Downloading Moodle

Go to http://download.moodle.org to download Moodle. As you can see, there are quite a number of distributions to choose from:

For the current version of Moodle, there are two releases: the latest stable build and the latest official release. The latest stable version is created weekly (every Wednesday) and is the best choice for a new server. The latest official release contains the stable build as well as new fixes, but the version will not have gone through the weekly code review and might contain unresolved issues.

Versions that are older than the current one are maintained by the Moodle development team, and bug fixes are back-ported. Sometimes newly added functionality is back-ported. Currently, the oldest supported version is 1.6, but this will certainly change in the future. For older versions, a stable build and the last release are made available.

Moodle (that is http://download.moodle.org) also offers you to download beta releases of the software (if available) and also the latest development release. These should only be downloaded for testing or development purposes, and never used in production environments.

Each version is made available in two compressed formats TGZ (use the tar command to uncompress) and ZIP (requires unzip). You can either download them by clicking on the respective link or, if you have (secure) shell access, retrieve the file directly using the wget command:

wget http://download.moodle.org/stable19/moodle-weekly-19.zip

Once you have moved the file to the location where you want to install it on your web server (dirroot), extract the file using the unzip command (or tar zxvf if you downloaded the TGZ version). In a hosted environment, you might have to use the uncompressing method provided by the web administration interface (CPanel, Plesk, or any customized system).

If you place the entire folder in your web server documents directory, the site will be located at http://www.yourwebserver.com/moodle. To access your site from http://www.yourwebserver.com, copy the contents directly into the main web server's documents directory.

This screenshot is taken from a secure shell (SSH) in a hosted environment. Four commands were used:

Once this is successful, you have to create the database that Moodle uses to store its data.

Creating the Moodle Database and the Data Directory

Moodle requires a database where it stores information. While it is possible to share an existing database, it is highly recommended to create a separate MySQL database for Moodle. This can either be done via a web interface as provided for hosted servers or via the Unix command line.

Running the Installer Script

The installer script performs two main actions: populating the database and creating the configuration file config.php. The Moodle installer is initiated by entering the URL of the wwwroot (the location where you copied Moodle) into your web browser. The installer will recognize that Moodle hasn't been installed yet and will start the process automatically.

The Moodle installer has to set a session cookie. If your browser has been configured to trigger a warning, make sure you accept that cookie.

The first installation screen lets you choose the language to be used during the installation. This is not the locale used for Moodle, but only the installation:

Before the Moodle installer continues, it checks that all your PHP settings are correct. If any of the tests are not passed, it is important that you go back to the software prerequisites section, resolve any problems, and restart the installation process after the issues have been fixed:

The next screen displays the expected values for the Web address of the site (wwwroot), the Moodle Directory (dirroot), and the Data Directory (dataroot). You might have to modify the data directory entry if the location of your moodledata differs:

If dataroot cannot be located or does not have the correct permissions, the following error message will be displayed:

If that is the case, go back to the Data Directory section to check for any problems.

The next screen deals with the configuration of your database, which we set up earlier:

Once you are through the database details screen, the Moodle installer checks to see if a number of components are installed. Not all modules are compulsory (see the section on Prerequisites in this chapter).

The next screen allows you to install additional language packs that are required if you want to support languages other than the one selected for the installer. See Chapter 8 for details on language packs.

You will see in the next screen that the Moodle configuration file config.php has been successfully created. If the creation of the configuration file fails, the installer will let you download config.php. You will have to copy the text from the screen and paste it into a file called config.php in your dirroot:

Before Moodle can proceed with the installation, you have to agree to the GPL (General Public Licence) agreement. You will find the full license text at http://docs.moodle.org/en/License:

This screen is followed by the current release information that includes the version and built to be installed as well as a link to the current release notes.

Once this screen has been confirmed, the Moodle installer will create all tables in the database. If you untick the Unattended operation option, each screen will have to be confirmed. Unless this is your first installation or you have encountered problems with previous installations, it is usually not necessary to run the rest of the installation in attended operation mode:

Once the table creation and population have been concluded, you will see the screen to set up the administrator account. The default username is admin, which can be changed. The self-explanatory fields you have to fill in are password, First name, Surname, Email address, City/town, and country. All other fields are explained in great detail in Chapter 5.

The last screen of the installation script asks you to enter some Front Page settings, namely the Full site name, the Short name of your site, and a Site description. These front page settings can be modified later on (see Chapter 7 for detailed explanation).

Once this information has been entered and the screen has been confirmed, you are ready to start using Moodle. However, it is recommended to finalize the installation and to set up the execution of the Moodle maintenance script.

Finalizing the Installation

To make sure that Moodle is running without problems, go to Notifications in the Site Administration block. Your installation has been successful if the following screen is displayed:

Moodle provides some statistics about its usage on http://moodle.org/stats. To be included in these figures, you have to register your Moodle site. Registration is optional and free, and you decide which information will be made public. You will get occasional notices from moodle.org, for example about advance security alerts.

Moodle states that once you are registered the Moodle Registration button will be removed, which is not the case. The fact that the button remains actually makes sense, as it is used to change any of your registration details at a later stage:

The settings of the registration screen are as follows:

Setting up the Cron Process

Moodle has to perform a number of background tasks on a regular basis. The script that is performing these tasks is known as a cron script, which is executed by the so-called cron process. An entire page has been dedicated in the Moodle documentation and you can find it at http://docs.moodle.org/en/Cron. It is important that you set up the cron process. Otherwise, any timed Moodle features such as scheduled backups, sending forum notifications, statistics processing, and so on will not work.

The script cron.php is located in the admin directory and can be triggered manually through a web browser (unless your security settings have been changed). Once executed, the output from the script (http://yoursite/admin/cron.php) is shown on screen and you have to navigate back to your Moodle system manually.

Most control panels allow you to set up scheduled tasks via their interface. The following is a screenshot from the widely used Plesk system that executes the script every 5 minutes:

There are a number of ways to call the cron script. wget q O /dev/null http://<yoursite>/admin/cron.php is the most popular option in a Linux environment (see Command in the preceding screenshot). However, if this does not suit your environment, check out http://docs.moodle.org/en/Cron for alternatives.

The above interface creates an entry in the crontab, a file located in the /etc directory that contains all system-wide cron entries. This file can also be added manually using crontab -e, but be careful to get the syntax right.

This concludes the entire installation process of Moodle. If you have come across any problems that have not been covered in these instructions, or your setup differs from the one described, go to http://docs.moodle.org/en/Installing_Moodle where more installation details are provided along with exceptions covered in great detail.