OK so I installed Apache on Mandrake 9.1 and and I know it works cause I connected to it over the internet via web browser. Now, of corse I want to populate the default web space with my own content,
but the problem is that the directory is /var/www/html/ so, when I try to replace index.html with my own it wont let me, I assume its because I am not logged on as root. I know it is bad practice to log into gui as root.
So my question is, do I need to give my account permissions to write to that directory or what? I know there has to be a simple solution, I would also like to be able to ftp it up from another computer, I can't seem to find the answers in the Apache docs.

thanks

You could create the web site offline in your home folder, then you could su to root and move it and change the permissions to root using a cli.

at the command prompt type:
su -
(then press enter)
follow the screen.

now, type at prompt:
cp /path/to/index.html /var/www/html/index.html

if you want to know what cp does, type:
man cp (at the prompt and press "q" to exit).

you should be able to use any ftp client to access ur computer. make sure the port is set to 21 and that you are using the pc's ip address. hope this helps.