using nominatim with python geocoder

Thanks for this clear answer. The browser address does load a very simple page.

Doing 'http://[server-ip]/nominatim' gets me the same "url does not exist" error that I'd been getting. However, when I add 'search.php' to the end of it, I get a "500 server error," but I'm not sure what could be going wrong. Any ideas of a common reason for this problem?

The webserver logfile should show the full error. On Ubuntu look into /var/log/apache2/error.log There is also http://[server-ip]/nominatim/status.php which might have pointers and the cd build; ./utils/check_nominatim_finished.php script.

Okay, so the error.log file says "Symbolic link not allowed or link target not accessible" and the status.php page says Database query failed. I also don't see a check_nominatim_finished script in utils... But I'm pretty sure Nominatim installed correctly and the map extract I used (just north america) finished importing

I mixed up the name, it's check_import_finished.php. It's only a couple of months old, maybe you installed an older version. In your Apache configuration /etc/apache2/conf-available/nominatim.conf look for the <Directory and alias lines and check if those paths exist. Maybe a simple typo.

Oh strange, that file isn't there either, so I must have installed an older version (although I started this process last week). I'd been playing around with the nominatim.conf file earlier - the director line is "/srv/nominatim/build/website" and the alias line is the same with the alias as /nominatim. Seems correct? (/srv/nominatim is where my build directory is)

Thanks for your help with this - I feel like I'm really close!