Here are two parts - one about how it works and another about how to run it. Consult them in any order according to your needs.

To make studying the project easier it could be done in steps. These steps are represented by certain points (branches) in repository, as more and more functionality are added.

• Step 1 - framework - at this point here is bare minimum of files, or "framework" which work for page loading. Refer to README in this version to learn more.
• Step 2 - users - now database is enabled and functionality of registering users, login, logout is added.
• Step 3 - htaccess - about some important features which are configured outside PHP code
• Step 4 - tasks - pages for creating, editing, listing and viewing tasks.
• Step 5 - submit - submission and checking.
• Step 6 - userrank - user profile and ranking pages.

Since we are able to submit and solve problems, we want user pages to work - here lists of solved problems are shown and some info about user (country, registration date, last login etc). In this update we add this page and also page for user-ranking (it is referenced from main menu).

One of the smaller issues by now is that we haven't yet added country support (it is not complicated but there is a lot of small data so let's do it separately). So country list shows single entry, unknown country.

There is also separate page for user's tried but not solved problems.

Reinitialize the database, create tasks and users (e.g. tasks from the taskinit.sql file) - try solving something and see the newly added pages.

This is a typical PHP + MySQL application, so you need an http-server with PHP interpreter and MySQL (MariaDB).

There are THREE ways to launch this zoo relatively easily.

Docker is something resembling virtual-machine (but not exactly) widely used in industry. We describe the content of "containers" we need in a file (or few) and docker prepares everything. You'll need to install docker itself (there could be subtle steps like setting user group in linux but generally it is not much complicated) - this is available in linux, windows and OsX. Then run files docker-build.sh to build an image containing our Apache2 httpd + PHP server with MariaDB in one. then docker-run.sh to launch container from it. If all is fine, the site should be ready at http://localhost:8080/

To initialize database: open http://localhost:8080/sqlexec.php and copy-paste content of the file dbinit.sql into the textarea, then click exec.

Pick some free hosting, for example AwardSpace / AtWebpages and simply copy files there. If you'll get error because RewriteRules exist in .htaccess while the server has no rewrite module enabled, and you can't control it - just comment these lines.

Then you'll get the site running on the web. There could be some limitations about some auxiliary functions (e.g. 3rd party login etc) but that's not much important for you now (such things anyway require efforts to setup).

Setup database: this is done with control-panel of the hosting - generally you are provided with some database name and connection info and create user here via web-interface. So then you need to put corresponding settings into conf.php file and populate database with tables, for which use the content of dbinit.sql except first few lines (no user or db creation) with some query running tool in the web-interface.

With this approach you'll find software package (by the name XAMPP probably) which contains HTTP server, PHP and MySQL inside and set up on your machine. It is not very difficult also and in some respects more handy than with docker. Then copy files there and setup database. For managing database there should be PHPMyAdmin web tool in the LAMPP packet - make use of it and generally follow instructions for shared hosting given above.