The readme is great, but I found a few things that need to be checked.

• In two seperate installation tests, I found I had to create a blank database before attempting to install the product (both on Debian). Just supplying root username and password wasn't enough, and nor supplying a new user with full rights for that schema.
• Our in-house server installed fine (debian wheezy), but on the more secure (and older) production server I needed to allow /sites/default/ and /cache/ more permission. I wasn't sure what these needed so I used chmod -R 0775 sites/default/
• renaming htaccess.txt to .htaccess seems to be required but not mentioned
• On my production debian (squeeze), I can't install because of an error relating to the php version I have : /install/index.php?u=/index.php&step=3
  • Unable to require /var/www/coursesuite/forum/public_html/sys//JsonSerializable.php
  • I have PHP 5.3.3-7+squeeze19 with Suhosin-Patch (cli) (built: Feb 17 2014 10:10:23) but there's no documentation on the required build or extensions.

In two seperate installation tests, I found I had to create a blank database before attempting to install the product (both on Debian). Just supplying root username and password wasn't enough, and nor supplying a new user with full rights for that schema.

Yes, that is how the installation works.
You need to create a database before installing codoforum.

I guess, database creation should also be included in the installation to make things easier.

Our in-house server installed fine (debian wheezy), but on the more secure (and older) production server I needed to allow /sites/default/ and /cache/ more permission. I wasn't sure what these needed so I used chmod -R 0775 sites/default/

We already have checks to tell you about the required permissions during the installation.

renaming htaccess.txt to .htaccess seems to be required but not mentioned

It is not required unless you want seo freindly urls.

On my production debian (squeeze), I can't install because of an error relating to the php version I have : /install/index.php?u=/index.php&step=3
Unable to require /var/www/coursesuite/forum/public_html/sys//JsonSerializable.php
I have PHP 5.3.3-7+squeeze19 with Suhosin-Patch (cli) (built: Feb 17 2014 10:10:23) but there's no documentation on the required build or extensions.

Codoforum requires at least PHP 5.4 or greater.

Great, perhaps you could modify the 'Installation' section of your readme.md file to mention this, e.g.

Requirements:

• PHP 5.4

Installation:

1. Extract zip file
2. create a database for codoforum
3. Give your web user account write permissions to ~/sites/default and ~/cache
4. Go to http://path_to_codoforum/install

BTW; This is an awesome looking product. Well done!