How to Install PrestaShop on Windows WSL

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The tutorial provides detailed instructions to install the PrestaShop eCommerce platform on Windows 10 using Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) 2 with Ubuntu OS. This includes enabling WSL in Windows, installing Ubuntu on Windows, setting up the Apache HTTP Server, MariaDB Database Server, PHP and related modules. Furthermore, it explains how to create a PrestaShop…

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to install the PrestaShop eCommerce platform with Apache on Windows 10 WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) 2 with Ubuntu OS.

PrestaShop is an eCommerce solution with all the features you need to create an online store and grow your business. Installing PrestaShop on Windows with Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) lets you create your online store in your environment with your servers.

With WSL, you can install and run a full Linux operating system inside Windows, which means you can use the powerful Linux tools and utilities to build and run your online store on Windows.

Additionally, WSL 2 comes with a performance boost and complete system call compatibility, which makes it a fantastic way to run a Linux environment in Windows.

If you have a machine that meets the requirements above to run WSL 2, continue below.

To get started with running PrestaShop on Windows with WSL, follow the steps below:

Enable WSL in Windows

To enable WSL in Windows, you will want to open the PowerShell terminal as administrator. Click on Start, then begin typing PowerShell.

Next, right-click the Windows PowerShell app and choose to run as administrator.

When the console opens, run the commands below:

dism.exe /online /enable-feature /featurename:Microsoft-Windows-Subsystem-Linux /all /norestart

After installing, you should get a success message similar to the lines below:

Deployment Image Servicing and Management tool
Version: 10.0.19041.844

Image Version: 10.0.19042.844

Enabling feature(s)
[==========================100.0%==========================]
The operation completed successfully.

Enable Virtual Machine Platform

WSL 2 requires Windows 10 Virtual Machine Platform to be enabled. This is not Hyper-V. To enable the VM platform feature in Windows, run the commands below from the same PowerShell administrator’s console.

dism.exe /online /enable-feature /featurename:VirtualMachinePlatform /all /norestart

If you’re using Windows 10 version lower than 2004, then use the commands below:

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName VirtualMachinePlatform -NoRestart

When you’re done running the commands above, restart your computer for all the configuration changes to apply. If you don’t restart, the below command might not be recognized.

After restarting your computer, log back in and launch PowerShell as administrator. Then, run the commands below to configure WSL 2 as the default version of WSL.

wsl --set-default-version 2

Install Ubuntu on Windows 10

Now that WSL 2 is installed and ready to be used, open the link below to download and install a copy of Ubuntu 20.04 from the Windows store.

Get Ubuntu 20.04 LTS – Microsoft Store

Ubuntu 20.04 LTS on Windows allows you to use Ubuntu Terminal and run Ubuntu command line utilities, including bash, ssh, git, apt, and many more.

Click the Get button and install. After installing Ubuntu, you’ll want the option to launch Ubuntu from the Windows WSL environment.

After launching, Ubuntu should install and prompt you to create your account.

Installing, this may take a few minutes.
Please create a default UNIX user account. The username does not need to match your Windows username.
For more information visit: https://aka.ms/wslusers
Enter new UNIX username: richard
New password:
Retype new password:
passwd: password updated successfully
Installation successful!
To run a command as administrator (user "root"), use "sudo <command>".
See "man sudo_root" for details.

Welcome to Ubuntu 20.04.2 LTS (GNU/Linux 4.4.0-19041-Microsoft x86_64)

 * Documentation:  https://help.ubuntu.com
 * Management:     https://landscape.canonical.com
 * Support:        https://ubuntu.com/advantage

  System information as of Mon Apr 12 17:57:37 CDT 2021

  System load:    0.52      Processes:             7
  Usage of /home: unknown   Users logged in:       0
  Memory usage:   26%       IPv4 address for eth0: 10.0.2.15
  Swap usage:     0%

1 update can be installed immediately.
0 of these updates are security updates.
To see these additional updates run: apt list --upgradable

That should do it!

Some troubleshooting commands to run when you run into the issues above. These run below and try to relaunch the Ubuntu image.

wsl --set-default-version 1
bcdedit /set hypervisorlaunchtype auto start

Now that the Windows 10 WSL environment is ready continue below to install Apache, MariaDB, and PHP and configure PrestaShop.

Install Apache HTTP Server

Apache is the most popular open-source web server powering most websites online. Since PrestaShop needs it, use the commands below to install it on Ubuntu.

To install Apache on Ubuntu, run the commands below:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install apache2

After installing Apache2, the commands below can be used to stop, start and restart Apache2 services.

sudo service apache2 stop
sudo service apache2 start
sudo service apache2 restart

To validate that Apache is installed and functioning, open your web browser and browse to the server’s hostname or IP address.

You should get a test page if everything works.

http://localhost

Install MariaDB Database Server

For this tutorial, we’re going to be installing MariaDB. PrestaShop needs a database server to store its content.

MariaDB is a truly open-source database server you can run with your projects. It is fast and secure and is the default server for almost all Linux.

To install MariaDB, run the commands below:

sudo apt-get install mariadb-server mariadb-client

After installing MariaDB, the commands below can be used to stop, start, and restart MariaDB services.

sudo service mysql stop
sudo service mysql start
sudo service mysql restart

Next, run the commands below to secure the database server with a root password if you were not prompted to do so during the installation.

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

To verify and validate that MariaDB is installed and working, log in to the database console using the commands below:

sudo mysql -u root -p

Type the root password when prompted.

Welcome to the MariaDB monitor.  Commands end with ; or \g.
Your MariaDB connection id is 46
Server version: 10.3.29-MariaDB-0ubuntu0.20.04.1 Ubuntu 20.04
Copyright (c) 2000, 2018, Oracle, MariaDB Corporation Ab and others.
Type 'help;' or '\h' for help. Type '\c' to clear the current input statement.
MariaDB [(none)]>

The server was successfully installed if you see a similar screen.

PHP and Related Modules

PHP is a general-purpose scripting language that glues all the above components together. PrestaShop is a PHP application and requires PHP and related modules to function.

To install PHP and recommended modules, run the commands below.

sudo apt install php libapache2-mod-php php-imagick php-imap php-json php-ldap php-common php-pgsql php-ssh2 php-sqlite3 php-xml php-mysql php-gmp php-curl php-intl php7.4-mbstring php-xmlrpc php-gd php-xml php-cli php-zip

That should get PHP installed with recommended PHP modules that you can run with many PHP-based applications.

To validate that PHP is installed, run the commands below:

php -v

You should see an output like the one below:

PHP 7.4.3 (cli) (built: Oct  6 2020 15:47:56) ( NTS )
Copyright (c) The PHP Group
Zend Engine v3.4.0, Copyright (c) Zend Technologies
with Zend OPcache v7.4.3, Copyright (c), by Zend Technologies

You can also test with a test PHP script and display the installed version and related modules that are enabled or disabled.

To do that, run the commands below to create a PHP test file called phpinfo.php

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

Then, type the content below and save the file.

<?php phpinfo( ); ?>

Save the file.

Open your browser and browse to your server hostname followed by phpinfo.php

Restart Apache, then type the address and browse the file.

http://example.com/phpinfo.php

You should see the PHP default test page.

At this stage, all required components that PrestaShop needs are installed above. Continue below to download and configure PrestaShop settings.

Create PrestaShop Database

Now that you’ve installed all the packages required for PrestaShop to function continue below to start configuring the servers. First, run the commands below to create a blank PrestaShop database.

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

sudo mysql -u root -p

Then, create a database called prestashop

CREATE DATABASE prestashop;

Create a database user called PrestaShop user with a new password

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

Then, grant the user full access to the database.

GRANT ALL ON prestashop.* TO 'prestashopuser'@'localhost' WITH GRANT OPTION;

Finally, save your changes and exit.

FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
EXIT;

Download PrestaShop

Next, download the latest version of PrestaShop.

When writing this article, the latest stable version of PrestaShop is version 1.7.7.4. Check the PrestaShop download page and check if a new version of PrestaShop is available.

wget https://assets.prestashop2.com/en/system/files/ps_releases/prestashop_1.7.7.4.zip -P /tmp
unzip prestashop_1.7.7.4.zip
sudo unzip /tmp/prestashop.zip  -d /var/www/prestashop

Then, run the commands below to set the correct permissions for PrestaShop to function.

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/prestashop/
sudo chmod -R 755 /var/www/prestashop/

Configure PrestaShop Site

Finally, configure the Apahce2 site configuration file for PrestaShop. This file will control how users access PrestaShop content. Run the commands below to create a new configuration file called prestashop.conf.

sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/prestashop.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/prestashop
     ServerName example.com
     ServerAlias www.example.com

     <Directory /var/www/prestashop/>
          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, including other modules.

sudo a2ensite prestashop.conf
sudo a2enmod rewrite

When you’re done, restart Apache.

sudo service apache2 restart

Now browse the server hostname or IP address and set up the PrestaShop platform.

http://example.com

This will bring up the PrestaShop installation wizard. Follow it until you’re done.

Type in your store information, create an admin account and continue.

Type in the database info and continue.

After that, your store should be installed, configured, and used. Login with the admin account created above and enjoy!

Conclusion:

This post showed you how to install PrestaShop in Windows WSL. If you find any error above, please use the comment form below to report.

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