Setup MantisBT on Ubuntu 18.04 | 16.04 with Nginx
This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to install Mantis Bug Tracker (MantisBT) on Ubuntu 18.04 | 16.04 with Nginx HTTP server…
Our previous tutorial showed you how to install MantisBT on Ubuntu with Apache2 web server… This one shows you how to use it with Nginx instead.
MantisBT is an open source issue tracker platform designed to be flexible and user friendly and provides a tool help you collaborate with different teams to resolve bugs and issues and quickly and professionally as possible..
MantisBT comes with a customizable dashboard board with role based access control for users, email notification and workflow to help your company fix issues with ease and care..
If you’re looking for a bug tracker tool for yourself or a business, you may want to take a look at MantisBT.. Mantis also has built-in modules that extend its functionality and the platform is actively being developed…
For more about Mantis, please check its homepage
To get started with installing Mantis, follow the steps below:
Step 1: Install Nginx HTTP Server on Ubuntu
Nginx HTTP Server is the most popular web server in use… so install it since Mantis needs it..
To install Nginx HTTP on Ubuntu server, run the commands below…
sudo apt update sudo apt install nginx
After installing Nginx, the commands below can be used 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
To test Nginx setup, open your browser and browse to the server hostname or IP address and you should see Nginx default test page as shown below.. When you see that, then Nginx is working as expected..

Step 2: Install MariaDB Database Server
Mantis also needs a database server to store its content… and MariaDB database server is a great place to start when looking at open source database servers to use with Mantis…
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 enable MariaDB service to always 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 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 logon to 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
Step 3: Install PHP 7.2-FPM and Related Modules
PHP 7.2-FPM may not be available in Ubuntu default repositories… in order 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-gmp php7.2-curl php7.2-intl php7.2-mbstring php7.2-xmlrpc 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 PHP default config file for Nginx…
sudo nano /etc/php/7.2/fpm/php.ini
Then make the changes on the following lines below in the file and save. The value below are great settings to apply in your environments.
file_uploads = On allow_url_fopen = On short_open_tag = On cgi.fix_pathinfo = 0 memory_limit = 256M upload_max_filesize = 100M max_execution_time = 360 max_input_vars = 1500 date.timezone = America/Chicago
After making the change above, save the file and close out.
Step 4: Create Mantis Database
Now that you’ve install all the packages that are required, continue below to start configuring the servers. First create a Mantis database.
Run the commands below to logon to MariaDB. When prompted for a password, type the root password you created above.
sudo mysql -u root -p
Then create a database called mantis
CREATE DATABASE mantis;
Create a database user called mantisuser with new password
CREATE USER 'mantisuser'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'new_password_here';
Then grant the user full access to the mantis database.
GRANT ALL ON mantis.* TO 'mantisuser'@'localhost' WITH GRANT OPTION;
While still connected to MariaDB database server, use the steps below to allow MariaDB root user to connect from the app to the databases..
You’ll need the root account and password to setup Mantis.. the steps below will disable plugin authentication for the root user..
use mysql; update user set plugin='' where User='root'; flush privileges; exit
Restart and run the commands below to set a new password.
sudo systemctl restart mariadb.service
Step 5: Restart Nginx
After installing PHP and related modules, all you have to do is restart Nginx to reload PHP configurations…
To restart Nginx, run the commands below
sudo systemctl restart nginx.service
Step 6: Download Mantis Latest Release
To download and install Mantis, run the commands below to get the latest as of this writing from this link..
On Ubuntu server, simply run the commands below to get it download… then extract its content into Nginx root directory…
cd /tmp wget https://excellmedia.dl.sourceforge.net/project/mantisbt/mantis-stable/2.22.1/mantisbt-2.22.1.zip unzip mantisbt-2.22.1.zip sudo mv mantisbt-2.22.1 /var/www/mantis
After that, run the commands below to set the correct permissions for Mantis to function.
sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/mantis/ sudo chmod -R 755 /var/www/mantis/
Step 7: Configure Nginx
Finally, configure Apahce2 site configuration file for Mantis… This file will control how users access Mantis content. Run the commands below to create a new configuration file called mantis
sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/mantis
Then copy and paste the content below into the file and save it. Replace the highlighted line with your own domain name and directory root location.
server {
listen 80;
listen [::]:80;
server_name example.com www.example.com;
root /var/www/mantis;
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 / {
index index.html index.php;
try_files $uri /index.php$is_args$args;
}
location ~ \.php$ {
include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php7.2-fpm.sock;
include fastcgi_params;
fastcgi_intercept_errors on;
}
}
Save the file and exit.
Step 8: Enable the Mantis
After configuring the VirtualHost above, enable it by running the commands below
sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/mantis /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/ sudo systemctl restart nginx.service
Then open your browser and browse to the server domain name. You should see Mantis setup wizard…

Type in the database name, username and root credentials..

After that, Mantis BT should be installed and ready to use..

Login with default:
Username: administrator
Password: root
Login and begin configuring your environment.

Conclusion:
You have learned how to install Mantis bug tracker on Ubuntu with Nginx HTTP server.. If you find any error above, please leave a comment below
Thanks,
You may also like the post below: