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After installing and configuring MySQL 8.0.30, I installed the Apache Web Server, PHP and the MySQLi packages. Here are the step-by-step instructions after installing and configuring the MySQL Server and provisioning a student user and the sakila and studentdb databases (blog for those steps). After installing the major components, I completed the HTTPS configuration steps for Apache 2.

The installation steps are:

  1. Install the Apache packages as the sudoer user with this command: 

    sudo dnf install -y httpd
  2. Enable Apache as the sudoer user with this command: 

    chkconfig httpd on

    This returns the following completion message:

    Note: Forwarding request to 'systemctl enable httpd.service'.
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/httpd.service → /usr/lib/systemd/system/httpd.service.

    A quick Linux syntax note in the event you want to confirm the link or link target later. You can use the following syntax as a sudoer user to find the link:

    ls `find /etc -type l | grep httpd.service 2>/dev/null`

    and the following syntax as a sudoer user to find the link’s target:

    readlink `find /etc -type l | grep httpd.service 2>/dev/null`
  3. You still need to start the Apache service unless you reboot the operating system as the sudoer user with this command: 

    apachectl start
  4. At this point, you need to check the firewall settings because Apache can’t even read localhost at this point. If you’re new to these firewall commands, you should consider reviewing Korbin Brown’s tutorial. As the sudoer user check the Apache available services with this command: 

    firewall-cmd --zone=public --list-services

    It should return:

    cockpit dhcpv6-client ssh

    Add the following services and ports with these commands:

    firewall-cmd --zone=public --add-port 80/tcp --permanent
firewall-cmd --zone=public --add-port 443/tcp --permanent
firewall-cmd --zone=public --add-port 8080/tcp --permanent
firewall-cmd --zone=public --add-service=http --permanent
firewall-cmd --zone=public --add-service=https --permanent

    Check the open ports with the following command:

    firewall-cmd --zone=public --list-ports

    It should return:

    80/tcp 443/tcp 8080/tcp

    Check the open services with the following command:

    firewall-cmd --zone=public --list-services

    It should return:

    cockpit dhcpv6-client http https ssh
  5. Create the hello.htm file in the /var/www/html directory as the root user:

    Restart the Apache service as the sudoer user:

    apache restart

    <html>
<body>
Hello World!
</body>
</html>

    Then, you can launch the Firefox browser and type the following:

    localhost/hello.htm

    It should print “Hello World!” in the browser.

  6. Install the php package as the sudoer user with the following command: 

    sudo dnf install -y php

    Create the info.php file in the /var/www/html directory as the root user:

    <?php
  phpinfo();
?>

    apache restart

    Then, you can launch the Firefox browser and type the following:

    localhost/info.php

    It should return the following in the browser.

  7. Install the php_mysqli package as the sudoer user with the following command: 

    dnf install -y php-mysqli

    Create the mysqli_check.php file in the /var/www/html directory as the root user:

    <html>
<header>
<title>Static Query Object Sample</title>
</header>
<body>
<?php
  if (!function_exists('mysqli_init') && !extension_loaded('mysqli')) {
    print 'mysqli not installed.'; }
  else {
    print 'mysqli installed.'; }
  if (!function_exists('pdo_init') && !extension_loaded('pdo')) {
    print '<p>pdo not installed.</p>'; }
  else {
    print '<p>pdo installed.</p>'; }
?>
</script>
</body>
</html>

    apache restart

    Then, you can launch the Firefox browser and type the following:

    localhost/mysqli_check.php

    It should print the following in the browser.

    mysqli installed.
 
pdo installed.
  8. Check if the mod_ssl module is installed. You can use the following command:: 

    rpm -qa | grep mod_ssl

    Assuming it’s not installed, you install it like this:

    dnf install -y mod_ssl

    Recheck after installing mod_ssl with the following command::

    rpm -qa | grep mod_ssl

    It should print:

    mod_ssl-2.4.51-7.el9_0.x86_64
  9. AlmaLinux and Apache require you to resolve the ServerName values and the public and private keys. Run this command on AlmaLinux to begin verifying and configuring the ServerName values and the public and private keys: 

    httpd -M | grep ssl

    Assuming a new installation consistent with were MySQL and Apache were just configured, you should get the following message:

    AH00558: httpd: Could not reliably determine the server's fully qualified domain name, using localhost.localdomain. Set the 'ServerName' directive globally to suppress this message
 ssl_module (shared)

    Recheck the failure for more detail with this command:

    sudo systemctl status httpd.service -l --no-pager

    It should print:

    ● httpd.service - The Apache HTTP Server
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/httpd.service; enabled; vendor preset: disabled)
    Drop-In: /usr/lib/systemd/system/httpd.service.d
             └─php-fpm.conf
     Active: active (running) since Sun 2022-11-13 22:39:07 EST; 1h 37min ago
       Docs: man:httpd.service(8)
   Main PID: 1351 (httpd)
     Status: "Total requests: 0; Idle/Busy workers 100/0;Requests/sec: 0; Bytes served/sec:   0 B/sec"
      Tasks: 213 (limit: 23280)
     Memory: 43.1M
        CPU: 2.733s
     CGroup: /system.slice/httpd.service
             ├─1351 /usr/sbin/httpd -DFOREGROUND
             ├─1443 /usr/sbin/httpd -DFOREGROUND
             ├─1452 /usr/sbin/httpd -DFOREGROUND
             ├─1456 /usr/sbin/httpd -DFOREGROUND
             └─1459 /usr/sbin/httpd -DFOREGROUND
 
Nov 13 22:39:06 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: Starting The Apache HTTP Server...
Nov 13 22:39:07 localhost.localdomain httpd[1351]: AH00558: httpd: Could not reliably determine the server's fully qualified domain name, using localhost.localdomain. Set the 'ServerName' directive globally to suppress this message
Nov 13 22:39:07 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: Started The Apache HTTP Server.
Nov 13 22:39:07 localhost.localdomain httpd[1351]: Server configured, listening on: port 80

    It takes the next set of steps to fix the ServerName values.

    • Generically, on Linux you need to find the files to modify. You can use the following command from within the /etc directory to find the configuration files in the /etc directory that include ServerName in them. Their values will be proceeded by a # symbol because they’re comments by default. 

      find /etc -type f | xargs grep -i ServerName

      It should return the following:

      ./httpd/conf.d/ssl.conf:#ServerName www.example.com:443
./httpd/conf/httpd.conf:# ServerName gives the name and port that the server uses to identify itself.
./httpd/conf/httpd.conf:#ServerName www.example.com:80
./dnsmasq.conf:# tftp_servername (the third option to dhcp-boot) and in that
    • Add the following line to the ssl.conf file as the root user: 

      ServerName localhost:443
    • Add the following line to the httpd.conf file as the root user: 

      ServerName localhost:443
    • After adding the two values, restart Apache with the following command: 

      sudo apachectl restart
    • Rerun the systemctl command to get the status of the httpd service with this command: 

      sudo systemctl status httpd.service -l --no-pager

      It should print:

      ● httpd.service - The Apache HTTP Server
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/httpd.service; enabled; vendor preset: disabled)
    Drop-In: /usr/lib/systemd/system/httpd.service.d
             └─php-fpm.conf
     Active: active (running) since Mon 2022-11-14 00:37:03 EST; 3min 23s ago
       Docs: man:httpd.service(8)
   Main PID: 53596 (httpd)
     Status: "Total requests: 0; Idle/Busy workers 100/0;Requests/sec: 0; Bytes served/sec:   0 B/sec"
      Tasks: 213 (limit: 23280)
     Memory: 34.0M
        CPU: 183ms
     CGroup: /system.slice/httpd.service
             ├─53596 /usr/sbin/httpd -DFOREGROUND
             ├─53597 /usr/sbin/httpd -DFOREGROUND
             ├─53598 /usr/sbin/httpd -DFOREGROUND
             ├─53599 /usr/sbin/httpd -DFOREGROUND
             └─53600 /usr/sbin/httpd -DFOREGROUND
 
Nov 14 00:37:03 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: Starting The Apache HTTP Server...
Nov 14 00:37:03 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: Started The Apache HTTP Server.
Nov 14 00:37:03 localhost.localdomain httpd[53596]: Server configured, listening on: port 443, port 80
  10. Your next step requires setting up an SSL Certificate. Consistent with the design to build a standalone test system that uses a DHCP assigned IP address to resolve a localhost server name, you require the following two tasks to create an openssl self-signed certificate.

    • On the new instance, you create a private subdirectory with this command: 

      sudo mkdir /etc/ssl/private

    • Then, you can build a self-signed certificate with this command: 
      sudo openssl req -x509 -nodes -days 365 -newkey rsa:2048 -keyout /etc/ssl/private/apache-selfsigned.key -out /etc/ssl/certs/apache-selfsigned.crt

      The openssl command will prompt you for these values to create a private key:

      You are about to be asked to enter information that will be incorporated
into your certificate request.
What you are about to enter is what is called a Distinguished Name or a DN.
There are quite a few fields but you can leave some blank
For some fields there will be a default value,
If you enter '.', the field will be left blank.
-----
Country Name (2 letter code) [XX]:
State or Province Name (full name) []:
Locality Name (eg, city) [Default City]:
Organization Name (eg, company) [Default Company Ltd]:
Organizational Unit Name (eg, section) []:
Common Name (eg, your name or your server's hostname) []:
Email Address []:
  11. Your last step requires three tasks to configure Apache to use SSL.

    • You need to create the following sites-available directory with the following command as the root user: 

      mkdir /etc/httpd/sites-available

    • Add the following localhost.conf/etc/httpd/sites-available directory: 
      <VirtualHost *:443>
   ServerName localhost
   DocumentRoot /var/www/html
 
   SSLEngine on
   SSLCertificateFile /etc/ssl/certs/localhost.crt
   SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/ssl/private/apache-selfsigned.key
</VirtualHost>

    • Restart Apache with the following command: 

      sudo apachectl restart
  12. After configuring everything, let’s test our self-signed HTTPS skunkworks. Launch the default Firefox browser and enter the following URL, which uses the mysql_check.php file from step #7: 

    https://localhost/mysqli_check.php

    It will raise a warning message about a potential security risk, which is caused by our self-signed certificate. Click the Advanced… button and will see the option to Accept the Risk and Continue. If you want to use the self-signed and contained AlmaLinux LAMP stack for developer testing, accept the risk.

    Having assumed the risk, the confirmation of the configuration will be displayed as follows:

As always, I hope this helps those looking to install MySQL, PHP, on AlmaLinux.

Written by maclochlainn

October 30th, 2022 at 11:16 pm

Posted in AlmaLinux,Apache,Linux,MySQL,MySQL 8,mysqli,Unix

Tagged with , ,

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