[documentation] need help with PDO requirement

[adept digital evolution]

On 08-21-2009 10:11 AM, TechnoSophos wrote:
>> I honestly think this new PDO requirement will send 99% of the general
>> public packing (i.e., looking for something to use besides Drupal).
>>     
>
> PDO should be included with PHP in just about every normal PHP5
> distribution. Hopefully, it will not be an issue for 99% of the
> general public.
>   

Thanks for answering Matt!

Maybe pdo is included by on my server there were no pdo drivers 
installed when I did phpinfo()

I think this is going to be the case on 99% of the public's servers, 
considering that most of us are only equipped to use CPanel or Plesk or 
Ensim or the like.


If it *is* true that PDO is included with PHP on all servers, we should 
definitely take the info on PDO out of the D7 installation guide that is 
shaping up, and perhaps just link to a informational page that is 
external to the guide itself. Because the page is there and I am told it 
is a requirement, I just spent 2 hours of my life asking questions, 
researching on the web, and went and put all sorts of who-knows-what all 
over my server, only to find out that I probably did not need to?


Can someone please say how exactly one can verify before installing D7 
(or whether it is really necessary *before* installing) whether one has 
the PDO extension enabled for the database one will be using??

This needs to become part of the installation guide, your answer will 
really help. What can the average end-user check to receive confirmation 
that, 'Oh, OK, according to this installation guide I don't have to 
worry about PDO because I see "____________________________" on my 
phpinfo() page'

What would fill in that blank?


> CentOS and RHEL may be exceptions, because they do not come with PHP
> 5.2 out of the box. (They're a few years behind on that.) So if your
> server is running PHP < 5.2, you need to look for instructions on
> updating *PHP*, not *PDO*.
>   


root at server1 [~]# php --version
PHP 5.2.8 (cli) (built: Feb 21 2009 20:20:11)
Copyright (c) 1997-2008 The PHP Group
Zend Engine v2.2.0, Copyright (c) 1998-2008 Zend Technologies


Yet, there was nothing about any PDO extensions in my phpinfo() and the 
only reference at all to PDO was:
> '--disable-pdo'
>
> Basically, the above tells you what flags were set BEFORE the PHP
> source code was compiled. To change a configure flag, you basically
> need to get the source code and start from scratch. My guess is that
> you do not want to do that (nor should you need to).
>   

no, on my CPanel server I do not want to do that. I guess I could get 
another VPS for $5/month that has only CentOS and not WHM/CPanel 
installed on it, BUT THIS IS NOT MY JOB (as interesting as all this is 
in a perverse sort of way)

> Check your PHP version and make sure it is high enough to meet D7's
> minimal requirements. That's probably the best way to start.
>   


I have set my WebHostManager (WHM) update preferences to "stable" (by 
default it's set to "release") so everything is pretty much up to date.

I'm just afraid that if I do not have PDO enabled my whole installation 
will blow up when I run the install script.


Alll IIII caaannn saaayyyy is,

Drupal is certainly not for the general public. Not installing Drupal, 
anyhow. I'm sorry to say this if folks here think that Drupal is really 
something that even 50% of the general public could get installed on 
their own web server for their own small business or organization or 
personal blog or anything. Won't happen.

:-(

thanks again, Matt, I'm still hanging in here, by a slim thread but 
still hanging in. I'll be very sad if I have to dump my own Drupal site 
and go back to Dreamweaver, but as with many folks I am not financed to 
hire someone with the sort of knowledge that's required to install & 
maintain Drupal's back end....

kazar