This article explains how to enable Search Engine friendly URLs using rewrite rules on Windows XP Joomla 2.5 installation. We decided to add this article, after we gave up on setting up SEO URL with rewrite when we were working with Joomla 1.5. After reviewing lot of blogs and sites, we consolidated and tried to add this to prevent the time loss involved in setting this up. The article assumes that Joomla 2.5 has already been installed and is up and running. This should also work for Joomla 1.6 or 1.7.

Admin Console Settings

1. Login to your Admin console of Joomla 2.5 installation
2. Click the Global Configuration
3. Select the settings as indicated in the below screenshot.
   

By select ‘No’ in option two and three, you will still be getting ‘semi-SEO friendly’ urls like:
http://localhost/joomla25/index.php/getting-started

But you will be stuck with index.php in all your pages

By selecting ‘Yes’ in option two and ‘No’ for option three, you will get URLs like
http://localhost/joomla25/getting-started

By selection ‘Yes’ to option two and three, you will get URLs like the pages are static html pages:
http://localhost/joomla25/getting-started.html

Inside the <Directory> tag ensure the following tags:

Options Indexes FollowSymLinks
AllowOverride All
Allow from all

The complete section is pasted below:

<Directory "C:/Apache2.2/htdocs">
    #
    # Possible values for the Options directive are "None", "All",
    # or any combination of:
    #   Indexes Includes FollowSymLinks SymLinksifOwnerMatch ExecCGI MultiViews
    #
    # Note that "MultiViews" must be named *explicitly* --- "Options All"
    # doesn't give it to you.
    #
    # The Options directive is both complicated and important.  Please see
    # http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/mod/core.html#options
    # for more information.
    #
    Options Indexes FollowSymLinks

    #
    # AllowOverride controls what directives may be placed in .htaccess files.
    # It can be "All", "None", or any combination of the keywords:
    #   Options FileInfo AuthConfig Limit
    #
    AllowOverride All

    #
    # Controls who can get stuff from this server.
    #
    Order allow,deny
    Allow from all

</Directory>

Add entry in httpd.conf to point to the htaccess file. You can either use the default htaccess.txt using the below entry:

AccessFileName htaccess.txt

Or

AccessFileName .htaccess

The above line will have to be added to the end of the httpd.conf.

For renaming htaccess.txt in the root of the Joomla 2.5 installation folder, you will have to do it through the command prompt.

After performing the above changes to httpd.conf, restart Apache server and retest.

.htaccess modifications

The default .htaccess configurations should work. However, if you still get 404 errors, try the following modification in htaccess

Uncomment RewriteBase.

RewriteBase /joomla25

Point to the location in which Joomla 2.5 is installed. Restart Apache Server and retest.

This article provides a step by step approach to install Joomla 2.5. This article assumes the installation of Apache, PHP and MySQL has been performed as explained in the previous article Installing Apache, PHP and MySQL for Joomla 2.5 on Windows XP

Download the latest Joomla 2.5 version from www.joomla.org website. At the time of writing, we are using the version 2.5x.

• Unzip the zip file to any location under htdocs. Example: C:\Apache2.2\htdocs\joomla25.
• To begin installation, access the URL: http://localhost/joomla25

• Input database connection settings to MySQL. See below screenshot. Click Next to proceed.
• Read and accept the Terms and agreement. Proceed to the next screen.

• Provide the website name and admin user id information. The admin user id will be used to login to the Admin console, after the installation is complete. 
• Next screen requests for FTP settings. For local installation in Windows XP, this can be skipped.

The article explains installation of Apache HttpServer, PHP and MySQL on Windows XP without using XAMP, a requisite for installing Joomla 2.5x

The article will go through the following steps one by one:

• Software requirements for Joomla 2.5
• Install Apache 2.x and verify
• Install PHP and get PHP working
• Install MySQL
• Verify PHP to MySQL connectivity

Software requirements for Joomla 2.5

Below are the recommended versions for Joomla 2.5
PHP  5.2+
Apache 2.x+
MySQL 5.0.4+

Installing Apache 2.x and verify

Download Apache 2.x from http://httpd.apache.org/.
We are showing installation of HTTP Server 2.2.17.

Click the download installer file to start installation. Click through the initial screens.

Select the typical installation.

We generally prefer a simpler installation path like C:\Apache2.2\

Click and move ahead and click the “Install” button to start.

After the installation is complete, start the server and verify by accessing URL http://localhost.

The above screen would confirm successful installation of Apache HTTP Server.

Install PHP and get PHP working

Download PHP from http://windows.php.net/download/

Download the VC6 version. We use the PHP 5.2 version. Download the zip file from this site.

Unzip the downloaded file to a location like “C:\php”.

The php initialization file needs to be configured. This file is present in C:\php by the name php.ini-recommended. It needs to be renamed as php.ini.

Some modification suggested for a local installation would be:
short_open_tag = On
display_errors =  On

Modify the extensions directory to point to the correct location.
extension_dir = “c:/php/ext”

Modify the session save path to windows like path from /tmp. Below would be an example:
session.save_path = “c:\tmp”

Also, to get Apache HTTP Server to be aware about PHP, we need to enable PHP in httpd.conf file located at C:\Apache2.2\conf.

Uncomment the below line:

#LoadModule php5_module “c:/php/php5apache2_2.dll”

To

LoadModule php5_module “c:/php/php5apache2_2.dll”

Uncomment or add the following line, inside the <IfModule mime_module> section.

AddType application/x-httpd-php .php

Verify, if you see the file at the location using Windows Explorer. Do not use backslashes.

Also, add the PHP Ini directory as below in the httpd.conf. This needs to be added at the end of the file:

PHPIniDir “c:/php”

Restart Apache HTTP Server for the changes to take effect.

To verify PHP to be functional, create a simple test.php with the following content

<?php phpinfo(); ?>

Save this file to location C:\Apache2.2\htdocs. This is the default location in which the server will look

Verify accessing the URL, http://localhost/test.php.

A page as provided in the below screenshot should open:

If this does not work, also add php in the path.

Go to Control Panel –> System –> Advanced tab –> Environment variables, and in system variables, modify the path variable and add “C:\php” at the end.

Install MySQL

Download the MySQL community server from 5.5.11 from http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/mysql/.

Click on the downloaded installer to install MySQL.

Run through the initial screens and click on the Custom installation.

We recommend using the simple path like C:\MySQL\

Click the install button to start installation.

Move ahead to confirm the My SQL Server instance. Ensure to enable starting/stopping as service, which is a very handy feature.

Provide a root password and finish installation.

Verify PHP to MySQL connectivity

This could be one of a painstaking step in this process.

Ensure that you are able to access MySQL instance. Create a new schema as test and create a table test inside it.

Create the table with such a simple columns. Add some values into this table. We will be later writing a simple php file to pull data from this table and display to verify php to mysql connectivity.

However, before reaching this step, you might want to check http://localhost/test.php again. Scroll down and try to locate any section for MySQL. This will not be currently present and will have to be enabled.

We need to enable the php extension for mysql connectivity. You will have to again edit c:/php.ini file which we created earlier.

Look for the php_mysql.dll and uncomment it. Remove the leading ;

extension=php_mysql.dll

Restart apache HTTP Server and again verify http://localhost/test.php

Scroll down to locate a MySql section in this page as provided in the screenshot. This would mean that all PHP MySQL connectivity libraries are enabled, so that we can proceed with the testing of PHP and MySQL connectivity.

Create a new file in htdoc folder by the name mysql_conn_test.php and add the below code:

<?php

# Define MySQL Settings
define("MYSQL_HOST", "localhost");
define("MYSQL_USER", "root");
define("MYSQL_PASS", "yourPass"); //Your root password goes in here
define("MYSQL_DB", "test");

$conn = mysql_connect("".MYSQL_HOST."", "".MYSQL_USER."", "".MYSQL_PASS."") or die(mysql_error());
mysql_select_db("".MYSQL_DB."",$conn) or die(mysql_error());

$sql = "SELECT * FROM test";
$res = mysql_query($sql);

while ($field = mysql_fetch_array($res))
{
$id = $field['id'];
$name = $field['field'];

echo 'ID: ' . $field['id'] . '<br />';
echo 'Name: ' . $field['field'] . '<br /><br />';
}

?>

Now, try accessing http://localhost/ mysql_conn_test.php

If it fetches the content from database, it would mean that we are finally ready to start installation of Joomla 2.5