Im very new to php but ive been doing well so far.
I am learning using a free 000webhost, then manually installing joomla using ftp filezilla. Ive got the whole thing set up however when i want to change anything via joomla i get “An Error has occurred! Unable to open configuration.php file to write!” I have no plug ins or components added. I looked in the the system info and everything is unwritable under permissions.
Im completly stuck and have no idea.
If you can help, could you write very basic steps so i can learn properly.
You will have to contact your hosting provider to change the permission of your configuration.php file to 777. Once they change the permission of your configuration.php file the file will be writable.
Looks like you need to change the file permissions. If you have FTP/SSH access, you can modify file permissions.
If you have to upload via some kind of web interface rather than PHP, you could have a PHP file do this for you:
<?php
chmod('configuration.php', 0777);
0777 may be too relaxed, but it will work. You might want to tighten the permissions back to their original values when you’re finished - file permissions have never been a strong point of mine.
Off Topic:
The best way of getting to grips with PHP would be to write a site from scratch and avoid CMSs like Joomla/Drupal like the plague. You’ll certainly learn faster by doing it yourself.
Err. How? I’m using 000webhost and using the phpMyAdmin. I can edit the configuration.php file directly using fillezilla but still doesnt tell me how to change permission.
Sorry, one more question. In filezilla it did allow me to change permissions and it sucessfully changed the configuration.php to chmod 777 but in joomla it is still registering as unwritable. have any ideas?
Woah, you must be working on a pretty top-secret project!
FTP gives you quite alot of control over files. Being logged in to the server, you’re typically given full permissions to do what you like with files - including changing permissions.
With some other protocols, e.g. SSH, you can also directly run commands (shell, cmd) on the server.
With many widely-used programs today, especially those of an open-source nature, if you think ‘this should be able to…’, chances are someone else thought that in the past and programmed it. So, if you get that ‘this should be able to…’ feeling, hit F1 and search - you may be pleasantly surprised!
Not a clue then, unfortunately. Maybe there’s something floating around the net that a google search may bring up?
Woah, you must be working on a pretty top-secret project! 
