How to Install a Joomla Forum on You Joomla Website

Forums are exciting extensions that are available for Joomla. They allow visitors in your website to interact by discussing topics. Installing forums is an imperative addition to your website if you want your visitors to discuss topics, content, or articles you post on your website.

SMF, or Simple Machines Forum, is one of the most popular applications used to generate forums. Installing SMF is different from installing other Joomla add-ons because you have to incorporate it into the Joomla database.

This tutorial will walk you through the process of setting up a Joomla forum.

Step #1
SMF can be downloaded at www.joomlahacks.com. After you have downloaded the extension, you will need to download the configuration.php file with your FTP client. The file is located on Joomla's main directory. Once you have downloaded it, you need to open it with Notepad and copy the following code lines:

$mosConfig_db = 'username_joomla';
$mosConfig_password = 'yours';
$mosConfig_user = 'username_joomla';

Step #2
Now you need to install SMF onto your Joomla directory. This process can be very difficult and will require little patience.
*First, you need to login to you cPanel account and click on File Manager. Then click upload files. Click Browse to select the destination of the SMF package you downloaded.
*Click Upload when you have selected the appropriate file. The file will be uploaded to ~/public_html/. Create a directory where you want your SMF package to be extracted to. Select your directory and then click Create New Folder. Name the folder "forum." On your directory, select the SMF installation package and click Move File. Copy it to the "forum" folder you created earlier. Select the SMF package and click Extract File Contents.

Step #3
You need to login to your cPanel account once again. Once you have logged in, go to MySQL Databases. Create a database and pick a name for that database. Now create a MySQL user account in order to access the database and assign privileges to the user.

Step #4
Next, you need to register with a JoomlaHacks account in order to download an SMF component. Now the component can be installed through your Joomla administrator account.
*Go the Installers menu and click Components.
*Then click Browse to select the destination in which you stored your SMF component.
*Click Upload and Install to begin installation.

Step #5
After the installation is complete, you will need to configure the forum program. Click on Components, Joomla SMF Forum, and then Configuration.

Configuration
SMF Absolute Path: forum (the file in which you stored the forum)
SMF Data Prefix: smf_

Now you click Save. And you should have successfully installed SMF!