• Linux
• Apache
• MySQL
• P (can mean PHP or PERL – depends upon your needs)

LAMP servers are very popular, cheap, effective, flexible, and reliable servers. But how are they installed? Actually, it’s not that hard. In this tutorial I am going to show you how to install a LAMP in two different ways: From the command line (using separate tools) and using the tasksel tool.

Hardware needed

Fortunately a LAMP server can be installed on lower-end hardware and still serve as a fairly efficient server. Naturally if you are going to be using your LAMP server for high traffic, you will want to select your hardware wisely.

Install prerequisite

Before you begin the installation of your server you will need to have your operating system installed. This is the “L” of LAMP. So find your favorite Linux distribution and install the operating system. For the purposes of this installation I am going to be installing on a Ubuntu 9.04 server installation. This will be a console only server (no GUI desktop) which is fine because the installation is done via command line only.

Once you have your operating system installed you are ready to install your server.

Apache

This is the easiest portion to install. Either log in to your console or open up a terminal window (if you are working from a GUI desktop) and enter the following command:
sudo apt-get install apache2

You will have to enter your sudo user password for this installation to continue. Once this installation is complete check it by pointing a browser to that server IP address. You should instantly know if Apache is up and running.

PHP

For the purposes of this article we will assume the “P” stands for PHP. To install PHP (and all of its requirements) issue the command:

sudo apt-get install php5 libapache2-mod-php5

Once this installation is complete restart Apache with the command:

sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

Let’s make sure this portion works properly. To test this create a file in the Apache document root (for this install it will be /var/www) called test.php. The contents of this file will be:
< ?php phpinfo(); ?>

Save that file and then point your browser to http://IP_ADDRESS/test.php

Where IP_ADDRESS is the actual IP address of your server.

You should see “Test PHP Page” written on your browsers page. If so, you’re good to go.

MySQL

Now to install MySQL. To do this issue the command:

sudo apt-get install mysql-server

Once this is done you then need to set a password for MySQL. To do this issue the command:

mysql -u root

which will put you in the MySQL prompt. From this prompt (which looks like mysql> ) enter the command:
SET PASSWORD FOR 'root'@'localhost' = PASSWORD('YOURPASSWORD');

Where YOURPASSWORD is the password you want to use for the mysql user.

Now start your MySQL server with the command:

/etc/init.d/mysql start

That’s it. Your LAMP server is up and running.

The quick version

You can actually install a full-on LAMP server on a (Ubuntu server install) with a single command:

sudo tasksel

You will need to select LAMP from the list and you will eventually be prompted for a MySQL password. That’s it.

Final thoughts

Getting a powerful, flexible web server up and running will take you less time and effort than you think. LAMP servers are an outstanding choice for your web servers’ needs.

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The most common server architecture on which PHP is found is called LAMP (for Linux + Apache + MySQL + PHP). All of the elements of LAMP are open source, meaning that the source code of the application is freely available. This means that the cost of setting up a server running LAMP is reduced (No License Fees), so LAMP based web hosting tends to be the least expensive solution available.

The Internet is built on a client-server architecture. On the client side we have the user and the browser. One the server side we have the server and its script interpreter (In our case, Apache and PHP).
Because PHP runs on the server side, we cannot use it for flashy client side effects, things like animations and auto-complete cannot be performed by php because php is only running on the server. For client side programming we could use javascript, Flash/Flex, Silverlight, or JavaFX.

What we can do with PHP is access a database, connect to other websites/services for information, and build a page out of smaller pieces, which we then deliver to the client for rendering.

I think it is important to indicate at this time that there are four levels at which you can work with PHP.

1. Scripting – this is where you take a small script and add it (integrate) into an existing page.
2. Coding – this is where you write scripts as needed to add basic functionality to your site.
3. Development – this is where you write an full application in PHP.
4. Architect – this is where you properly design an application that develop it into an application. Like development but puts a lot more thought into a good foundation.

Depending on your actual needs, several of these layers could be overkill for your task. The following articles will mainly be focused on the first two levels – scripting, and coding. In Scripting and coding we have two primary tasks we accomplish. One makes your job as webmaster easier. The second adds new functionality to your site.

Jeremiah Stover is a Software Engineer and a Business IT Consultant at Pragmatic Development. He has hands on experience and regularly provides practical advice in Business, Marketing, IT equipment and software. His Specialties include interpersonal communications, design skills, teaching and instruction. Right now he spends most of his time developing web applications in PHP and MySQL.

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One of the simplest installation is on a LAMP (Linux Apache MySQL PHP) server. Before you go on, however, I will highly suggest you install PhpMyAdmin so the database creation is simple. For more information take a look at my Install PhpMyAdmin for easy MySQL Administration article. Once you have PhpMyAdmin installed you will want to create a database for your installation. You can name the database whatever you want, just make sure you remember the name. With your LAMP server up and running you have the most difficult aspect of the installation out of the way. All that is left is the actual installation of Drupal.

Your first step is to download the latest release of Drupal from the Drupal download page. Once you have that file downloaded move it to your web servers’ document root. You will need root access to undertake these steps so you will with su to root or use sudo.

Unpack the Drupal file. This will most likely be done with the tar xvzf drupal-XXX.tar.gz command (Where XXX is the actual realease number). This will create a new directory called drupal-XXX (Where XXX is the release number). Now, I always change the name of this directory for simplicity. I will either rename this directory to main or something easy to remember. You can also move the entire contents of the directory into the document root. The only issue this can cause is if you are installing multiple sites on the same server. For that reason I tend to keep the Drupal install in its very own directory.

Once you have this file unpacked and the directory renamed, the fun begins. Fire up your browser and point it to http://path/to/installation/ (Where path/to/installation is the entire path to the Drupal installation. For example http://192.168.1.10/main/.) This will automatically start up the installation process.

Step 1

The first step in the installation is to select your language. The default will be English. If you need to install Drupal in another language select the obvious link. Once you click the appropriate link you will be taken to the next step.

Step 2

Step 2 requires that you change the name of the default.settings.php to settings.php. This file will be found in the /var/www/html/main/sites/default/ directory (This will depend upon your installation of course.) You also need to change the permissions of this file so it is writable by the web server. You can do this with the command chmod g+w settings.php. One last step is to create the directory sites/default/files with the command (from within your web servers’ document root) mkdir sites/default/files. You may get another error when you click try again. If you do this is a permissions error. Enter the command chmod -R g+w sites/default/files which should solve the problem.

Step 3

Now it is time to set up your database. Remember the database you created with PhpMyAdmin? This is where that information goes.

Once you fill out this information click Save and Continue to move on. You’re almost done.

Step 4

Just a couple more steps. Now you can remove write permissions on the settings.php file (chmod o-w settings.php) and enter the configuration information for your site. The information you need to provide is self explanitory. Once you have finished save the information and you’re done. You will be greeted with the “Installation Complete” page!

Installation Complete

Final Thoughts

You can now log in with your administrator name (you will have created that in the site configuration page above) and start building your site. Drupal is an outstanding Content Management System you will quickly come to depend upon for many of your website rollouts.

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The script made use of the following tools: date, cat, tar, mv, and rm. That’s it. The script will create backups with the date in the file name and then move the backups to a central location. Without further adieu, let’s get to the script.

#! /bin/sh

TMP=”/tmp/”

#Format the date in YEAR-MO-DY format
TODAY=`date +%F`

# Check to see if there is a lastbackup file in /tmp, if not create it,
# if so then set LAST equal to $TODAY
if [ -f /tmp/lastbackup ]; then
LAST=`cat /tmp/lastbackup`
else
LAST=$TODAY
fi

# Set the web directory backup name to the following
WEB_FILENAME=”inc-”$TODAY”-web.tar.gz”

# Set database backup name to the following
DB_FILENAME=”inc-”$TODAY”-db.tar.gz”

# this tars up my web directory into web.tar.gz tarball.
/bin/tar -czf $TMP$WEB_FILENAME –after-date=$LAST /var/www/html

# Move the web back to the backup directory
/bin/mv $TMP$WEB_FILENAME /data

# Remove web backup file from temp director
rm $TMP$WEB_FILENAME

# this tars up my database directory into $TODAY-db.tar.gz tarball.
/bin/tar -czf $TMP$DB_FILENAME –after-date=$LAST /var/lib/mysql

# Move the backup database to the backup directory
/bin/mv $TMP$DB_FILENAME /data

# Remove web backup file from temp directory
rm $TMP$DB_FILENAME

What I wanted this to do is create daily backups and move the backups to the /data directory on the drive housing the server. These backups will be saved for one month. After the month is completed i have a second script that deletes the months backups prior to running the next backup (so there is always a backup to fall to). How I made use of this script is simple. I save the script (called backup.sh) in the root user directory and create a second script called rm_backups.sh that looks like this:

#! /bin/sh

rm /data/*gz

With these two files in place I create two cron entries. The first cron entry is for running the backup.sh script and looks like:

0 23 * * *     ~/backup.sh

The second cron entry is for running the rm_backups.sh script and looks like:

0 20 1 * *     ~/rm_backups.sh

Both of the above cron jobs are created as the root user.

Final Thoughts

Naturally this solution could be easily modified (using such tools rsync) to set up an offsite backup solution. What should be obvious is that creating a simple, flexible server backup system on Linux is easy. With the help of a little ingenuity, you can create your own automated backup service.

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In this article you will learn how to install and configure the phpMyAdmin MySQL tool.

The first step is to download phpMyAdmin. You can get this tool from the phpMyAdmin download page. Once you have this downloaded you will need to move the file into the document root of your web server (you will need to have root or sudo access to do this and the setup) Most likely this will be either /var/www/html or /var/www. Once you have this file in the proper locaton it is time to take care of business.

The first thing to do is to unpack the file. The unpacking command will depend upon what file format you download. Let’s use the .gz file for an example. With the file phpMyAdmin-3.1.1-english.tar.gz in place issue the command:

tar xvzf phpMyAdmin-3.11-english.tar.gz

The resulting directory will be phpMyAdmin. I highly recommend changing the name of that directory to something easier to navigate and remember. I generally just change the directory with the command mv phpMyAdmin phpmyadmin.

Now that the directory is correct move into the directory. There is one file in particular you must have which is the config.inc.php file. You will notice there is a file called config.sample.inc.php. Some documentation instructs to change the name of config.sample.inc.php to config.inc.php and make your changes from within that file. It is my opinion that method can become confusing with all of the extra options included. Instead create the new config file with the following contents (depending upon your setup):

<?php
$cfg['blowfish_secret'] = ''; /* YOU MUST FILL IN THIS FOR COOKIE AUTH! */
/*
* Servers configuration
*/
$i = 0;
/*
* First server
*/
$i++;
$cfg['Servers'][$i]['user'] = 'root';
$cfg['Servers'][$i]['password'] = 'ROOT_PASSWORD';
$cfg['Servers'][$i]['verbose'] = '';
$cfg['Servers'][$i]['host'] = 'localhost';
$cfg['Servers'][$i]['port'] = '';
$cfg['Servers'][$i]['socket'] = '';
$cfg['Servers'][$i]['connect_type'] = 'tcp';
$cfg['Servers'][$i]['extension'] = 'mysqli';
$cfg['Servers'][$i]['auth_type'] = 'config';
$cfg['Servers'][$i]['AllowNoPasswordRoot'] = true;
$cfg['Servers'][$i]['nopassword'] = true;
?>


There are a few pieces to note. First make sure you use the actual root mysql password where you see ROOT_PASSWORD. Also, if you want to prompted each time for your login information change ‘config’ to ‘cookie’ in the ‘auth_type’ line.

Once you have that configuration file in place you should be able to log into your phpmyadmin system. To do this you will enter http://ADDRESS_TO_SERVER/phpmyadmin/ in your browser (where ADDRESS_TO_SERVER is the IP Address or URL that points to the server.

If, for some reason, this configuration file does not work for you give the web-based setup script a try. To run this point your browser to http://ADDRESS_TO_SERVER/phpmyadmin/setup to start the graphical setup process.

After you are logged in it should be pretty obvious how to create a new database. You simple enter thename you want to give the database and click the Create button.

You’re done! You now have a phpmyadmin install ready to serve you.

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