Something is not working correctly for installing. I uploaded the zenphoto files. Then I ran setup (studiopickett.com/zenphoto/zp-core/setup.php as per instructions. It did not ask me for any info - it just spat out a list of errors. It complained that zp-config.php.source should be changed to zp-config.php - after I do that, it then complains that there is no zp-config.php.source file.

Then it complains - Could not connect to the MySQL server. Check the user, password, and database host and try again - it never asked me for this info. I'm not a programmer - I have no idea where I''m supposed to put this manually - and why should I have to do this manually? I thought this was supposed to be easy.

I did this once. I then deleted all files on the server and re-unzipped the downloaded file and re-uploaded everything and did it again. Same problems. Plz - what did I miss of fail to do or do wrong?

Most likely the file permissions on your site prevented Zenphoto setup from creating the zp-config.php file. That is why you were instructed to copy the source file. When you do that, you also need to edit the file with your MySql user, password, and host information. (The error message did tell you this, but perhaps it was not specific enough with what you should edit.)

The error you are currently getting does tell you to check those values!

Where do I edit it? What do I type? Am I supposed to create a MySQL database? Years ago, I installed wordpress and it led me through creating a MySQL database and getting setup. Are there detailed instructions for doing this with Zenphoto?

You need of course to create the database yourself. You need to do that on your host's user interface. Zenphoto can't do that, but it will create the necessary database tables (as Wordpress does)

ok. I made a database - called it zenphoto, and created a user. Now what? How do I tell zenphoto about it?

Run setup then there should be fields to fill in the database info like user, passoword. Or use the zp-config.php file to fill in that info manually.

I dug out the wordpress php file to see what it looked like and used it as a guide. That has solved the problem. Perhaps you should make a sample file and instructions for others in the future to follow.

Thx.

Normally setup will use the zp-config.php-soure file to create the zp-config.php file after you entered the data in the form displayed.

Well, the zp-config.php.source file is the example. Not sure how much more clear it could be, but we will add more commentary.

The biggest problem you have is that Zenphoto cannot write to the folder. If there are other folders (albums, cache) like that, Zenphoto will not work.

I'm slowly getting the file permissions set correctly. As I fiddle, it lets me know which folders/files need the change made. That's not causing me too much grief, so far.

The zp-config.php file is really hard to read due to you not putting each command/item on a separate line. It also does not give any hint what the correct answers are. I would never have come up with the answer "localhost" on my own in a million years.

What file are you looking at? Each item is on a separate line in zp-config.php. And "localhost" is the value set by default for 'mysql_host'.
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I opened the file for editing in notepad and there were no line breaks nor paragraph breaks. Just one big run-on paragraph. Very un-readable.

"localhost" was not filled in - I had to type it in.

Get a modern editor (http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/uk/site.htm). All Zenphoto files use Unix line endings. "localhost" has been default filled in since forever in the zenphoto distribution examples. If yours was not, someone has altered your file.

Another great editor is bluefish ( http://bluefish.openoffice.nl/ ) from the open office project. Maybe try this one