                                 ------------------------------
                                 AnyPortal(php)-0.1   08/MAY/00 
                                 ------------------------------
                                            Stefan Wiesendanger
                                                     d@nger.org


  NOTE: The information here is updated only from time to time.
        For up-to-date documentation, check the AnyPortal(php)
        website at http://www.nger.org/anyportal/.

  CHANGELOG
  =========

  post-0.1

  12/MAY/00 Fixed a bug which possibly sent you to a non-exis-
            ting page after file modifications.
  12/MAY/00 Fixed a bug in Writeable(). Reported to be a prob-
            lem in recent versions of PHP (3.0.1x).

  Y2K DISCLAIMER
  ==============

  The date in the title of this README  is not Y2100-compliant. 
There may be all kinds of issues realted to PHP, to your OS and
to time-keeping  in general,  but generally Y2K disclaimers are 
just there to  keep customers from asking questions,  and so it
is here.

  REQUIREMENTS
  ============

  PHP3 on Unix/Linux.  AnyPortal(php) hasn't  been tested under
Windows. Some problems you  may encounter when running it under
Windows are listed further down under "ISSUES ON WINDOWS".  In-
stead, get the original ASP version from www.anyportal.com. 

  INSTALLING  
  ==========  

  'tar xvfz anyphp-0.1.tar.gz' in the directory of your choice.
The script file is called siteman.php3.  Access it via your web
browser.  There are no access restriction by default.  Edit the
configuration lines at the beginning of siteman.php3 to make it
suit your need.  Check http://www.nger.org/anyportal/  for more 
details.

  AnyPortal(php)  is basically  relocatable to anywhere  within 
your website.  Just copy it to  a directory where  PHP3 scripts
can be executed.  If you are concerned about security, the sec-
tion below might give you some ideas.

  -  PHP needs to have an upload  directory configured (usually
     in php3.ini)

  -  The directories and files you would like to administer via
     AnyPortal(php) need  R/W permissions  for the user the PHP
     engine is running as (ususally nobody).

  -  If you use GifIcons rather than MockIcons based on the M$-
     WingDings font, you need the default Apache icons that are
     usually installed under "/icons/" and "/icons/small". Some
     icons are lacking in the latter case which are included in
     the  AnyPortal(php)  distribution.  Just copy them to your 
     "/icons/small" directory.

  -  You will have to set a couple of things on the first lines
     of the AnyPortal(php)  script file.  Read the instructions
     there and modify the parameters. 

  SECURITY
  ========

  Remote Administration  is a security risk.  It should however
be possible to reach a reasonable  level of security using Any-
Portal(php).  Aside from the usual things you  can do to secure
your Apache/PHP setup  (consult the  respective documentation),
you can do the following things :

  -  Run AnyPortal(php) in a separate directory. Use a name for
     the  directory that is hard to guess.  

  -  Use Apache  access restrictions and authentication on that 
     directory, or even SSL (I personally use mod_ssl which you 
     can obtain from http://www.modssl.org).

  -  Set R/W permissions  only on the files you need to modify.

  -  And the most obvious but least implemented: frequent back-
     ups.

  ISSUES ON WINDOWS
  =================

  AnyPortal(php) currently doesn't run cleanly on Windoze.  The 
problem is  the broken PHP3  implementation of  is_writeable().
The workaround relies on an exec call to "id".

  Another thing is that file uploads may be handled differently
under PHP for Windows.  Also, there are a bunch of chmod calls,
after uploading and, implicitly,  when creating new directories
and files. Some work bill be required to adapt AnyPortal(php). 

  IMPLEMENTATION
  ==============

  Check the AnyPortal(php) homepage for documentation. It lives
at http://www.nger.org/anyportal/

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  ================

  Thanks to John Martin for providing  the original ASP version
of AnyPortal as open source.  The layout and  functionality are 
his ideas entirely. The ASP version lives at www.anyportal.com.

                              ***

