You could use ForumReady.com -- http://www.forumready.com -- it offers everything in a simple package that E-Blah does, but without the the need for hosting and all through a server.

On Windows XP, this would be the best application to use:

http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html

It installs everything you need, and all you need to do is install E-Blah (which isn't that difficult on Windows with Apache).

I've heard GoDaddy gives free hosting (small hosting package) for free with the $9 domain.  I'm not sure if it works with E-Blah or not, though.  If you're wanting a domain, that may be the way to go.  There's many options now-a-days, but it's all up to you which way you'd like to go.  Running E-Blah from a closet server over a DSL/Cable line isn't always the fastest thing in the world.  

I was able to get Apache xampp installed so it responds to commands from the other computer on my hub.

Even after I pointed the blah.pl & setup.pl to c:\xampp\perl\bin\perl.exe and I copied EBlah under xampp on my server, it didn't appear to respond from my other computer.   Perhaps I made some other error but I cannot say I see evidence of the pl extension getting the commands into Perl when execution is attempted.  Suggestions please?

I also tried a CD-R boot of UBUNTU but found only 4 simultanous connections allowed there too so I returned to WinXP.

I don't know all the options but comparing to GoDaddy at $9 there is Hostway at $8 and Candanga at $7 per year.  I get my share of cable for $10 a month and I have the "closet server" so I want to finish.  

What does it say when you try to run it from the browser?

http://localhost/cgi-bin/forum/setup.pl  

Server error!
The server encountered an internal error and was unable to complete your request. Either the server is overloaded or there was an error in a CGI script.

http://localhost/cgi-bin/printenv.pl

This URL prints an accurate looking report, proving their Perl script does run.  

Combined it appears there is something amiss in the setup.pl but I don't know Perl for how to get a display of what works before it dies.

What does your Apache error logs say is the problem?

The previous error was corrected by using this format for the first line:
#!"C:\xampp\perl\bin\perl.exe"

The current error was a blank page but the log reports this:

[Wed Jan 10 21:03:10 2007] [error] [client 127.0.0.1] Premature end of script headers: Setup.pl
[Wed Jan 10 21:03:10 2007] [error] [client 127.0.0.1] Can't locate CGI/Carp.pm in @INC (@INC contains: .) at C:/xampp/cgi-bin/forum/Setup.pl line 22.\r
[Wed Jan 10 21:03:10 2007] [error] [client 127.0.0.1] BEGIN failed--compilation aborted at C:/xampp/cgi-bin/forum/Setup.pl line 22.\r

Go and install ActivePerl from ActivePerl.com and then change the directories to the new Perl location (it should be c:/perl/bin/perl.exe).  ActivePerl has all the modules you'll need.

That did it!  Thanks.  God bless you!

Great!  Glad you got it all fixed up.  

My EBlah works, but how do I get XAMPP to turn to my own webpage or eblah forum instead of the XAMPP pages when I first open the site:  http://localhost ?

Not sure where to break this from an install thread to a post install thread.  

Also where do you suggest I go to start learning mods?  I'd like to hide the stats behind a button up top like the calender for example, allow uploading photos in messages, and maybe a few other tweaks.

Thanks.

You should be able to edit the index.??? file in the main www directory.  Change it to a link to your forum or add content to it and all.

You'd have to study how to program in Perl.  I don't have any good tut sites, but if you Google, I'm sure you'll find some good ones.  

you need to edit the default directory setting in the config file of xampp
it will be in something like xampp/apache/conf/httpd.conf
open httpd.conf and look for documentroot
it will look something similar to this: documentroot  "c:/program files/xampp/public_html"  (this on a windows installation)
change the directory to whatever your root html directory is.  if your serving your main pages out of c:/websites/mywww then you would change c:/program files/xampp/public_html to c:/websites/mywww
now scroll down just a little further till you find "this should be changed to whatever your document root is set to" and change that directory as well.
make sure you do not change the serverroot directory, or you will render your server useless.

also, you may need to change the cgi-bin directory to your new location (found in the same configuration file), or easier yet, just enable handlers and add .pl and .php as handlers.  that will enable you to run scripts outside the cgi-bin directory.  (comes in handy for running php webpages, or mods/addons to eblah)

Seeing as its kind of along these lines..

I've just created a nice shiny new forum, and now I'm trying to upgrade it from 10.1.something to 10.2. I downloaded the latest version, but I have no idea how totry to upload it as I've been told by the help questions etc. I used forumready.com as my base template thingy. Any help would be ace

Thanks

read the install doc found in the full download.  it will tell you step by step what to do.