LAMP stack

LAMP is an acronym for Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP, it is a popular software stack for serving websites.

It is comprised of a Linux server operating system running the Apache2 web server, MySQL or MariaDB database, and the PHP scripting language.

ChatGPT defines a LAMP stack as such....

A LAMP stack is a popular combination of open-source software used to run dynamic websites and servers. The acronym "LAMP" stands for:

Linux: This is the operating system. In the context of the LAMP stack, Linux serves as the foundation upon which all the other components are installed and operate.
Apache: This is the web server software. Apache handles HTTP requests, such as serving up web pages to visitors. When someone accesses a site hosted on an Apache server, Apache processes the request and provides the appropriate web page as a response.
MySQL: This is the relational database management system. It's where the data for websites or applications is stored. Databases in MySQL store things like user information, site content, or any other data that needs to be persistently stored and retrieved.
PHP: This is the programming language primarily used in this stack for developing web applications. PHP is a server-side scripting language, meaning it runs on the server rather than in the user's browser. It processes requests, interacts with the MySQL database, and generates the appropriate HTML to be served by Apache.

When you hear someone mention a "LAMP server" or "LAMP hosting," they're referring to a server configured with this specific combination of software. Together, these components provide a robust and reliable platform for hosting and serving web applications. It's worth noting that while this specific combination is quite popular, there are many other technology stacks out there that serve similar purposes, such as the MEAN (MongoDB, Express.js, Angular, Node.js) or MERN (MongoDB, Express.js, React, Node.js) stacks.

This tutorial was made using Ubuntu 22.04, you must provision a vps have a fully qualified domain name and configure dns settings as per your vps provider and domain name registrars instruction.

SSH into your vps and set a root password.

ssh root@127.0.0.1 use the ip address provided by your vps provider.

passwd set strong password.

Set up a non-root user account

adduser "new_user"

Now give the new user sudo privileges.

usermod -aG sudo "new_user"

Lets transfer our ssh-keys to our new user.

rsync --archive --chown="new-user":"new-user" ~/.ssh /home/"new_user"

Set up the ufw firewall

ufw allow OpenSSH

ufw enable

Lets go ahead and update the server now.

apt update; apt dist-upgrade -y; apt autoremove -y

Once the server is updated lets edit the sshd_config file to disallow remote root access to our server and use our non root user to log in from now on.

vim /etc/ssh/sshd_config we want to change PermitRootLogin no to yes, make sure PubkeyAuthentication is set to yes, that PasswordAuthentication is set to no, and that KbdInteractiveAuthentication is no.

We need to reload sshd.

systemctl reload sshd

Now we should reboot the server, when it comes back up you will need to ssh using the non-root user name that we just created.
SSH back into your vps using your non-root user account.

ssh "vps_user"@127.0.0.1" Of course replacing "vps_user" with your non-root user account and 127.0.0.1 with the actual ip address of your server.

Now we are going to install our web server and database server we are using apache2 for our web server and mariadb for our database.

sudo apt install apache2 mariadb-server -y

We need to let apache2 through our firewall for now on port 80

sudo ufw allow 'Apache' we will remove the allow 'Apache' rule and add the 'Apache Full' rule to enable https traffic later but for now lets just let in http.

After installing apache2 and mariadb we need to enable and strart them.

sudo systemctl enable apache2

sudo systemctl start apache2

sudo systemctl enable mysql

sudo systemctl start mysql

Run the mysql_secure_installation script and follow the instructions

sudo mysql_secure_installation

Now we will install php.

sudo apt install php libapache2-mod-php php-mysql -y

Now that PHP is installed lets create the document root of our web server, and give the directory the right permissions.

sudo mkdir /var/www/"my_domain_name.com"

sudo chmod -R 755 /var/www/"my_domain_name.com"

Now we will create our index.html file.

sudo vim /var/www/"my_domain_name.com"/index.html

         
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
  <head>
    <meta charset="utf-8">
    <title>Welcome to my website</title>
  </head>
  <body>
    <h1>Looks like everything works!</h1>
  </body>
</html>

We need to create the virtualhosts file

sudo vim /etc/apache2/sites-available/"your_domain_name.com".conf

<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerAdmin "email address"@"Your domain name here"
    ServerName "Your domain name here"
    ServerAlias www."Your domain name here"
    DocumentRoot /var/www/"Your domain name here"
    ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log
    CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined
</VirtualHost>

We need to tell apache where are document root is, and enable rewrite, and restart apache.

sudo a2ensite "my_domain_name.com".conf

sudo a2enmod rewrite

sudo systemctl restart apache2

We are now going to use LetsEncrypt and certbot to enable ssl on our server.

sudo apt update

sudo apt install certbot python3-certbot-apache

sudo systemctl reload apache2

Now we will adjust the firewall to allow https traffic.

sudo ufw allow 'Apache Full'

Remove the allow 'Apache' rule so that we are only serving https traffic

sudo ufw delete allow 'Apache'

Now we are going to run the certbot program.

sudo certbot --apache

Follow the instructions on the screen
Check the status of the certbot renewal timer

sudo systemctl status certbot.timer

Do a dry run of the certbot renew script

sudo certbot renew --dry-run

There we have it a lamp stack running on Ubuntu 22.04 serving our web page in https.