This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to install Froxlor Host Control Panel on Ubuntu 16.04 | 18.04 with the Nginx HTTP server.
Our previous tutorial showed you how to run Froxlor with Apache2.
For students or new users looking for a Linux system to start learning on, the most accessible place to start is Ubuntu Linux OS. It’s a great Linux operating system for beginners.
Ubuntu is an open-source Linux operating system that runs on desktops, laptops, servers, and other devices.
Back to Froxlor.
Froxlor is free, simple, and lightweight server control software that you can use to manage your servers in a web hosting environment from which you can manage and control domains, SSL, MySQL databases, and other web hosting features from a simple web interface.
Froxlor also runs on low-resource servers right out of the box. With its auto-installer, you can install multiple apps with one click.
For more about Froxlor, please visit its homepage. When you’re ready to install Froxlor, continue with the steps below:
Configure Ubuntu Local Host Domain
Before installing Froxlor, you must set up Ubuntu local domain on the server. To do that, run the commands below to open the Ubuntu local hosts file.
sudo nano /etc/hosts
Then type in the server address to domain mapping. You can use your public IP address instead of the local one.
127.0.0.1 froxlor.example.com
It should look like the lines below:
127.0.0.1 localhost
127.0.1.1 ubuntu1804
127.0.0.1 froxlor.example.com
# The following lines are desirable for IPv6 capable hosts
::1 ip6-localhost ip6-loopback
fe00::0 ip6-localnet
ff00::0 ip6-mcastprefix
ff02::1 ip6-allnodes
ff02::2 ip6-allrouters
Save the file and exit
Install Nginx
Froxlor is PHP-based and requires a webserver. The most popular open-source web server in use today is Nginx. To install Nginx, run the commands below:
sudo apt update sudo apt-get install nginx
After installing Nginx, the commands below can be used to stop, start and enable the Nginx service to always start up with the server boots.
sudo systemctl stop nginx.service sudo systemctl start nginx.service sudo systemctl enable nginx.service
To test the Nginx setup, open your browser and browse to the server hostname or IP address, and you should see the Nginx default test page as shown below. When you see that, then Nginx is working as expected.
http://localhost
Install MariaDB Database Server
MariaDB database server is a great place to start when looking at open-source database servers to use with Froxlor. 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
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
Restart MariaDB server
To test if MariaDB is installed, type the commands below to log on to the MariaDB server.
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-FPM and Related Modules.
PHP 7.2-FPM may not be available in Ubuntu default repositories. 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-FPM
sudo apt-get install software-properties-common sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ondrej/php
Then update and upgrade to PHP 7.2-FPM
sudo apt update
Next, run the commands below to install PHP 7.2-FPM and related modules.
sudo apt install php7.2-fpm php7.2-common php7.2-curl php7.2-posix php7.2-intl php7.2-mbstring php7.2-xmlrpc php7.2-mysql php7.2-gd php7.2-pgsql php7.2-xml php7.2-cli php7.2-imagick php7.2-bcmath php7.2-gmp php7.2-zip
After installing PHP 7.2, run the commands below to open Nginx’s PHP default config file.
sudo nano /etc/php/7.2/fpm/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 short_open_tag = On memory_limit = 256M cgi.fix_pathinfo = 0 upload_max_filesize = 100M max_execution_time = 360 date.timezone = America/Chicago
After making the change above, please save the file and close it.
To restart Nginx, run the commands below
sudo systemctl restart nginx.service
To test PHP 7.2 settings with Nginx, create a phpinfo.php file in the Nginx 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 Froxlor Database
Now that you’ve installed all the required packages, continue below to start configuring the servers. First, create a Froxlor database.
Run the commands below to log on to MariaDB. When prompted for a password, type the root password you created above.
sudo mysql -u root -p
Then create a database called froxlor
CREATE DATABASE froxlor;
Create a database user called froxloruser with a new password
CREATE USER 'froxloruser'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'new_password_here';
Then grant the user full access to the froxloruser database.
GRANT ALL ON froxlor.* TO 'froxloruser'@'localhost' WITH GRANT OPTION;
Finally, save your changes and exit.
FLUSH PRIVILEGES; EXIT;
Download Froxlor Latest Release
Next, continue below to download the Froxlor package. To download, go to the link below and download the latest version.
After downloading, run the commands below to extract the downloaded file into the Nginx root directory.
wget https://files.froxlor.org/releases/froxlor-latest.tar.gz tar -xvzf froxlor-latest.tar.gz sudo mv froxlor /var/www/froxlor
Change or modify the directory permission to fit the Nginx configuration.
sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/froxlor sudo chmod -R 755 /var/www/froxlor
Configure Nginx
Finally, configure the Apahce2 site configuration file for Froxlor. This file will control how users access Froxlor content. Run the commands below to create a new configuration file called froxlor
sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/froxlor
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.
server {
listen 80;
listen [::]:80;
server_name example.com www.example.com;
root /var/www/froxlor;
index index.php;
access_log /var/log/nginx/example.com.access.log;
error_log /var/log/nginx/example.com.error.log;
client_max_body_size 100M;
autoindex off;
location / {
try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$query_string;
}
location ~ \.php$ {
include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php7.2-fpm.sock;
fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
include fastcgi_params;
}
}
Save the file and exit.
Enable the Froxlor
After configuring the VirtualHost above, please enable it by running the commands below.
sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/froxlor /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/
sudo systemctl restart nginx.service
Then open your browser and browse to the server domain name. You should see the Froxlor setup wizard complete. Please follow the wizard carefully.
http://froxlor.example.com
Click Start Install to continue.
Validate that all requirements are met. Then continue to the next page.
Type in the name, username, and password on the database configuration page. You must also type in the database root user account and password.
All others can stay default.
When you click Next and get an error that the connection is denied for the root@localhost user, follow the steps below to fix it:
Login to the MySQL server by running the commands below
sudo mysql -u root
Type in the current root password from above.
That should get you into the database server. After that, run the commands below to turn off plugin authentication for the root user.
USE mysql; UPDATE user SET plugin='mysql_native_password' WHERE User='root'; FLUSH PRIVILEGES; exit;
Restart and run the commands below to set a new password.
sudo systemctl restart mysql.service
Try again, and this time it should work.
After that, log in and begin setting up your environment.
Congratulations! You have successfully installed Froxlor on Ubuntu
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