Here’s a tip that’s something I’ve done for a long time and I think will be of use to many of you.
I have a private WordPress blog running on my desktop PC, and I use it for storage of all my articles. Most are my own articles, but some I’ve paid other writers to create and even a few are from PLR (private label rights) packages. In all over the years I’ve accumulated a lot of articles and just storing them as individual documents became very disorganized quickly.
So, with the help of a free and super easy program called WampServer (there are others out there, this is just what I’m using now) I’m able to run a small local apache server complete with PHP and MySQL database access on my desktop–and that allows me to run WordPress or any other type of PHP/MySQL based programs I want on my local machine. (Instructions for setting up WampServer and WordPress will be included below)
Like I said, I use WordPress for article storage. I’ve got it setup with lots of categories, and it’s searchable; so it works nicely for this.
Here’s why that’s important for me. As someone who does a lot of article marketing, I often use my own old articles as inspiration for new articles in niches. For example, let’s say I was going to create a new niche site about mortgage loans, and in the past I may have created a niche site about personal or auto financing loans.
I can’t really just reuse those old articles because they aren’t perfectly on topic, plus there’s the whole duplicate content concern… but a lot of the information in them will still be valid so I can use them as inspiration while writing the new articles.
And of course with PLR packs you’re purchasing articles that you will rewrite into your own words and publish. So again, having them available in an organized and searchable manner saves lots of time. You can find and display the article you want to work with, and then begin writing in seconds.
And you aren’t limited to WordPress. I know another article marketer who runs a copy of ArticleCMS on his desktop for the same purpose. I just like the WordPress interface a little more, but really you can use any PHP/MySQL based software you want.
Article Storage isn’t the only way to use this:
I also have another copy of WordPress running on my local server which has my theme files for the Leap blog. This allows me to make tweaks and adjustments to the theme and test them out before applying them to my live blog online.
As someone who likes to tinker with things, and often breaks what he tinkers with that’s a life-saver for me.
Another use of running a local server on your desktop is for site development. Right now I have the files for about a dozen new niche sites I want to launch but haven’t purchased domains or hosting for yet. However, the sites are sitting there ready to go, so when I get around to it I’ll be able to have them online and ready to earn revenue in minutes.
I really can’t list all the uses you could come up with for this, and the fact that it’s so easy to do makes it a double bonus in my mind.
Setting up WampServer on your PC
To run an apache server with PHP and MySQL database access on your PC you have to just download the free WampServer installer.
Once the download finishes (about 20MB) double-click the installer file.
You’ll have to accept the license and then click “Next” once or twice.
You’re done!
Seriously, it’s that easy to install.
To run the WampServer once it’s installed
Simply click the desktop icon that was created during the installation, or if you didn’t have a desktop icon created just go to the Windows Start menu and locate the WampServer folder. There you’ll have 1 option, “Start WampServer”.
After you start WampServer you’ll see a new icon in your system tray (lower right corner of Windows near clock).
If you hover over the icon you’ll see that the WampServer is running, but in an “offline” status:
Just left-click the icon and in the popup that appears select “Put Online”:
You can now open your web browser and go to “http://localhost/” and you will see an information entry page that links to your projects (you won’t have any yet), and also to PHPMyAdmin. There’s some additional stuff there too, but that’s mostly for more advanced users so unless you have detailed knowledge on server administration I wouldn’t mess with any of it. There’s really no need to for most people.
Adding a project
To add a new project to your local server–each project can be thought of as adding a new web site online–you’ll go down to the WampServer icon in your system tray again and left-click it.
This time in the popup that appears, select the “www directory” option:
This will open Windows Explorer to your projects directory.
Simply create a new folder for your project, place your files into this folder and they are now live on your local server. To visit the new project in live mode simply use your web browser and go to “http://localhost/ProjectFolderName”
Or you can just go to the main entry page at “http://localhost/” and all of your project folders will be listed there as clickable links.
You can have as many projects as you want (and your hard drive will accommodate).
Installing WordPress on your WampServer
This is literally no different than installing WordPress on any hosting account.
Simply download the latest version of WordPress and unzip it into your “www directory”. By default it will create a new project folder named wordpress, but if you plan to run more than 1 local blog for testing or whatever then I’d rename that folder to something else.
From your browser load the WampServer main entry page and click the PHPMyAdmin link. When PHPMyAdmin opens up find the field for creating a new database. Give it a one-word name. Okay, that’s done so get out of PHPMyAdmin and go back to your entry page.
In Windows Explorer (not Internet Explorer, but the file manager of Windows that comes up when you select the “www directory” option from the WampServer icon) navigate into the wordpress project folder that was created when you unzipped the WordPress download and rename the wp-config-sample.php file to wp-config.php.
Now, open that file (wp-config.php) in NotePad or WordPad and edit your database details.
Your database name is whatever name you gave it when you created it in PHPMyAdmin.
The database user should be “root”, and the password should be empty like so: “”.
A note on security here, you can modify it to give a password to your databases, and probably should, but since I run a good firewall and don’t actually store anything sensitive in my WampServer projects I don’t bother with that. For information on adding or editing passwords you should use the help and forums sections of the WampServer web site.
Save the wp-config.php file and then in your browser go to “http://localhost/ProjectFolderName/wp-admin/install.php” (replace “ProjectFolderName” with the actual name of your project folder) and follow the on-screen instructions. In just another minute your WordPress blog will be up and running on your PC for you.
Running a local server has allowed me to do a lot of things on my desktop that I otherwise wouldn’t be able to, and I can honestly say it’s improved my productivity by leaps and bounds.
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Tags: wampserver, wordpress
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