Connection Timed Out

Apparently at this point, BitNami is not aimed at the average site developer. I consider myself pretty competent at following directions, installing scripts and very competent at wordpress. But BitNami site and the installation directions left me with plenty of questions. BUT I saw the notes that this is an early release and better instructions are to follow.

So my first question is about BitNami in general. Is my understanding correct that it is designed for installing and using these scripts easily on your computer. Obviously, fantastico covers the hosting installation. So my understanding is that this helps me install and run WordPress on my computer without messing with xampp or something similar?

In order to try to understand the function better, I just went ahead and started with an installation of WordPress. So I installed it into my program files. One of the questions along the way is about hostname. It said I could use a .com name? But this is not a real site at this point right? Meaning it can’t actually be accessed via the internet because it’s on my computer? Then can I give it an actual existing domain name? I assumed it would only be on my computer so I would give it a real domain name so I could later export and install on an actual hosted site once I had things set up the way I wanted them.

So I went ahead and gave it a real domain name that is already hosted on the net. Set up a port of 81 because 80 was already in use. I have not idea what ‘ports’ are (one of the reasons I’m guessing this isn’t for the average web user) but looked it up and found that 81 is an http one so I used it. Now when I try to access the site (making sure I included the alternate port number), I get ‘connection has timed out’. I went into start/programs and clicked ‘start start stack service’ to see if that would help. I closed skype ‘just in case’. Thought maybe I should change the port to 18080 or something or get rid of the .com name I used, but didn’t know where to do that.

SO.. if you have suggestions and replies to help me understand I would be VERY excited to get this working so I can design wordpress sites offline and learn drupal and joomla offline. BUT.. I totally understand if you need to say “just wait for upgrades to the manual, you are a little too clueless at the moment” ;)

Thank you!

Christine

Hello Christine,

So my first question is about BitNami in general. Is my understanding correct that it is designed for installing and using these scripts easily on your computer. Obviously, fantastico covers the hosting installation.

Well, I managed to install a BitNami Stack in a host some time ago, but I think that it depends on your hosting. We’re not officially supporting it, I don’t know if we’ll do in the future.

So my understanding is that this helps me install and run WordPress on my computer without messing with xampp or something similar?

Yes, you don’t need xampp or any other similar solution. The BitNami WordPress Stack already installs and configures Apache, MySQL, PHP and WordPress.

One of the questions along the way is about hostname. It said I could use a .com name? But this is not a real site at this point right? Meaning it can’t actually be accessed via the internet because it’s on my computer? Then can I give it an actual existing domain name? I assumed it would only be on my computer so I would give it a real domain name so I could later export and install on an actual hosted site once I had things set up the way I wanted them.

The hostname is needed because WordPress (and Joomla, by the way) uses absolute paths in the website. This means that they need to be told what the hostname is so that they can create the valid links (I don’t really know if I’m explaining myself here :S) So, in your situation, you need to provide the installer with an IP address or hostname accessible from your computer. An example would be your LAN IP.

I have not idea what ‘ports’ are (one of the reasons I’m guessing this isn’t for the average web user) but looked it up and found that 81 is an http one so I used it.

A software port (usually just called a ‘port’) is a virtual data connection that can be used by programs to exchange data directly, instead of going through a file or other temporary storage location. More info on this at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_port_%28software%29

I think that’s all, I hope it helps you to understand the stack operation better. I’ll be glad to answer further doubts, in case you have them.

Cheers

Thank you very much, Antonio, for the detailed response. Is there any way, once it’s installed, to change the hostname back to my ip rather than the domain I entered? Or do I need to start again?

Christy

Yes, there is, though it might be easier just to install it again if you haven’t started with the blog. Anyway, just in case, here you go

• Make sure that the servers are running. Type from the main folder

./ctlscript.sh start

• Connect to MySQL. You will need the password you specified during installation. Again, from the main folder

mysql/bin/mysql -u root -p

• Now, let’s modify the database. Substitute HERE_GOES_THE_IP for your local IP

use wordpress_bitnami;
UPDATE wp_options SET option_value = ‘HERE_GOES_THE_IP’ WHERE wp_options.option_name = ‘siteurl’;
UPDATE wp_options SET option_value = ‘HERE_GOES_THE_IP’ WHERE wp_options.option_name = ‘home’;
exit;

You’re done :)