your server error log.
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