Below are some of the main pieces of information you need to know when installing and getting the WAMP server.
- If you have IIS running and you don't particularly need it, disable it from running automatically. This will free up port 80 for Apache, and you can close down Apache and run IIS should you need to do so (assuming you are not using WAMP for a live hosting environment!).
- If you do need IIS, you can set Apache to run on a different port. This will require you to append the port number to the URL; for example, if you set Apache to run on port 81, the URL you will need to use is similar to http://localhost:81 as http://localhost will take you to the IIS install. To set Apache to run on a different port, open httpd.conf and change all instances of :80 to the new port number.
- If you have previously had MySQL installed on your system, make sure there are no instances set to automatically run. This can be checked in Windows Services. Also, there may be a my.ini file in the C:Windows directory which will mess with the new install. Remove this file, or make sure it is set in the data directory of the install it is for.
- Perhaps the most overlooked, and most important, is to install WAMP server as Administrator. If you don't do this, the server will not have the permissions it needs to run properly. You may find some services just won't start as they don't have permission to write to required directories - and they may not throw enough errors to help you figure out what the problem is. If you are having problems and you did not install as Administrator, the best thing to do is to uninstall and reinstall. Remember, uninstalling will remove any current data you have (website files, databases etc). Back these up if you need them.
- Just in case you missed the previous point, make sure you install WAMP server as Administrator.
- INSTALL WAMP SERVER AS ADMINISTRATOR!!! To do this, right click on the downloaded installation file and choose to 'Run as Administrator'.
Errors you may encounter
Table 'mysql.plugin' doesn't exist. Can't open the mysql.plugin table. Please run mysql_upgrade to create it.
You will need to initialise the database. It is easiest to do this from the bin folder of the wamp install.
Open a command prompt then change directory to where your MySQL is installed.
If your wamp installation is on a different drive to C, first change drives by typing in the drive name then change directory. For example, if your wamp installation is on D drive, you would do this:
- type in 'd:' (yes, a colon after the 'd')
- type in 'cd wampbinmysqlmysql5.7.26bin' - this assumes that the wamp directory is in the root of D drive. If you have spaces in the path anywhere, then enclose the path in double quotes
- to initialise the database, type in 'mysqld.exe --initialize-insecure' (without the quotes)
This list will be added to over time. Let us know if you have come up with any solutions to problems encountered when installing WAMP server.