Will be installing some plugins of Sean Donahue in the coming weeks, and since the plugins require ionCube, we’ll need to read up on webhosts that do not have ionCube by default.

For example:

http://wiki.dreamhost.com/IonCube_Loader

We’ll update this page in the future and note down any challenges we encountered during the installation of the WP Profit Builder plugin.

Here’s how to enable ionCube in Hostgator:
http://www.ehow.com/how_8026831_enable-ioncube-hostgator-account.html

The Dreamhost Experience

1. Make sure your user account allows SSH first, before moving to the next step.

2. Read the tutorial at http://wiki.dreamhost.com/PuTTY (We downloaded beta release 0.64 – individual exe files, instead of the zip file)

After you have successfully installed the Public Key and the Private Key for autologin (for SSH), move to the next step.

3. Read http://wiki.dreamhost.com/IonCube_Loader

4. Download ionCube Loader.

Error – The ioncube folder does not appear in /home/username/ioncube

When I tried to mkdir ioncube via SSH (PuTTY), there was an error saying that the directory exists. Are we allowed to see the ioncube folder via FTP? Maybe not.

5. Install ionCube Loader (read http://wiki.dreamhost.com/PHP.ini for the phprc file)

NOTE: I don’t recall going through all these steps in the past for ionCube.

Created the phprc file and uploaded it via FTP.

Killed off all PHP processes via Manage Domains panel (easier than SSH). Waited 10 minutes for this to take effect.

Tested the system via loader-wizard.php (Tough luck: Got an Internal Server Error message.)

All php pages now display the Internal Server Error message. Perhaps killing off all PHP processes (via Panel and also via SSH) did this? Will wait 10 more minutes.

Enabled php.log and saw this: “[ionCube Loader] The Loader must appear as the first entry in the php.ini file in Unknown on line 0”

Okay… Filed a ticket with Customer Support. :-D