Cerb provides a guided installer that verifies your requirements, initializes the database, and walks you through the initial configuration of the software.

• Step 1: Requirements Check
• Step 2: License
• Step 3: Database Setup
• Step 4: Save Configuration File
• Step 5: Database Initialization
• Step 6: Admin Account
• Step 7: Testing Mode
• Step 9: Security
• Step 10: Finished
• References

To start the installer, open your browser to the location where you downloaded Cerb. For instance:

• http://localhost
• https://support.example.com/
• https://example.com/cerb/

Step 1: Requirements Check

The first step of the installer checks if your server meets the requirements for installing Cerb. Correct any problems before proceeding, and then click the Next Step button.

Step 2: License

Review the software license agreement and then click the I Accept button.

Step 3: Database Setup

Driver

Leave this at the default of MySQLi (the MySQL Improved extension).

Cerb currently only supports MySQL¹ databases. You can also use one of the MySQL-based forks², like Amazon Aurora, MariaDB, Percona, or WebScaleSQL. We recommend MySQL or Amazon Aurora, as they receive the most testing.

Engine

MySQL supports many storage engines³ that offer different functionality, strengths, and trade-offs. Of those, Cerb is well-tested with the two most common:

• InnoDB: This is the default and recommended storage engine in recent versions of MySQL. It is transactional and designed to recover gracefully from unexpected interruptions. It implements row-based locking on writes, which reduces resource contention at scale in high-volume environments. It has slightly higher overhead than MyISAM due to transactions, durability, and indexing. It may require more resources, and more experience to maintain and tune performance.

• MyISAM: This is the legacy storage engine in MySQL, and it is no longer under active development. It's simpler to configure and maintain than InnoDB, and has slightly less overhead for some workloads (due to being non-transactional), but it risks data loss and corruption when the server is unexpectedly interrupted. It also implements table-based locking on writes, which generally doesn't scale well and may lead to resource contention in high volume environments.

In general, we recommend that you use InnoDB. If you're in an environment that only supports MyISAM, or you just feel more comfortable with it, then go ahead and use it.

This isn't a life-or-death decision. You can easily switch between storage engines at any time (and even use different storage engines for each table).

Host

This is the IP or hostname of your MySQL server.

If MySQL is installed on the same server as your web server, this value is usually localhost.

Database Name

The name of the database on the MySQL server that you created earlier with the CREATE DATABASE <database> CHARACTER SET utf8mb4 statement.

Username

The username that you created earlier with the GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON <database> TO <user>@host statement.

Password

The password that you created earlier with the CREATE USER <user>@host IDENTIFIED BY '<password>' statement.

Test Settings

Once you've entered your database connection details, click the Test Settings button to verify them.

Step 4: Save Configuration File

If the web server has write access to the framework.config.php file then it will automatically handle this for you and skip to the next step.

If it can't write the file, it will generate the file for you to manually copy and paste.

Step 5: Database Initialization

If successful, the installer will create your initial database structure. This may take a while because the database is created by incrementally running the updates from each previous version. Don’t worry if it doesn’t look like anything is happening right away.

Step 6: Admin Account

In this step you'll create the administrator account that you use to log in.

Name

This is simply your first and last name (given and surname).

Email Address

Your personal email address. This is how you will authenticate during logins, and it's where your notifications and account recovery details will be sent. For that reason, this should not be an email address managed by Cerb.

This will likely be something like you@company.com or you@gmail.com.

Password

It is recommended that you choose a strong password here that you don't use anywhere else. It should be fairly long, contain a mix of alphanumeric characters and symbols, in both upper and lower cases.

We highly recommend using a password manager like 1Password⁴ to maintain strong password security practices. You can also enable two-factor authentication for even stronger security.

Timezone

Cerb will use your timezone setting to display and interpret dates using your local timezone. The installer attempts to automatically detect this for you, but you can adjust it as necessary.

Default Sender

This establishes your first shared outgoing email address. You'll probably want to use something like support@example.com (where example.com is your own domain name).

You can also configure a personalized name for the email address, such as your organization name.

Once you're done, click the Continue button.

Step 7: Testing Mode

Without a license, Cerb operates in testing mode. This allows full functionality with a single seat.

You can install a purchased license in Setup » Configure » License.

Click the Continue button.

Step 9: Security

Review the security recommendations.

Step 10: Finished

That's it! You're ready to start using Cerb.

Click the Log in and get started link.

References