I did look for this answer and exhausted all tires at it.
I installed Joomla using the Script install; which works great love it and the upgrade feature; form 1.5.1 to 1.5.2 worked great; although I don't see 1.5.3 yet (hint).
My issue is this: I'm not sure if I did this right; but I changed the Document root to home/x/public_html/joomla so that I don't have to use the joomla in my URL like www.x/joomla, to pull up the site; this works fine until I install another script and it installs in the root of public_html; now my URL links to those folders fail. My logic said this isn't the way to do this; I need to redirect it using mod rewrite or something; but don't know how to do it the right way.
I know this is a rookie question and feel stupid asking it; the answer is very simple I know it; but my mind is in the ozone right now; it has a big hole in it; I've got Gulf War Syndrome; I use this as my excuse for not getting this problem solved on my own.
This program is the greatest; can't say that enough.
Thanks
Jeff

here is a clear document about redirecting
http://httpd.apache.org/docs/1.3/mod/mod_alias.html#redirect

why not put the joomla in the toplevel and the other scripts in a subfolder instead the other way around? Or call the "joomla" folder differently so it's part of a whole or make a subdomain or or or... lol
there are so many ways..

Timing is everything; I just came to the conclusion that maybe I should have installed Joomla to the top level to start with, instead of taking the default; but I was a newbe; then I heard my email chime; checked it and here you are confirming that; thanks; I mean; it makes sense now; it is going to be the web site; not like other applications I might load after it; like phpBB; which should be no problem running under a sub folder. Some days I just hate making a decision; making a bad one makes it worse; trying to find ways to make up for that bad decision was even worse; redirects would be very slow and add a complexity that didn't need to be there; I wonder how many other people made this mistake; oh well I learned something today; it wasn't a total waste.
Thanks again.

switching joomla 1.5 to top level is luckily very easily done.
move the files and change 1 line in the configuration.php
var $ftp_root = '/home/xxxxx.xxx/public_html';
the var $live_site = ''; is empty on my installs as apparently it doesn't really need it as where older joomla versions need more lines to be changed.

I think many people oversee the little button: 0 toplevel 0 /joomla

btw joomla has fireboard forum component which is a nice alternative to other forum applications.

I was using Fireboard; then Joomla and other sites started moving to phpBB, which has nice features; but still lacks the integration I like about Fireboard; but for some reason I can't install phpBB; I did open a tracklist for it.

I did forget to reset the $ftp_root; thanks for reminding me; but one thing odd is that VM turns the FTP off; but with the permission set right it doesn't need it anyway.

I use JURI::Base for live_site; I do think this is the new 1.5 way.

You right about the button; I didn't fully understand it till the last minute.

The only problem I'm left with on some sites; its an error running Validate all Virtual Servers; I get a warning Home Directory: Sub-directory public_html/x under home directory does not exist. I did look at all the setting for any reference to joomla; I backed up my database and configure.php and uninstalled the joomla script, then reinstalled it; copied the database and config file back; apply settings to restart service; tried rebooting. I did get it to go away one time on one site; then it came back for two after I redid it; I have 9 sites on this server.

I started to use Freeway from http://www.openfreeway.org/; Open Source shopping cart; it needs a lot of work but with some community support it has a lot of promise.

The sites work fine; faster in fact; don't know why.

Thanks agin

We use Fireboard here at Virtualmin.com. It's a slightly older version at the moment, and has a *lot* of annoying bugs. Some of which have been fixed in newer versions, some of which have not. But, as jflesher notes, the integration is a killer feature and the reason we didn't go with phpBB for our forums.

Hopefully, Fireboard will continue to improve--mainly I want fewer features and fewer bugs and a cleaner interface, which is a weakness of Joomla in general. But Fireboard has spent an awful lot of development effort on loads of new features (and, let me tell you, the smiley features in Fireboard are awesome to behold...we would want them here at Virtualmin.com...but boy, Fireboard sure has a lot of smiley-related features). ;-)