s9y only uses default settings and requires only 'session', 'xml/libxml' modules. *checks the PHP config*

Session support is enabled, as is the libxml stuff.
s9y runs with fastcgi, but I don't know about those redirect options and what they do. enable-force-cgi-redirect:
This compile-time option ...

Hi!

That's really strange. Which PHP version are you using? I know there have been buggy PHP releases where open_basedir did not work properly. PHP Version 5.2.3, which is the latest according to the website.

I am always using the latest PHP5 version to check my s9y version under. But s9y does ...

That's the thing, I removed virtually all restrictions from PHP short of turning off safe mode (which I'm not crazy about).

include_path: this is obvious as to what this does for PHP

open_basedir: From the PHP manual:

Limit the files that can be opened by PHP to the specified directory-tree ...

Ok, I have added the following to the vhost config for the user:

php_value include_path .:/usr/lib/php/:/server/web/:/server/web/s9y/:/server/web/s9y/bundled-libs/:/home/user/public_html/blog/
php_admin_value open_basedir /usr/lib/php/:/server/web/:/server/web/s9y/:/home/user/public_html/blog/
php ...

That Smarty error means that PHP cannot access the "templates_c" or "templates" directory of either the local or shared install. Can you check the permissions and ownerships of those directories? Maybe you also need to include them specifically to your safe_mode include listing? What should the ...

recap :

Each user blog has it's own serendipity_config_local.inc.php file with the correct settings (it's own database and/or table prefixes)
Each user blog has it's own uploads directory
Each user blog has the db set correctly (see 1)
Each user blog has all paths set correctly in the config ...

Hm, with enabled SafeMode, it might be that requires/include from a user directory require that the permissions on the shared installation files are members of the same group (or even with matching owners). I would agree, but what?

I added this to the vhost confg: php_admin_value safe_mode_include ...

In the fatal error messag,e did you notice that '/server/web/' was NOT in the include_path, as I said it must be? Sorry, my mistake, it is in there. I just turned safe mode back on and went to the page:

Warning: require_once(s9y/index.php) [function.require-once]: failed to open stream: Operation ...

Looks like things are not working perfectly...

The javascript stuff is broken on the plugin config page, as is the SSL support for the login...

I do have another virtual host for the web mail under an SSL link, however, using SSL for the login from the directory alias I mentioned earlier does work ...

Can you show me the exact error message you now get with the modified apache?

Warning: require_once(s9y/index.php) [function.require-once]: failed to open stream: Operation not permitted in /home/user/public_html/blog/index.php on line 6

Fatal error: require_once() [function.require]: Failed ...

Ah, okay, that's fine then. So no serendipity_Config_local.inc.php file is in the shared directory, only in the user directory? Actually, looking at the users directory, there isn't a serendipity_Config_local.inc.php file. It would appear that the script doesn't ever get that far to generate one ...

What do you mean with "main install"? You actually don't need to "install" the serendipity in /servers/web/s9y! Actually, that would make problems. That directory really only is the core acting for user installations. Only user directories are installed. Main install refers to the decompressing of ...

Hello!

I have searched the forum and googled a bunch with no luck, I hope someone can point me in the right direction.

I have followed the directions from http://www.s9y.org/41.html with no success (using links to htmlarea and templates).

If anyone has any ideas or needs more info, post/ask away ...