question about installation path

[travistaci]

I have an existing website on the server in which I am loading zencart that I would like to keep active until I am ready to replace it. However, I am unclear as to how this affects the path and url that I enter during installation (the screen directly after it asks you for database host). will this be a difficult thing to do and will I have to change the path setting and url? If so how will I do this?

regardless i am generally confused by what i should enter for the path. I already installed once and then started getting an error (seen in version 6.1.1 in implementation guide for version 1.5). I have started over and this time i really want to be sure i enter the correct info! Thank you.

[stevesh]

Generally you would install Zencart in a subdirectory of the site (the installer will set the proper paths), and when you're ready to go live, move everything to the root and edit the two configure.php files.

http://www.zen-cart.com/content.php?...that-directory

[travistaci]

Thank you for the advice Stevesh! I have uploaded the contents of the zencart folder to the root directory on my file manager (using filezilla)......should these contents then be contained withing a sub-directory instead of just floating around in the root menu? Can i leave it as it is and direct the installation into a sub-directory?

[RodG]

I have uploaded the contents of the zencart folder to the root directory on my file manager (using filezilla)......should these contents then be contained withing a sub-directory instead of just floating around in the root menu?

Installing zencart in the root folder as you have done is fine.. as long as there is no conflict with your existing website. This generally means that your existing website will be accessed via http://yourdomain.com/index.html and the zencart to be accessed via http://yourdomain.com/index.php

The most common conflict is if your existing site is also accessed via 'index.php', in which case overwriting this with zencarts 'index.php' is going to break your existing site.

The 'site' that is served when a user enters just http://yourdomain.com/ is determined by the server settings. Some servers will try to use 'index.php' first, while others may be set to try 'index.html' first

Can i leave it as it is and direct the installation into a sub-directory?

I'm not quite sure what you mean by 'direct the installation into a sub-directory'. The zencart installations are where you upload the files too. You cannot direct them to a different location. If this is what you want to do you'll need to delete the files you uploaded to the root folder and re-upload them to the subdirectory of your choosing (you can also 'move' them rather than delete/re-upload using your sites file manager).

Keep in mind that if you place zencart in a subdirectory (eg /shop/ or /zencart/) then you'll need to access the store using these same pathnames, eg: http://mydomain.com/shop/ or http://mydomain.com/zencart/

There is no 'right' or 'wrong' place to install zencart. It'll work the same regardless of location. The main difference is what you want/expect the user to type in order to access your store. (having said that, it is quite possible to re-assign 'zencart' folder to be the 'root' folder regardless of which subdirectory it is located in, but this is a configuration best avoided unless you know exactly what you are doing).

Cheers
Rod