Here are the essential steps for a standard osCommerce installation in 5 minutes on your localhost.

1. Unzip the file oscommerce-2.2ms2.zip. 2. Copy the 'catalog' folder and put it in your web server directory path.

For example in Unix with Apache: /var/www/htdocs/catalog

For example in Windows with IIS: C:Inetpubwwwrootcatalog

3. Keep your MySQL database username and password handy 4. Point your browser to: http://localhost/catalog/install/ and follow the on-screen instructions 5. Remember to change the directory and file permissions as recommended during the installation process.

That's it. Congratulations on your installation of osCommerce.

Additional osCommerce installation Notes

* If you change your mind later about any configuration setting, edit the catalog/includes/configure.php file. Some relevant fields in this file are:

define('HTTP_SERVER', ''); define('HTTP_COOKIE_DOMAIN', ''); define('DB_SERVER_USERNAME', ''); define('DB_SERVER_PASSWORD', ''); define('DB_DATABASE', 'osCommerce');

* If you can't change file permissions in Windows XP make sure "Use simple file sharing (Recommended)" is checked off.

Problem symptom: Can't change file permission. Right-clicking a file and choosing properties does not show the security tab where read, write and modify permissions can be controlled.

Problem solution: Go to Windows Explorer. Click Tools->Folder Options. Select the View tab, and scroll down to find "Use simple file sharing (Recommended)" option. Make sure it is checked off.

About the author: Sanjib Ahmad has been in the IT industry for 6 years and works as the CIO for http://www.ambiah.com