1. Installing Drupal on Your Local Computer
This tutorial will help you install Drupal on your own home computer and allow you to test and
experiment building a Web site using this open‐source software. This is advantageous in crafting a site
to your satisfaction before publishing live on the Internet through a web hosting service. The
installation involves the download of necessary accompanying software enabling you to use your own
local computer as a web server.
Installing WAMP
Before installing Drupal, we’ll need to download and install the platform and software that will enable it
to run and communicate with the Web. Specifically, you’ll need to download WampServer
(http://www.wampserver.com/en/download.php). WAMP is an acronym for:
• Windows
• Apache – Web server software
• MySQL – Relational database system that
stores all of a Web site’s content
• PHP – scripting language that interacts
with both MySQL and Apache to deliver
dynamic Web pages.
This software package also includes phpMyAdmin, which handles the administration of MySQL via a
Web interface. WAMP will install automatically to a folder called C:WAMP on your machine. For basic
installation, just accept all the default values. WAMP will create a subfolder called ‘www’ which will be
used later for Drupal’s files.