Install Concrete5 on Ubuntu 17.04 | 17.10 with Nginx, MariaDB and PHP

This brief tutorial is going to show students and new users how to install Concrete5 on Ubuntu 17.04 | 17.10 with Apache2, MariaDB and PHP support.

For those who don’t know, Concrete5 is a popular and widely used open source content management system based on PHP. It is designed for ease of use to allow webmasters and users to create powerful and dynamic content websites.

If you’re looking for a functional, high performance content management platform to manage your websites or blogs and 100% free, you’ll find Concrete5 to be useful.

This post covers installing the latest version of Concrete5, which at the time of writing was at version 8.2.1

To get started with installing Concrete5, follow the steps below:

Step 1: Install Nginx

Concrete5 requires a webserver to function and the second most popular webservers in used today is Nginx. So, go and install Nginx on Ubuntu by running the commands below:

sudo apt install nginx

Next, run the commands below to stop, start and enable 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

Step 2: Install MariaDB

Concrete5 also requires a database server to function.. and MariaDB database server is a great place to start. To install it run the commands below.

sudo apt-get install mariadb-server mariadb-client

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

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

After that, run the commands below to secure MariaDB server.

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

sudo systemctl restart mariadb.service

Step 3: Install PHP-FPM and Related Modules

Concrete5 is based on PHP.. so you’ll need to install it. To install PHP and related modules run the commands below

sudo apt install php-fpm php-common php-mbstring php-xmlrpc php-soap php-gd php-xml php-intl php-mysql php-cli php-mcrypt php-ldap php-zip php-curl

After install PHP, run the commands below to open Nginx PHP default file.

sudo nano /etc/php/7.1/cli/php.ini # Ubuntu 17.10
sudo nano /etc/php/7.0/cli/php.ini # Ubuntu 17.04

Then make the change the following lines below in the file and save.

file_uploads = On
allow_url_fopen = On
memory_limit = 256M
upload_max_filesize = 64M

Step 4: Create Concrete5 Database

Now that you’ve install all the packages that are required, continue below to start configuring the servers. First run the commands below to create Concrete5 database.

Run the commands below to logon to the database server. When prompted for a password, type the root password you created above.

sudo mysql -u root -p

Then create a database called concrete5

CREATE DATABASE concrete5;

Create a database user called concrete5user with new password

CREATE USER 'concrete5user'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'new_password_here';

Then grant the user full access to the database.

GRANT ALL ON concrete5.* TO 'concrete5user'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'user_password_here' WITH GRANT OPTION;

Finally, save your changes and exit.

FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
EXIT;

Step 5: Download Concrete5 Latest Release

Next, visit Concrete5 site and download the latest version.

After downloading, run the commands below to extract the download file into Apache2 root directory.

cd /tmp && wget --trust-server-names http://www.concrete5.org/download_file/-/view/96959/ -O concrete5.zip
unzip concrete5.zip
sudo mv concrete5-8.2.1 /var/www/html/concrete5

Then run the commands below to set the correct permissions for Concrete5 to function.

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/html/concrete5/
sudo chmod -R 755 /var/www/html/concrete5/

Step 6: Configure Nginx Site

Finally, configure Nginx site configuration file for Concrete5. This file will control how users access Concrete5 content. Run the commands below to create a new configuration file called concrete5

sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/concrete5

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

server {
    listen 80;
    listen [::]:80;
    root /var/www/html/concrete5;
    index  index.php index.html index.htm;
    server_name  example.com www.example.com;

    location / {
    try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php$request_uri /index.php;        
    }

    location ~ \.php$ {
    try_files $uri = 404;
    fastcgi_split_path_info  ^(.+\.php)(/.+)$;
    fastcgi_pass             unix:/var/run/php/php7.1-fpm.sock; #Ubuntu 17.10
  # fastcgi_pass             unix:/var/run/php/php7.0-fpm.sock; #Ubuntu 17.04
    fastcgi_index            index.php;
    include                  fastcgi_params;
    fastcgi_param   PATH_INFO       $fastcgi_path_info;
    fastcgi_param   SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
    }

}

Save the file and exit.

Step 7: Enable the Concrete5

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

sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/concrete5 /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/

Step 8 : Restart Nginx

To load all the settings above, restart Apache2 by running the commands below.

sudo systemctl restart nginx.service

Then open your browser and browse to the server domain name followed by install. You should see Concrete5 setup wizard to complete. Please follow the wizard carefully.

http://example.com

Then confirm all the requirements are met

Finally, enter your site info and the database connection settings and click Install Concrete5 to complete

Congratulations! You’ve successfully installed Concrete5 on Ubuntu server.

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