If you have already installed &PyGopherd; system-wide, or your administrator has done that for you, your task for setting up &PyGopherd; for the first time is quite simple. You just need to set up your configuration file, make your folder directory, and run it!

You can quickly set up your configuration file. The distribution includes two files of interest: `conf/pygopherd.conf` and `conf/mime.types`. Debian users will find the configuration file pre-installed in `/etc/pygopherd/pygopherd.conf` and the `mime.types` file provided by the system already.

Open up `pygopherd.conf` in your editor and adjust to suit. The file is heavily commented and you can refer to it for detailed information. Some settings to take a look at include: `detach`, `pidfile`, `port`, `usechroot`, `setuid`, `setgid`, and `root`. These may or may not work at their defaults for you. The remaining ones should be fine for a basic setup.

Invoke &PyGopherd; with `pygopherd path/to/configfile` (or `/etc/init.d/pygopherd start` on Debian). Place some files in the location specified by the `root` directive in the config file and you're ready to run!