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Getting to Know Your AdminCPin phpFox

(Written while using version 2.07 Build 4)

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Disclaimer: This is meant as a guide to help you get your site set up and to show you how to use some features. Always backup your site before attempting any changes. You are responsible for your actions and any damages done to your site because of your use of this guide are your responsibility.

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These are some basic tips for using your AdminCP. This guide should help you learn to navigate your control panel but I'm not going to spoon feed you every detail. You will need some hands-on knowledge that you can only get by trying things yourself. I strongly recommend you do a few things before jumping in and making changes via your AdminCp.

1. Set up a development site. If you want to change things around, it's best to test out the end result first. If you mess up something and then can't access your AdminCp on your live site, your going to be kicking yourself. However, if you mess up your development site you can just reload it (and still kick yourself if you want, just not as hard. Lol). http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/129/setting-up-a-development-site/

2. Back up your site! http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/93/backup-database/

After doing the above, access your AdminCp by clicking the Admin menu link on your site (assuming you've already logged in to your site with your Admin username and password). You are now in your site's control panel (AdminCp) and looking at your dashboard.

In the center of your screen is a place for notes. You'll want to use this periodically to write notes for yourself about things you've done to change the site around, etc. These are only for you, or other admins, to see so write whatever you want.

On the top left you will see a menu, which I'll go over later in this article. The top right has links back to your site and also to log out. The left column, under the menu, contains your site stats, quick links, and active admins. The right block contains various phpFox news articles and Tweets. Keep an eye on those for updates to the script and other useful information. Scroll down and on the bottom right you'll see your phpFox version number.

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Table of Contents

Menus................................................................................................... 6Dashboard..............................................................................................................................................6CMS.......................................................................................................................................................6

Menus............................................................................................................................................... 6Managing Menus......................................................................................................................... 6Adding Menus..............................................................................................................................6

Blocks............................................................................................................................................... 6Managing Blocks......................................................................................................................... 6Creating Blocks............................................................................................................................7

Pages................................................................................................................................................. 7Managing Pages........................................................................................................................... 7Create Pages.................................................................................................................................7

Users......................................................................................................................................................7Browse Members.............................................................................................................................. 7User Group Manager........................................................................................................................ 8

Manage User Groups................................................................................................................... 8Profile...................................................................................................................................... 8User......................................................................................................................................... 8Marketplace.............................................................................................................................8

Create User Group....................................................................................................................... 8Add User Group Setting...............................................................................................................8

User Cancellation..............................................................................................................................9Promotions........................................................................................................................................9Custom Fields................................................................................................................................... 9

Extensions............................................................................................................................................. 9Module..............................................................................................................................................9Language...........................................................................................................................................9Product..............................................................................................................................................9Plugins............................................................................................................................................ 10Themes............................................................................................................................................10Emoticons....................................................................................................................................... 10

Settings................................................................................................................................................ 10System Settings................................................................................................................................... 10

Manage Settings..............................................................................................................................11Content Formatting.................................................................................................................... 11Debug......................................................................................................................................... 11General....................................................................................................................................... 11Server Settings........................................................................................................................... 11IPInfoDB....................................................................................................................................12Registration................................................................................................................................ 12Core............................................................................................................................................12Feed............................................................................................................................................12

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Shoutbox.................................................................................................................................... 12Comments.................................................................................................................................. 12IM...............................................................................................................................................12Subscribe....................................................................................................................................12User............................................................................................................................................ 12Contact....................................................................................................................................... 13Mail............................................................................................................................................ 13Notification................................................................................................................................ 13Profile.........................................................................................................................................13Share.......................................................................................................................................... 13Video.......................................................................................................................................... 13

Tools................................................................................................... 14System Overview................................................................................................................................ 14IP Address............................................................................................................................................14Site Stats.............................................................................................................................................. 14Maintenance........................................................................................................................................ 14Ban Filters........................................................................................................................................... 14Messages............................................................................................................................................. 14Countries............................................................................................................................................. 14SQL..................................................................................................................................................... 14Currency.............................................................................................................................................. 14

Modules.............................................................................................. 14Ads.......................................................................................................................................................14

Creating ads.................................................................................................................................... 14Managing Ads.................................................................................................................................15Ad Placement..................................................................................................................................15

Attachments.........................................................................................................................................15Blogs....................................................................................................................................................16Forum.................................................................................................................................................. 16Group...................................................................................................................................................16Marketplace:........................................................................................................................................16Music................................................................................................................................................... 16Newsletter............................................................................................................................................16Photo....................................................................................................................................................16Report.................................................................................................................................................. 16Share....................................................................................................................................................16Subscribe............................................................................................................................................. 16Video................................................................................................................................................... 16

Some Tips.......................................................................................... 17

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Menus

Dashboard: Explained above.

CMS : Contains links to Menus, Blocks, Pages and is where you would manage your site's Menus, Blocks and Pages.

Menus: You can manage and add menus here.

Managing Menus : When you click Manage Menus you will then see a screen that lists all of the menus on your site and controls which user groups can see them, where they are located on your site, and the parent/child relationship for drop down menus.

1. Each menu item has a number to the left of it that tells in which order it appears in on your site. Arrange your menus by changing the numbers.

2. There is a clickable box under the Active column to activate/deactivate a menu.

3. To the right of each menu is a box, under the Actions column, to select an action.

a. Edit will bring up the screen to edit the menu. Here you can change where the menu is located (connection) and which user groups have access to the menu. The box labeled Language Pack Details is where you change the title of the menu. Save your changes before exiting this screen.b. Manage Children will show a number indicating the amount of sub-menus located in this menu. If you click this, you will bring up all of the sub-menus which can be edited.

Adding Menus :

Search the knowledgebase at phpFox as there are some good articles there for this. http://www.phpfox.com/kb/ You may ask why I'm telling you to search for the answer. Reason: It'll help you get more familiar with searching the knowledgebase which has a lot of useful articles in it.

Blocks : You manage your blocks and add them here.

Managing Blocks :

1. Each block is located within a Controller. For instance: core.index-visitor is the controller for the visitor page; core.index-member is the dashboard page controller.

2. Using the visitor page as an example, click core.index-visitor and to the right you will see all of the blocks that are contained on the visitor main page and each item within

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that block.3. Rearrange the block items the way you want them by

dragging them up or down (click the arrows to the left of the item's name then drag it around within the block.

4. If you want an item located within a different block on that page, just click the arrow to the left of the item name and edit it. Each block item can be set per user group in the edit screen so if you want to hide an item from certain users, this is where to do it.

5. You disable a block item by clicking the dot to the right. Green is enabled and Red is disabled.

6. To move a block item from one page (controller) to another, click the edit button to the left of the item. Then change the controller to whatever page you want it on. (ex. Change from core.index-visitor to core.index-member to move from main visitor page to dashboard page).

Creating Blocks :

See this video tutorial in the knowledgebase.

http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/195/video-tutorial-how-to-create-a-block-welcome-phpfox-v2/

Pages : Create pages and manage them here.

Managing Pages: After you've created some pages, you manage them here. Your page editing is done by clicking edit, which is found in the Actions column, after clicking Select action.

Create Pages : Search the knowledgebase for Make a Page and you'll find detailed tutorials.

Users : Contains links to Browse Users, User Group Manager, User Cancellation, Promotions, and Custom Fields. This is where you manage your members.

Browse Members : Fairly self explanatory. Look at and for your members here. I'm not walking you through this, you do need to experiment to learn your site management. I will give a few tips.

1. I have a different way of controlling spammers. I don't use the member approval feature because I want new people to be able to explore the site. That being said, I also don't want spammers posting anything. So, I have it set up so the Registered member group cannot post anything at all. This allows me to search my members by group (Registered) and

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then mass delete them if they are all spammers, or approve the good ones and mass delete the rest. Time saver! The options for deletion, etc appear at the bottom of the screen.

2. You can see how many members you have above your list of members on the main browse member page.

User Group Manager : You'll create, manage and add settings for your user groups here.

Manage User Groups : This is where you change the settings for each user group the way you want them. I'm not going into every setting. You can search the forum or knowledgebase for a good many settings.

1. Click to the left of the user group that you want to change settings for.

2. Here's a nifty tip. If you click Edit User Group, you can then change the icon for that user group so each group gets different icons that appear under their name, next to their user group.

3. Click Manage User Settings to change all of the settings for this group. There are far too many to list. I suggest you thoroughly look through this list though and click on each item so you can see the settings for them. I'll include some links here. (or I won't because I couldn't find any). So I'll make some tips myself.

Profile:

1. If they can't comment on any profiles this is where the setting is to fix that.

2. If you don't want membership details to display under their name on their profile, this is where to change that.

User :

1. If you want them to, or not to, load a profile image you will find the setting here.

2. If they can't stay logged in and keep getting kicked off the site, you need to set to Yes – Can Stay Logged In To the Site.

3. Set whether members can or can't delete their account here.

Marketplace: If you don't enable it, they won't be able to use it.

Create User Group : This one is self-explanatory when you get on the page.

Add User Group Setting : From the phpFox knowledgebase: This section is only for developers, when they are creating a new option (via a plug in or a module) they can add special permissions from here.

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User Cancellation: This one is another that needs to be explored to know it but is simple to learn.

Promotions : There's nothing in the knowledgebase that I could find for this and am not using it myself. It looks pretty simple to set up promotions. Have a run at it yourself and see how it works. :)

Custom Fields : This is for customizing your site's member information. Lots of good articles in the knowledgebase. Search for Custom Fields. Here are a few:

http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/234/add-other-custom-fields-for-members-profile-options/http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/118/create-custom-user-fields/http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/157/video-tutorial-how-to-add-custom-fields/

Extensions : Contains links to Module, Language, Product, Plugin, Theme, Emoticons. This is where you manage all of the goodies for your site. I can't possibly go into everything but am going to give pointers/tips.

Module : Here you manage and create modules; add and manage components.

1. http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/227/disable-or-enable-a-module-feature/2. To the left of each module with settings, in Manage Modules, you can click to

edit the settings for that module (feature).3. Components are all of the parts within each of your sites modules. You enable

them or disable them from the Manage Components area. Language : Manage and add language packs and phrases for your site.

1. http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/197/how-to-install-a-language-package/2. http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/239/using-phrase-manager-and-var-name/3. http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/169/add-phrases-from-3rd-party-products-to-

all-installed-languages/4. http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/193/how-to-edit-a-phrase/5. Look through your phrase manager to get familiar with it. Change the phrases

you want to in order to customize your site.Product : This is where you manage, create and import products (3rd party add-ons) for your site.

1. After you've uploaded your add-on, you need to import it before it'll work. Click on Import products and you'll see your add-on that you just loaded to your server, waiting to be imported (installed).

2. If you want to disable a product, go to manage and you'll see a box to the right for Active. Uncheck it to disable the product and then click update to save your changes.

3. Here's a great tutorial. http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/182/how-to-install-

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amp-manage-third-party-plugins-mods-in-phpfox-2-0/Plugins : Manage and create plugins here. These add extra functionality to your site/products/modules.

1. In Manage Plugins you'll see a list of items that either you created or that an add-on created when you installed it. You can edit/delete and activate or deactivate them here. Don't forget to click Update when you are done.

2. Read this tutorial which explains modules, plugins, etc. http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/144/creating-your-first-add-on

Themes: This is where you manage all of the themes you have. There are a lot of articles about themes so I'll include a few links here.

1. Here's a tutorial for installing a theme. http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/201/how-to-install-themes-in-v2/

2. Tutorial for editing your templates. http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/80/editing-your-sites-templates/

3. Tutorial for creating a theme. http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/112/creating-your-site-s-looks/

4. You activate and deactivate your themes in Manage Themes and then just like with other parts of your site, you click the dot to the right (green/red) and then remember to click update to save.

5. If you should ever edit your templates within the admin cp, you will always have to do so or the edits won't save. Either edit the files on the server or via your admin cp.

Emoticons : Add and manage your emoticons/smileys here.

1. In Manage Packages you can turn on/off your various packages.2. You can add packages that will allow you to sort your smileys into categories

(like Holiday, Halloween, Fun, etc). http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/183/video-tutorial-uploading-amp-installing-emoticons-in-phpfox-2-0/

3. In Import Emoticons you can load a package of emoticons that you've created and put in zip format. The image files must be in the zip's root directory (no folders) and the file names will be the codes used.

Settings: Contains links to System Settings, Payment Gateways and Branding Removal. You'll want to get familiar with the System Settings area as that is where you'll control the back-end settings for your site which will affect your site's performance.

System Settings : Controls for your site's management are here. I won't delve into Add New Setting or Add New Setting Group as this is a BASIC AdminCp guide and that is more advanced. If your site is acting up, you can click on Find Missing Settings which automatically search for missing settings. Sometimes this helps.

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Manage Settings : Contains Global Settings (controls site wide settings) and Module Settings (controls settings for modules). It helps to know what you are trying to change so you know where to look for the settings to change it. Look in Global if you are trying to set things that are throughout your site. Look in Module if you are trying to set things that only affect one particular module (ex. Forum, blog). Here are some basic tips. Some topics are not included because if you click them, you should easily be able to see what to do.

Content Formatting :

1. To allow your members to use html codes when posting, etc you need to turn on the feature. Set to True to allow hml.

2. You may also want to add some additional tags in the Allowed html.

3. You can control the size of embedded photos and videos here.4. Set your default wysiwyg editor if you have one other than the

standard phpFox editor.Debug : If you have a problem with your site, come here and enable debug to see

if there are any site errors. If you do find errors, copy and paste them in your support ticket or forum post (remove your site name from the info you post) so people can better assist you.

1. If you cannot enable debug from your AdminCp due to errors preventing you from accessing it, do this http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/138/enabling-debug-mode/

2. To turn off debug, go to the place you enabled it and change it back. In admin cp, change it back to 0. If you enabled it via the file on your server, change it back to false.

General : Set your site name here, site title, copyright, etc.

1. Item location determines where user content is displayed. If you want everything in the public arena then choose public. If you want everything on the user's profile, choose profile. Basically, if you want greater privacy for your members, choose profile. Mine is set to public since my site is an open site. See this thread for a better explanation of item location http://www.phpfox.com/forum/general-support-and-questions-75/photos-viewable-by-anyone-photo-privacy-set-to-no-one-friends-only/page_1/#post201620 you'll need to read through the thread for Raymond's post.

Server Settings : Basic tips

1. Cache Javascript & Css – I have this set to false to speed up the site.

2. Active session – Mine is set to 15 minutes. How long to you want your members to remain logged in if inactive?

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IPInfoDB: Do this! Get your free key, input it and you'll be able to see where your visitors are coming from. Definite must IMO.

Registration : Go through this entire section in your AdminCp and set the settings the way you want them before you go live. Here are some tips.

1. Set Allow User Registration to true when you're ready for members.

2. Verify Email at Sign-up – set to false if you want Facebook Connect.

3. Captcha on Registration – mine is set to true.4. On Signup New Friend – I have my admin username in here since

I want to know every member of my site.5. User Default Privacy on Registration – here's a key setting. How

do you want your site set up in regards to privacy? Definitely set this up before you get new members.

6. Redirect After Sign Up – mine is set so that new members go to their privacy setting page after signing up so they can manage their privacy settings. If you want your members to go to a specific page after signup, go to that page on your site and copy and paste the url into the box in this setting. (ex. Http://mysite/user/privacy)

Core : You'll find a lot of settings in here that are elsewhere. Just look down the list to verify you have things set the way you want.

Feed : News feed settings are here.

1. Friends Only – set this to true so member updates are only shown to their friends.

2. Allow Comments on Feeds – set this to true so members can comment on their friend's feeds.

3. If you want to enable the “like” system, you will find it in here.

Shoutbox : If you want your shoutbox to be live so your members won't have to refresh the page to see new shouts, set Live Shoutbox to true. This may slow your site.

Comments : The setting to allow comments on profiles is found in here.

IM : Enable instant messenger here. It will probably slow your site.

Subscribe : If you want to have subscription packages, you need to enable it here and then set it up elsewhere in the admin (modules menu which will be covered later).

User : Before you “go live” set your user settings here. Some tips:

1. You'll find user pic sizes here, adjust as you want them.

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2. Decide how you want your users to login – username, email, email & username.

3. Select how user browsing will display the results depending upon how much info you want to show. I only have it show name_photo because of user privacy concerns.

4. Force Profile Privacy can be set for minors. This is a good feature to keep your under age members safe from potential predators.

5. If you want random featured members, set it here.6. Want to display your user's online status, set it here.7. If you want your site specific to certain ages groups, you set your

minimum and maximum year dates in here.8. I believe it important to set the user age privacy on browse feature

to true in case some of your members want to hide their age. This way, they will be excluded from the browse search and kept private.

9. URL redirect after login can send your users to whatever page you want. Such as core.index-member (dashboard) or mine is set to core.home (custom home page).

10. After done with the settings, click submit to save.

Contact : This is to set up your contact info for contact us.

Mail : Set your user mail settings here.

1. Display total mail count – set this to true so your members will see a number next to their mail menu tab to see how many messages they have.

Notification : Set your site-wide notification to true if you want your users to see a notification in the footerbar for new messages, comments, etc.

Profile : Enable user rating in here if you want users to be able to rate other users. Also, if you want them to be able to drag and drop blocks on their profile, set it here.

Share : Enable social bookmarking here. Basically, share=free advertising!

Video : Some tips

1. You need FFMPEG and MENCODER on your server if you want members to be able to upload their personal videos. Not necessary for Youtube videos. If you're on a shared server you probably don't have these. I don't have these so I only use Youtube sort of videos.

2. You'll find the setting here to disable autoplay of Youtube type of videos.

3. You can enable full screen for Youtube videos.4. You can change whether to show both the upload and share links

on the dashboard here.

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Tools : Here, you'll find System Overview, IP Address, Site Stats, Maintenance, Ban Filters, Messages, Countries, Online, SQL, Currency. I'll provide info on most. Some are self-explanatory.

System Overview : This is the server overview of various php settings, etc. Check it out.

IP Address : Search IP addresses here to get info about IP's that are accessing your site.

Site Stats : You can manage what shows up in your site's stats block here. Here are some tutorials for adding site stats. Search the add-ons for more.

http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/219/site-stats-add-videos/http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/220/site-stats-add-marketplace/http://www.phpfox.com/addons/view/site-stats-add-newest-member/http://www.phpfox.com/addons/view/site-stats-members-online-today/

Maintenance : This is where you'll find: clear your cache, remove duplicates, reparser, counters.

1. Clear your site cache after changing/adding anything.

Ban Filters : You can ban by IP, Username, Email, Words, and Display Names.

Messages : You can view all of the private user messages here. I only use this if a member reports spamming or something like that.

Countries :

1. You can move the country names around in Country Manager just by dragging them up or down. Helpful to put your country as first.

2. You can add and import countries (text file) here.

SQL : Your database info, maintenance (optimize and repair tables) and backup are here.

Currency : Manage or add currency here. If you're using anything involving currency, you'll want to set which currencies you will allow people to use.

Modules : This is where you'll set up the various modules in your site like forum categories, ads, blog categories, etc. You need to explore this area to see what settings are available for your customization of your site. I'll give some tips for some of the modules here.

Ads : The best thing to do is create one to see what happens. Note that if you create an ad using Image instead of HTML, you can select the amount of clicks allowed instead of just the number of views. You'll find invoices for member created ads in the Invoice link. In Manage Sponsorships you can also add a sponsorship ad.

Creating ads:

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Check these links http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/120/create-ad-campaigns/ http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/70/create-an-advertisement-ad-banner/

1. Don't find yourself mired in “thinking within the box” in regards to the ads module. You can put other things in there besides just ads. I don't like to mess with the templates so this is how I deal with code, like google adsense, that needs to be placed in the page. A few examples of what I've done:

A. Go to http://www.alexa.com and sign up for their site tools for traffic reports and Alexa page ranking. You can paste the code in an advertising block and it'll work.

B. Sign up at http://projecthoneypot.org which is a great site for keeping track of spammers, checking IP's, etc. You can get a honeypot to put on your site to send info to them regarding the spammers that are visiting your site. This information helps them keep track of harvesters, spammers, bots, etc. I put my honeypots in an ad and let it run. It's invisible and doesn't interfere with anything.

C. Go to Google and get yourself a search box then put the code in an ad spot on your site.

D. Get a free account at http://attracta.com and use their SEO tools. I put their code in a block on my site. Since it is required to show at all times, I have that block only for attracta and have not put any other ads in that block.

Managing Ads : This is where you'll manage your ads. Turn them on/off, move them around, change which user groups see the ads, etc.

Ad Placement : Here, you'll create where you want your ad placements for people buying ads. You'll manage these placements in Manage Placements if you want to edit them after creating them.

1. Make a title for your ad location so your users will know what size ad they are buying. Example: Leaderboard Ad (728 x 90, 468x60)

2. Be sure to have your currency set up before allowing members to purchase ads.

3. Only members will be able to purchase ads.

Attachments : Manage the types of attachments that you will allow on your site here. Here's a tutorial from the knowledgebase. http://www.phpfox.com/kb/article/86/adding-more-extensions-to-attachments/

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Blogs : Add and manage your blog categories here.

Forum : Here you add and manage your forum categories. They can be dragged and dropped in place where you want them.

Group : Add and manage categories for groups here.

Marketplace: This is where you set up your categories for the marketplace.

Music : Add and manage your music genres here.

Newsletter : Create and manage newsletters here. You'll be given several options with regards to how you want to send your newsletters out. You can use plain text or Html, choose which groups get the newsletter and much more.

Photo : Create and manage your categories here (are you noticing a pattern?). Again, you can drag and drop.

Report : Check on user reports that your members may submit, create report categories and manage categories. One always hopes not to see the admin reported, but one never knows what a member might do. :)

Share : Here is where you manage which places you allow your members to share your content. Perhaps you don't like free advertising?? No problem, turn them all off.

Subscribe : Now here's a fun one. I almost don't want to get into it as it's rather involved. :) This is a brief tutorial for creating a package.

1. Put a title. Example: Basic2. Make a description for this membership level. Example: Yo, this is a

basic membership package entitling you to basic access to the site.3. Put an image for it if you wish. This will be a small icon that shows on

the user's profile page next to their membership type.4. User group on success. You need to have a user group already made to

assign your membership package to.5. User group on failure. I put this as Guest. You can select what you want.6. Decide whether to put this on the registration.7. Put your prices in and whether it's recurring. If recurring, select the

period.8. Save (submit).

Video : Create and manage your video categories here.

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Some Tips:

1. To remove the Image Url that appears when viewing photos, go to AdminCp—CMS--Blocks--Manage Blocks and select photo.view and turn off photo::detail.

2. Always clear your cache after doing any modifications or adding anything.3. If editing any file, make a back up of it first.4. Be careful who you give ftp access to.5. If you just installed the script and stuff isn't working, search the forums for answers

before starting a new thread. Always search by post if you get no answers when searching by thread.

6. Sometimes ftp programs do not load all of the files. This has happened to me as well as many others. You can always re-load everything using another ftp program, filezilla is a good one, and see if that solves the issue.

7. Backup your site periodically and before loading anything new.8. EXPLORE your AdminCp.9. Make a test user account for every user group so you can see how everything is

working.10. If you have installed a template with it's own login, so now you have two logins on your

main page, go to AdminCp—cms--blocks--manage blocks and select Site Wide and turn off user::login-block.

11. ALWAYS go into the upload folder of whatever you are trying to install and load those files/folders. Do not load the upload folder.

12. Shave your head – that way you won't have to pull your hair out when attempting stuff on your site.

13. Don't expect developers of third party mods to immediately answer your questions. They are busy, located in other countries (with different time zones or internet restrictions) and will answer you as soon as they can. If you need support of their mods, they usually have a support site and you will get better results by posting there. NEVER post in the forum – “HEY!! Where are you!! Why do you not answer me!!” and stuff like that.

14. Create a second admin account just in case you need it.