Macromedia Flash Communication Server 1.5 on Fedore Core 2

[aldor]

Hi,

I've been asked many times how to perform an easy install of the Flash Communication Server of Macromedia on Fedora Core 2 and every time I do this for me I still have to "explore" the way again I did it last time...

The first problem you will experience is this error when trying to install it:

> ./installFCS
> ./installFCS: line 221: [: -eq: unary operator expected
>
> ERROR: Your distribution, unknown, is not supported by this
> Macromedia Flash Communication Server MX installer.

Okay, this is not true - only if you would trust Macromedia and believe everything they say - but specially in the linux section I wouldn't trust them too much.

In fact Macromedia has tested the Flash Communication Server on some platforms and this test is about one year old - this "one year old" test describes that:

The official System Requirements are:
Red Hat Linux 7.3, 8.0 or Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3.0

The truth is: It also works on SuSE, Debian, Gentoo, etc. (If it is your decission to use it with this platforms...)

In this case, if you don't use "Red Hat Linux 7.3, 8.0 or Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3.0" (especially for the first one I suggest it is your case...) you have to start the install-script with:

> ./installFCS -platformWarnOnly

Okay, you think you got it - wrong - you would get maybe an error like this:

> ./fcsconfig: error while loading shared libraries: libstdc++-libc6.2-2.so.3: cannot open
> shared object file: No such file or directory
>
> ERROR: Your are running the Macromedia Flash Communication Server MX installer
> on the wrong platform.

Macromedia is again trying to tell that it is the wrong platform - the truth is that the installer has an problem with "libstdc++-libc6.2-2.so.3". Only trying to install libstdc++ or libstdcd++-devel is not the solution, you will have to install compat-libstdc++ - you can easiely do it by "yum":

> yum install compat-libstdc++

Say always "yes" and trust the makers of Fedora.

The next step is - before you start the installation - to create an Flash Communication Server User "fcs" and the group "fcs" on the machine with "adduser fcs".

Start now the installation again with:

> ./installFCS -platformWarnOnly

Durin the installation the installer will ask you for the user/group of the Flashcom - tell him "fcs".

The last step is really recommended if you will have cross related content between the Flash Communication Server, the Webserver and any other servers on your machine.

After the installation check if really EVERY file of the Flash-Communication server (default installed under /opt/macromedia/fcs) has the "fcs" owner on files and directories. If not so - change it recursively for the whole directory - in other cases you will expect some really nice bugs during Flashcom development that will make you crazy (trust me!).

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Okay - if you have any questions or run in trouble with any other things regarding the Macromedia Flash Communication Server just write it into this thread. I'm very curious.