Installing Magento: Notes

Tonight I installed Magento and it took much longer than I expected. Here are some notes to consider the next time:

1. The following folders MUST be 777 enabled: /var, /app/etc, /media
2. Even though the Magento website sort of makes it sound like the sample data is optional, IT IS NOT. Make sure you install that first.
3. If you are installing this on a local device you won't be able to validate the URL. You'll be able to prevent this check on the installation screen.

If you don't follow these rules you might run into the following:

1. Page Error: The URL "http://www.example.com/magento/" is invalid. Response from server isn't valid.
2. Page Error: Server Error...It may be down for maintenance or configured incorrectly.
3. The installation process might hang and the CPU might spike.
4. You might get the following in your error log: Call to a member function getFrontNameByRoute() on a non-object.

Good luck guys.