[MKDoc-admin] Re: MKDoc on Windows

[Bruno Postle]

On Fri 25-Jul-2003 at 11:56:20AM +0100, Adam Moran wrote:
> Richard J. Christensen wrote:
> 
> > I currently help support my son's school's website which uses
> > Apache on Windows. ...   can you point me towards any docs that
> > explain how to get the older versions of MKDoc and how to get
> > them to work under Windows?
> 
> we made some notes about 2 yrs ago but i can't find them :( - i'll
> ask around if any one has a copy

Actually, I've just discussed this with Jean-Michel and the current
version of MKDoc-1.6.14 is probably much better suited to run on
Windows than any of the earlier versions.

We haven't tested any of this, but these are the issues involved
with installing on Windows:

-  The apache/mod_perl/perl system needs to be working ok before
   *anything* else is attempted.
   
   MKDoc needs apache-1.3.xx and perl-5.8.x; the latest binary
   versions from apache.org and activestate.com should be ok.
   mod_perl can apparently be installed via activeperl ppm.

-  There should be no problems with the Windows version of MySQL.

-  If anyone wants to use the discussion forums, then an IMAP server
   is needed, there are various win32 options, but none of them are
   tested as suitable - So I don't know.

-  Most of the perl modules are available via activeperl ppm.
   Missing modules are: HTML::TreeBuilder, Time::ParseDate and
   Petal, these will need to be installed by hand - I don't think
   that any of them require a C compiler.

-  MKDoc sends out email for various purposes (none of them critical
   to the basic functionality); to do this, it expects a Sendmail
   binary at /usr/sbin/sendmail - Again, I have no idea if the
   Windows version of Sendmail is suitable.

-  There are various regular operations involved with MKDoc,
   normally these are managed via Unix Cron; though probably the
   Windows scheduler can be used.
   
   The only critical cronjob is the indexer for the search engine
   that runs every hour - Without this, the search engine will
   produce no results.

All in all, MKDoc is probably ok on Windows, though I wouldn't
recommend installing it without experience of at least some of the
above items.

-- 
Bruno