Instructions for the installation of the PunBB forum and for upgrading from previous versions.

• A webserver (preferably Apache).
• PHP 4.1.0 or later (PHP 5 included).
• MySQL 3.23.17 or later, PostgreSQL 7.0 or later or SQLite. (see details below).

MySQL: PunBB will not work at all with any version prior to 3.23.17.

PostgreSQL: PunBB 1.2.* has been thoroughly tested on various versions between 7.3.3 and 7.4.5, but it should work fine with any version greater than 7.0. Please note that PHP 4.3.0 or later is required for PostgreSQL support.

SQLite: PunBB 1.2.* has only been thoroughly tested on versions 2.8.11 and 2.8.14 of SQLite, but should work with basically any version.

1. Copy/upload all contents of the directory upload/ into the directory where you want to run your forums.
2. Run install.php from the forum root directory (e.g. open http://mydomain/myforums/install.php in your browser). Follow the instructions.

Please report any problems you might encounter during installation in the PunBB.org Support Forums.

NOTE: Make a backup of your current forum directory before proceeding. Also, don't forget to make a backup of your forum database. Use the tool mysqldump for MySQL and pg_dump if you are using PostgreSQL. If you're using SQLite, just make a backup copy of the SQLite database file. You can also make database backups via most administration tools such as MySQL Administrator, phpMyAdmin and phpPgAdmin.

In order to upgrade from PunBB 1.0.* to 1.2.14, you must first update your current installation to 1.1. Download PunBB 1.1 from the PunBB.org downloads page and follow the upgrade instructions in the included install.html.

In order to upgrade from PunBB 1.1.* to 1.2.14, you must first update your current installation to 1.2. Download PunBB 1.2 from the PunBB.org downloads page and follow the upgrade instructions in the included install.html.

Follow these instructions to update your current 1.2.* installation to 1.2.14.

1. Copy/upload all contents of the directory upload/ into your old 1.2 directory (overwriting any existing files).
2. Copy/upload the script 12_to_1214_update.php from the directory extras/ to the forum root directory and run it through your browser. Follow the instructions. Once the update script has finished you should remove the script from the forum root directory.

You should now be running PunBB 1.2.14.

Here are some recommendations for maximizing the performance of PunBB.

• Run it in a UNIX-like operating system!
• Use a proper webserver such as Apache or Zeus.
• Use a PHP cache/accelerator tool such as Turck MMCache or Alternative PHP Cache.
• Make sure that PHP has zlib support so you can enable gzip output compression in Admin/Options. This greatly reduces the size of the XHTML output at the cost of a little CPU time. An alternative is to use the Apache modules mod_gzip or mod_deflate. The two methods yield similar results.
• Visit the administration interface and disable any forum features that are not used or you feel are unnecessary.