Update:

Weeks after giving up on MAMP, I stumbled across the solution. Turns out, ClamXav (open source anti-virus software) was blocking ports 8888 and 8889 by default. I turned it off and MAMP now works like a charm. When I have time, I will make ClamXav work with MAMP and post what you need to do.

— original post from May 23, 2008 —

If you have managed to get MAMP working on your desktop, hurray for you. I’ve given up.

I’m no newbie to Apache MySQL PHP stacks on other platforms. I’ve installed and developed on UAMP, LAMP, and WAMP stacks for both dev and production environments (except WAMP in production, that’s a NO-NO!!!) and someone has always managed to put together a clever install package that installs the latest versions of each piece of the stack in one go. I salute those faceless individuals (and groups) and offer to buy them each a beer if we ever meet.

The Living-e’s MAMP stack a different beast. I gave up after two days of Googling solutions. Am I whining? Ranting? Bitching?

Yes.

BUT I have a reason. I post this as a warning to those who have thrown together extra dev environments and staging servers in the past and think they will do it again with the most common MAMP stack out there. Plan extra days to get it working. You’ll need them.

(PS. for all those you have contacted me to solve my problem, thank you. I have moved development to a remote LAMP server and don’t have the time to try different solutions for my local environment right now. When I do, I’ll post my findings.)