Time for action — setting up the data directory

Let's see how easy it is to set up your data directory:

1. 1. Make the data directory outside of the public folder of your home directory. Create the directory using the mkdir command and call it uploaddir:

   mkdir uploaddir
   
   

   Note

   It doesn't really matter what you decide to call your dataroot directory, but try and choose a name that is relevant to what the directory is doing. The name suggested by Mahara and most commonly used is uploaddir, but other names such as maharadata would be just as good.

2. 2. Set the permissions on this folder, using the chmod command:

   chmod -R 0777 uploaddir
   
   

3. 3. Change the user of the new directory to be the same as your server, using the chown command. The user is usually apache or www-data:

   chown -R www-data:www-data uploaddir
   
   

4. 4. And that's all there is to it, you now have a place where Mahara can put all of the stuff belonging to your users.

What just happened?

You just created your data directory and made sure that it was in a safe place in your home directory outside of the htdocs directory. Then you changed the permissions, users, and groups for the directory to make it easy for Mahara to put things in and to delete things.

Let's take a quick look at the file structure that you have just created for your Mahara installation:

So far, you have downloaded and put the Mahara files into place on your server, and seen how to create the database and dataroot needed to store all the Mahara information.