RegisterMe! - Setup Guide

RegisterMe!^TM

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Setup Guide

1. Planning

Before installing RegisterMe! 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 RegisterMe! database. RegisterMe! 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 RegisterMe! configuration variables. RegisterMe! scripts must have read/write access to this file. By default RegisterMe! 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 script 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 the scripts 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 RegisterMe!. 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

RegisterMe! 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.

We suggest to prepare the following table before proceeding to setup

Scripts Directory
Data Directory
Configuration File
Passwords File
Images Directory

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

2. Setup

2.1. Unzip registerme.zip. You should get the following files:

admin.cgi - Admin tools script
accmgr.cgi - Account Manager script
accview.cgi - Account viewer (customer entry)
autoban.cgi - IP logging and password sharing prevention script
*.pm - common libraries
styles.css - CSS styles
*.gif - image files

There is a number of files within samples.zip file. These 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 must contain single line with a full pathname of configuration file. Do not create the configuration file - it must be created by RegisterMe!. 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 content:

/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 *.css and *.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. 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 2.10.

2.10. Check and edit if required values for major variables. Please leave other fields intact.

Base Directory - 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
Admin Passwords File - enter full pathname of passwords file (as per 1.4)

Example:
Base Directory = /home/www.domain.com/billing
Image Directory URL = /images
Admin Passwords File = 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 RegisterMe!. You will need to provide system administrator ID and password you have just selected.

In order to continue configuring RegisterMe! click System Setup menu. Use embedded help susbsystem for more info on configuration variables and options.

To create users click "User Management" button.

2.11. (optional) AutoBan activation.
Place the following html code



on one or more pages under password protected directory. Every time the page(s) will be accessed the autoban.cgi script will update access log file for the customer and will disable the account if if maximum number of IP addresses logged within last 24 hours exceeds the value specified as per System Setup form.

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 source code of 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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