Installing Open Server 6 (2025), Cotonti Siena 0.9.26, and phpMyAdmin

This guide allows beginners with no technical knowledge to set up a local environment for developing or testing a website on Cotonti.

In fact it's really simple, - just take 5 minutes to understand and you won’t need this guide anymore.

Requirements

• Windows, 10-14 GB of free space.
• Administrator rights (right-click → "Run as administrator").
• Files:
  • Open Server 6: https://ospanel.io/
  • Cotonti Siena 0.9.26: https://github.com/Cotonti/Cotonti/
  • phpMyAdmin 5.3.0: https://www.phpmyadmin.net/downloads 

Step 1: Installing Open Server 6

1. Download Open Server 6 from https://ospanel.io/ (full version).
2. Run the installer (right-click → "Run as administrator").
3. Install in C:\OSPanel (but not necessarily on the system disk, for example, I have it in E:\OSPanel_640).
4. Choose:
   • Web server: Apache 2.4.
   • PHP: 8.4.
   • MySQL: 8.0.
   • All PHP modules (zip, gd, mbstring, curl, pdo_mysql, mysqli) enabled.
5. Finish the installation. A shortcut for Open Server Panel will appear on the desktop.

Step 2: Launching Open Server

1. Double-click the Open Server Panel shortcut on your desktop or directly run the executable file (in my case, E:\OSPanel_640\bin\ospanel.exe).

2. Wait for the app icon to appear in the system tray, and wait until the cursor stops blinking inside it. 

   

3. Open the browser, enter example.local. The Open Server page should open with the text “Hello World!” as shown in the screenshot.

Attention, do not try to open https://localhost/ or https://127.0.0.1/ 

If preinstalled sites like https://example.local/ are not opening and you see messages like:

"Hmm. We can't find this site. We can't connect to the server example.local." (for FireFox)
or
"Can't access the site Couldn't find the IP address of the server example.local" (for Chrome and others)

 solutions to problems here. 

Step 3: Installing phpMyAdmin

1. In C:\OSPanel\home create a folder called phpmyadmin.local.
2. Inside it, create:
   • .osp.
   • public.
3. In phpmyadmin.local\.osp create project.ini:
   • Open Notepad.

   • Paste:

     [phpmyadmin.local]
     public_dir = {base_dir}\public
     php_engine = PHP-8.4
     

   • Save as project.ini ("All files").
4. Download phpMyAdmin 5.3.0 from https://www.phpmyadmin.net/downloads
5. Extract the archive and copy the files to C:\OSPanel\home\phpmyadmin.local\public.
6. Configure config.inc.php:
   • In C:\OSPanel\home\phpmyadmin.local\public copy config.sample.inc.php to config.inc.php.

   • Open config.inc.php in Notepad, replace:

     <?php
     $cfg['blowfish_secret'] = 'my_super_secret_string_1234567890123456';
     $i = 0;
     $i++;
     $cfg['Servers'][$i]['auth_type'] = 'cookie';
     $cfg['Servers'][$i]['host'] = 'MySQL-8.0';
     $cfg['Servers'][$i]['compress'] = false;
     $cfg['Servers'][$i]['AllowNoPassword'] = true;
     $cfg['Lang'] = 'ru';
     $cfg['UploadDir'] = '';
     $cfg['SaveDir'] = '';
     ?>
     

   • Save.
7. In the system tray, click the Open Server icon → "Restart".
8. Open http://phpmyadmin.local, log in: username root, password empty.

Step 4: Creating a Database

1. Open http://phpmyadmin.local.
2. Log in: username root, password empty.
3. Go to the "Databases" tab.
4. In the "Create database" field, enter cotonti.
5. Choose the collation: utf8mb4_unicode_ci.
6. Click "Create".

Step 5: Installing Cotonti Siena

1. In C:\OSPanel\home create a folder called mysite.local.
2. Inside it, create:
   • .osp.
   • public.
3. In mysite.local\.osp create project.ini:
   • Open Notepad.

   • Paste:

     [mysite.local]
     public_dir = {base_dir}\public
     php_engine = PHP-8.4
     

   • Save as project.ini ("All files").
4. Download Cotonti Siena 0.9.26 from https://github.com/Cotonti/Cotonti/
5. Extract the archive and copy the files to C:\OSPanel\home\mysite.local\public.
6. Open http://mysite.local.
7. Installation wizard:
   • Language: "Russian".
   • Requirements check: all items green.
   • Permissions: folders datas/avatars, datas/cache, datas/photos, datas/thumbs, datas/users - checkmarks.
   • Database:
     • Host: MySQL-8.0.
     • Database name: cotonti.
     • User: root.
     • Password: empty.
     • Prefix: cot_.
     • Click "Test Connection".
   • Site settings:
     • Site name: "My site".
     • Admin login: admin.
     • Password: secure.
     • Email: yours.
   • Click "Install".
8. Delete C:\OSPanel\home\mysite.local\public\install.php using File Explorer.
9. Check the site: http://mysite.local.

Step 6: Checking Cotonti Settings

1. Open C:\OSPanel\home\mysite.local\public\datas\config.php in Notepad or another editor.

2. Check the values of the global variable $cfg keys:

   $cfg['mysqlhost'] = 'MySQL-8.0';    // do not write localhost!!! need to specify the DBMS type and its version
   $cfg['mysqlport'] = ''; 
   $cfg['mysqluser'] = 'root';         // 'root' if everything is for phpmyadmin as in the instruction above
   $cfg['mysqlpassword'] = '';         // empty if everything is for phpmyadmin as in the instruction above
   $cfg['mysqldb'] = 'cotonti';        // name of the DB created in phpmyadmin for Cotonti
   
   $cfg['mainurl'] = 'http://mysite.local';
   

3. Save and run.

Step 7: If it doesn’t work

• You can read here or ask for help on the forum.