How to Install Microweber CMS with Apache on Ubuntu Linux

This article describes the steps to install and use Microweber CMS on Ubuntu Linux with Apache support.

Whenever folks think about content management systems, WordPress, Drupal, and Joomla come to mind. However, Microweber is a CMS that most people haven’t heard of.

However, if you’re looking for an open-source CMS that’s intuitive with drag n’ drop and real-time text writing and editing features for building websites, then Microweber is a great place to start.

Besides building great websites and blogs, Microweber has an integrated online store feature by default. You can then store components to sell your products online.

How to install Microweber CMS on Ubuntu Linux with Apache

As described above, Microweber is a great place to start if you’re looking for an open-source CMS that’s intuitive with drag n’ drop and real-time text writing and editing features for building websites.

Below is how to install it on Ubuntu Linux.

Install Apache

Apache2 HTTP Server is the most popular web server in use. Install it since Microweber needs it.

To install Apache2 HTTP on the Ubuntu server, run the commands below.

sudo apt update
sudo apt install apache2

After installing Apache2, the commands below can be used to stop, start and enable the Apache2 service to always start up with the server boots.

sudo systemctl stop apache2.service
sudo systemctl start apache2.service
sudo systemctl enable apache2.service

To test the Apache2 setup, open your browser and browse to the server hostname or IP address, and you should see the Apache2 default test page as shown below. When you see that, then Apache2 is working as expected.

http://localhost

Install MariaDB

MariaDB database server is a great place to start when looking at open-source database servers to use with Microweber.

To install MariaDB run the commands below.

sudo apt-get install mariadb-server mariadb-client

After installing MariaDB, the commands below can stop, start and enable the MariaDB service to start up when the server boots.

Run these on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS

sudo systemctl stop mysql.service
sudo systemctl start mysql.service
sudo systemctl enable mysql.service

Run these on Ubuntu 17.10 and 18.04 LTS

sudo systemctl stop mariadb.service
sudo systemctl start mariadb.service
sudo systemctl enable mariadb.service

After that, run the commands below to secure the MariaDB server by creating a root password and disallowing remote root access.

sudo mysql_secure_installation

When prompted, answer the questions below by following the guide.

• Enter current password for root (enter for none): Just press the Enter
• Set root password? [Y/n]: Y
• New password: Enter password
• Re-enter new password: Repeat password
• Remove anonymous users? [Y/n]: Y
• Disallow root login remotely? [Y/n]: Y
• Remove test database and access to it? [Y/n]:  Y
• Reload privilege tables now? [Y/n]:  Y

Type the commands below to log on to the MariaDB server to test if MariaDB is installed.

sudo mysql -u root -p

Then type the password you created above to sign on. If successful, you should see MariaDB welcome message.

Install PHP 7.2 and Related Modules

PHP 7.2 isn’t available on Ubuntu’s default repositories. So to install it, you will have to get it from third-party repositories.

Run the commands below to add the below third party repository to upgrade to PHP 7.2

sudo apt-get install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ondrej/php

Then update and upgrade to PHP 7.2

sudo apt update

Next, run the commands below to install PHP 7.2 and related modules.

sudo apt install php7.2 libapache2-mod-php7.2 php7.2-common php7.2-mbstring php7.2-xmlrpc php7.2-soap php7.2-mysql php7.2-gd php7.2-xml php7.2-cli php7.2-zip

After installing PHP 7.2, run the commands below to open the PHP default config file for Apache2.

sudo nano /etc/php/7.2/apache2/php.ini

Then save the changes on the following lines below in the file. The value below is an ideal setting to apply in your environment.

file_uploads = On
allow_url_fopen = On
memory_limit = 256M
upload_max_filesize = 100M
max_execution_time = 360
date.timezone = America/Chicago

After making the change above, please save the file and close it.

After installing PHP and related modules, you must restart Apache2 to reload PHP configurations.

To restart Apache2, run the commands below

sudo systemctl restart apache2.service

To test PHP 7.2 settings with Apache2, create a phpinfo.php file in the Apache2 root directory by running the commands below

sudo nano /var/www/html/phpinfo.php

Then type the content below and save the file.

<?php phpinfo( ); ?>

Save the file. Then browse to your server hostname followed by /phpinfo.php

http://localhost/phpinfo.php

You should see the PHP default test page.

Create Microweber Database

Once you’ve installed all the packages required for Microweber to function, continue below to start configuring the servers.

First, run the commands below to create a blank Microweber database.

To log on to the MariaDB database server, run the commands below.

sudo mysql -u root -p

Then create a database called Microweber.

CREATE DATABASE microweber;

Create a database user called microweberuser with a new password

CREATE USER 'microweberuser'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'new_password_here';

Then grant the user full access to the database.

GRANT ALL ON microweber.* TO 'microweberuser'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'user_password_here' WITH GRANT OPTION;

Finally, save your changes and exit.

FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
EXIT;

Download and Install Microweber

Run the commands below to download Microweber latest. Then create a root directory for Microweber and unzip the content there.

wget https://microweber.com/download.php -O microweber-latest.zip
sudo mkdir /var/www/html/microweber
sudo unzip microweber-latest.zip -d /var/www/html/microweber

Next, run the commands below to change the root folder permissions.

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/html/microweber/
sudo chmod -R 755 /var/www/html/microweber/

Configure Apache2 Microweber Site

Finally, configure the Apache2 configuration file for Microweber. This file will control how users access Microweber content.

Run the commands below to create a new configuration file called Microweber.conf.

sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/microweber.conf

Then copy and paste the content below into the file and save it. Replace the highlighted line with your domain name and directory root location.

<VirtualHost *:80>
     ServerAdmin admin@example.com
     DocumentRoot /var/www/html/microweber/
     ServerName example.com
     ServerAlias www.example.com

     <Directory /var/www/html/microweber/>
          Options FollowSymlinks
          AllowOverride All
          Require all granted
     </Directory>

     ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log
     CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined

</VirtualHost>

Save the file and exit.

After configuring the VirtualHost above, please enable it by running the commands below.

Enable the Microweber Site

After configuring the VirtualHost above, please enable it by running the commands below, then restart the Apache2 server.

sudo a2ensite microweber.conf
sudo a2enmod rewrite
sudo systemctl restart apache2.service

Install Let’s Encrypt Client

You should first install its client to get Let’s Encrypt free SSL/TLS certificates on your Ubuntu machine. The client helps automate the process for you. To install it, run the commands below.

sudo apt-get install python-certbot-apache

If python-certbot-nginx isn’t installed, you may have to add its PPA repository and install the package.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:certbot/certbot
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install python-certbot-apache

Obtaining your free SSL/TLS Certificates

After installing the Let’s Encrypt Certbot client module for Apache2, run the commands below to obtain your free Let’s Encrypt SSL/TLS certificate in the domain specified. Make sure to replace example.com with your domain.

sudo certbot --apache -m admin@example.com -d example.com -d www.example.com

After running the above commands, you should get prompted to accept the licensing terms. If everything is checked, the client should automatically install the free SSL/TLS certificate and configure the Apache2 site to use the certs.

Please read the Terms of Service at
https://letsencrypt.org/documents/LE-SA-v1.2-November-15-2017.pdf. You must
agree in order to register with the ACME server at
https://acme-v01.api.letsencrypt.org/directory
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(A)gree/(C)ancel: A

Choose Yes ( Y ) to share your email address.

Would you be willing to share your email address with the Electronic Frontier
Foundation, a founding partner of the Let's Encrypt project and the non-profit
organization that develops Certbot? We'd like to send you email about EFF and
our work to encrypt the web, protect its users and defend digital rights.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(Y)es/(N)o: Y

This is how easy it is to obtain your free SSL/TLS certificate for your Apache2-powered website.

Please choose whether or not to redirect HTTP traffic to HTTPS, removing HTTP access.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1: No redirect - Make no further changes to the webserver configuration.
2: Redirect - Make all requests redirect to secure HTTPS access. Choose this for
new sites, or if you're confident your site works on HTTPS. You can undo this
change by editing your web server's configuration.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Select the appropriate number [1-2] then [enter] (press 'c' to cancel): 2

Pick option 2 to redirect all traffic over HTTPS. This is important!

After that, the SSL client should install the cert and configure your website to redirect all traffic over HTTPS.

Congratulations! You have successfully enabled https://example.com and
https://www.example.com

You should test your configuration at:
https://www.ssllabs.com/ssltest/analyze.html?d=example.com
https://www.ssllabs.com/ssltest/analyze.html?d=www.example.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

IMPORTANT NOTES:
 - Congratulations! Your certificate and chain have been saved at:
   /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/fullchain.pem
   Your key file has been saved at:
   /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/privkey.pem
   Your cert will expire on 2018-02-24. To obtain a new or tweaked
   version of this certificate in the future, simply run certbot again
   with the "certonly" option. To non-interactively renew *all* of
   your certificates, run "certbot renew"
 - If you like Certbot, please consider supporting our work by:

   Donating to ISRG / Let's Encrypt:   https://letsencrypt.org/donate
   Donating to EFF:                    https://eff.org/donate-le

The highlighted code block should automatically be added to your Apache2 Microweber configuration file by Let’s Encrypt certbot. After that, your Microweber site is ready to be used over HTTPS.

<VirtualHost *:80>
     ServerAdmin admin@example.com
     DocumentRoot /var/www/html/microweber/
     ServerName example.com
     ServerAlias www.example.com

     <Directory /var/www/html/microweber/>
          Options FollowSymlinks
          AllowOverride All
          Require all granted
     </Directory>

     ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log
     CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined

RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{SERVER_NAME} =example.com [OR]
RewriteCond %{SERVER_NAME} =www.example.com
RewriteRule ^ https://%{SERVER_NAME}%{REQUEST_URI} [END,NE,R=permanent]
</VirtualHost>

A new configuration file for the domain should also be created named /etc/apache2/sites-available/example.com-le-SSL.conf. This Apache2 SSL module configuration file should contain the defined certificate definitions.

<IfModule mod_ssl.c>
<VirtualHost *:443>
   ServerAdmin admin@example.com
     DocumentRoot /var/www/html/microweber/
     ServerName example.com
     ServerAlias www.example.com

     <Directory /var/www/html/microweber/>
          Options FollowSymlinks
          AllowOverride All
          Require all granted
     </Directory>

     ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log
     CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined

SSLCertificateFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/fullchain.pem
SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/privkey.pem
Include /etc/letsencrypt/options-ssl-apache.conf
</VirtualHost>
</IfModule>

You’ll have to renew the certificates manually. You’ll get an email reminder to reset when the certificates are about to expire. To test the renewal process, run the commands below.

sudo certbot renew --dry-run

To set up a process to automatically renew the certificates, add a cron job to execute the renewal process.

sudo crontab -e

Then add the line below and save.

0 1 * * * /usr/bin/certbot renew & > /dev/null

The cron job will attempt to renew 30 days before expiring

After that, open your browser and browse your domain name to launch the Microweber configuration wizard.

You should see the Microweber setup wizard complete. Please follow the wizard carefully.

https://example.com

You should see the Microweber setup wizard. Type the database info and create and click Install.

Wait a moment for the installation to complete. After that, you should be able to sign on to the admin backend.

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