Set up a localhost Web Server for Faster Website Development

In this lecture we'll cover exactly what software you need to install so you can develop websites locally, on your computer. We'll choose a package that installs all you need in one go:

• web server
• PHP
• database server
• phpMyAdmin

In this lecture I'll take you through every step the installation process for installing XAMPP, starting from downloading the installation file to running the software.

This lecture is specifically for computers running Microsoft Windows. Equivalent lectures for Apple Mac and Linux follow.

In this lecture I'll take you through every step the installation process for installing XAMPP, starting from downloading the installation file to running the software.

This lecture is specifically for computers running Apple Mac OSX. Equivalent lectures for Microsoft Windows and Linux are available in this section.

In this lecture I'll take you through every step the installation process for installing XAMPP, starting from downloading the installation file to running the software.

This lecture is specifically for computers running Linux. Equivalent lectures for Microsoft Windows and Apple Mac OSX are available in this section.

When you're writing code, you'll need a text editor. In this lecture we'll look at what comes as standard with your computer, and recommend a better, free alternative.

In this lecture you'll learn what a web server's root directory is, and how to find it in the XAMPP software you just installed.

In this lecture we'll look at how to develop one website locally, in the web server's root directory.

The HTML source code shown is available to download in the resources section of this video.

In this lecture I'll show you how to develop multiple websites using subfolders of the web server's root directory.

We'll also learn how this can be a problem when copying your site live to a live web server on the internet, as the structure of internal links might change.

The HTML source code shown is available to download in the resources section of this video.

In this lecture you'll learn how user-friendly web addresses like www.example.com are converted into numbers so that your web browser can find and display a website - this is called the Domain Name System.

In this lecture you'll learn how to add web addresses to your local computer's equivalent of DNS, the hosts file.

In this lecture we'll revisit why developing several websites locally in subfolders can be a problem, and how to solve it - configuring the web server so it has several virtual web servers inside the one web server, commonly known as virtual hosts. We'll also see an overview of what you need to do to set up a virtual host.

In this lecture you'll learn how to choose a web address for a virtual host. We'll see exactly what the standard says, what is commonly used, and what is recommended.

In this lecture we'll start adding a virtual host by first creating a web address for our site. We'll do this in the hosts file. 

This lecture contains specific instructions for Microsoft Windows. Instructions for other operating systems are alongside this video.

In this lecture we'll start adding a virtual host by first creating a web address for our site. We'll do this in the hosts file. 

This lecture contains specific instructions for Apple Mac OSX. Instructions for other operating systems are alongside this video

In this lecture we'll start adding a virtual host by first creating a web address for our site. We'll do this in the hosts file. 

This lecture contains specific instructions for Linux. Instructions for other operating systems are alongside this video

In this lecture we'll continue to add a virtual host to the web server that we have installed locally by adding a virtual host to the web server's configuration files.

This lecture contains specific instructions for Microsoft Windows. Instructions for other operating systems are alongside this video.

In this lecture we'll continue to add a virtual host to the web server that we have installed locally by adding a virtual host to the web server's configuration files.

This lecture contains specific instructions for Apple Mac OSX. Instructions for other operating systems are alongside this video

In this lecture we'll continue to add a virtual host to the web server that we have installed locally by adding a virtual host to the web server's configuration files.

This lecture contains specific instructions for Linux. Instructions for other operating systems are alongside this video

In this lecture we'll learn how to use a web address in DNS for the virtual host, as opposed to a web address in the hosts file.

We'll see some existing domains that we can use, and how to add one to DNS yourself.

In this lecture we'll add a new virtual host with a web address in DNS instead of in the hosts file.

In this lecture we'll see how to get the folder for the virtual host's root directory directly from the web address. 

For example:

site1.localhost.tv would automatically get its content from a folder called site1;

site2.localhost.tv from a folder called site2, and so on.

We'll add a virtual host that does this, and several example sites that all work from one virtual host configuration.

In this lecture you'll learn how the Apache web server can be configured even if you don't have access to the configuration files, something which is common on shared hosting.

In this lecture you'll learn how to enable .htaccess files in a virtual host, which are disabled by default.

In this lecture we'll look at some common uses for .htaccess files, where to get ready-made code for these common tasks, and we'll see an example of how to use an .htaccess file in one of our virtual hosts.

In this lecture I'll introduce you to phpMyAdmin, the tool we use for administering databases in XAMPP. You'll learn how to access it, and we'll also create a new database.

Before you can access a database from code, for example from PHP, you need a user account that has access to the database. In this lecture we'll add a new database user and grant it access to the database we just created.

WordPress is a very popular content management system, for creating websites, blogs, and so on. In this video we're going to install it to our local web server, following these steps:

1. download the WordPress software
2. extract it to a folder on our hard drive
3. create a local database and user
4. run the installation program
5. create a new WordPress user
6. view our new local WordPress site

Congratulations on finishing the course!

In this lecture we'll look at a brief overview of what you've achieved, and where to go from here:

• the simple steps to take when starting a new local website
• look out for updates to the course;
• please contact me if you need help