Server Requirements

If you are installing Hero on your own web server (or in a local development environment), your web server must have the following components:

• Apache or comparable web server
• PHP 5.0+
• MySQL 3.23+ (either as "localhost" or remotely hosted)
• Crontab (ability to add/edit cronjobs)

More information for configuration is below.

Web Server

Most server software will work fine with Hero, including Apache, lighttpd, and Microsoft IIS.

Please note the following:

• Your server should support .htaccess configurations and mod_rewrite or equivalent software which can rewrite URLs such as /articles/edit/134 to /index.php?articles/edit/134. Hero includes a .htaccess file that does all URL rewriting automatically, but it will not work if your server does not support this.
• An SSL Certificate is highly recommended for any site that has members and/or ecommerce activity. Once an SSL certificate is installed for your site on your web server, you can set the "force_https" setting to "On" to make sure that a secure HTTPS connection is used during account management and checkout.
• You will need FTP access to your web server to upload the files for Hero and also to CHMOD (change permissions) 2 folders and 1 file so that they are writable by the web server.

PHP

Your PHP should be configured like so:

• XML support with SimpleXML (installed by default as of PHP 5.13)
• cURL (with SSL support) must be compiled with PHP to use most payment gateways.
• fopen_allow_url should be "On".
• error_reporting can be as high or low as you would like. Hero is properly programmed and will not throw E_NOTICES.
• enable_short_tags should be set to "On", although they will be rewritten on the fly if not.
• safe_mode should be "Off".
• GD2 Image Library support. Optional: ImageMagick for more efficient image resizing and processing.

Hero eCommerce Requirements

This add-on has a commercial license and includes license protection software to protect this. For this reason, there is an additional license requirement:

• IonCube Loaders must be installed (free - download here)