The core functionalities of ownCloud 6 are provided by the core apps which ship with ownCloud server by default. Some of these apps which are enabled by default include Activity, Calendar, Contacts, Documents, PDF Viewer, Share Files, Video Viewer, etc. While, apps like Bookmarks, Encryption, LDAP user and group backend, etc. are disabled by default.
If you are logged in as an administrator you can see the list of these apps by clicking on "Apps" at the left-bottom of the page.
What if you need more functionality?
After working on ownCloud for some time, you might find out that you need more functionality. More features can be added either by installing contributed apps or by creating your own custom apps.
You can download the apps contributed by various developers from http://apps.owncloud.com. Generally, ownCloud users have a tendency to keep the apps downloaded from the app store in the core “apps” folder of ownCloud server. This is not good because you might find it difficult to upgrade the core code later.
Where to keep the downloaded apps? Follow the steps below to keep the core code clean by separating it from the contributed apps.
1) Create a folder for the contributed apps. Name the folder something as "apps_contrib". Keep the newly created folder in the same directory as the core "apps" folder. This folder will be used to keep the downloaded apps.
2) Now, open the "config.php" file which is located in the "\config" folder. You will see the $CONFIG array in the file.
In the $CONFIG array, add the key 'apps_paths' and the associated array as shown below. Observe the array associated with the key 'apps_paths'. It tells ownCloud to look for the “apps” folder which contains the core apps and the "apps_contrib" folder for the contributed apps. The contributed apps folder has been made writable so that more app can be added to it through Internet.
'apps_paths' => array
(
0 => array
(
'path' => OC::$SERVERROOT."/apps",
'url' => '/apps',
'writable' => false,
),
1 => array
(
'path' => OC::$SERVERROOT."/apps_contrib",
'url' => '/apps_contrib',
'writable' => true,
),
),
Now, you can keep the downloaded apps in the “apps_contrib” folder, and enable them from the apps settings inside the ownCloud interface.
Note: You might get some error like "Can't write into apps directory
This can usually be fixed by giving the webserver write access to the apps directory or disabling the appstore in the config file.“.
To solve this problem, check if you have created the folder with the same name as mentioned in the $CONFIG array.
To know how to choose a hosting for ownCloud, you can see our detailed guide on how to choose an ownCloud hosting.
