Install CentOS (minimal install).
Configure network
Run: ip a to find your network adaptor's name. In my case the adaptor is called ens32.
Navigate to /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ and open network configuration file with your network adaptor name, i.e. ifcfg-ens32
vi ifcfg-ens32
Edit the file replacing all IP addresses according to your network requirements.
HWADDR =00:0B:27:A1:DC:1A
TYPE=Ethernet
BOOTPROTO=static
ONBOOT=yes
IPADDR=192.168.0.10
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
GATEWAY=192.168.0.1
DNS1=8.8.8.8
DMS2=208.67.222.222
Start network:
service network start
Run: ip a again to make sure configuration was applied correctly. You should now have working network connection.
If you need to change anything, modify the same file and run:
service network restart
Install nano editor (optional)
I'm not a big fan of vi. My preferred editor is nano. To install it run:
yum install nano
Change the server hostname
CentOS servers have 3 type of hostnames: static, transient and pretty.
To change all 3 hostnames run:
hostnamectl set-hostname SERVER-NAME
To review the hostnames:
hostnamectl --static
hostnamectl --transient
hostnamectl --pretty
To add the new server hostname to the hosts file, modily: /etc/hosts
Install Apache
yum install httpd
Enable Apache service to start when booting:
systemctl enable httpd.service
Start Apache service:
systemctl start httpd.service
Other useful commands:
Check if Apache running: sudo systemctl is-active httpd.service
Stop Apache: sudo systemctl stop httpd.service
Restart Apache: sudo systemctl restart httpd.service
Default HTML directory: /var/www/html
Configure firewall to allow HTTP access
firewall-cmd --permanent --zone=public --add-service=http
firewall-cmd --reload
If you now browse to the server's IP address, you should see Apache welcome message.
If you need to temporary disable firewall, run:
systemctl stop firewalld
To start firewall again:
systemctl start firewalld
To check firewall status:
systemctl status firewalld
Install PHP
yum install php
Restart Apache: systemctl restart httpd.service
To test PHP:
Create file /var/www/html/info.php with content:
<?php phpinfo(); ?>
Then browse to http://192.168.1.10/info.php
Where 192.168.1.10 - server's IP address
You should get PHP test page:
Install MySQL (MariaDB)
CantOS 7 is now distributing MariaDB instead than MySQL. MariaDB is a community developed fork of MySQL that is designed to be a drop-in replacement for MySQL.
Install MariaDB
yum install mariadb-server
Start the database engine:
systemctl start mariadb
Secure the database:
mysql_secure_installation
Just follow the wizard and complete following: setup root password, disable anonymous user, disable root remote login, delete test database, reload privilege tables.
Enable MariaDB to start on boot:
systemctl enable mariadb.service
Other useful MariaDB commands:
Check version:
mysql --version
Connect to console:
mysql -u root -p
Configure firewall to allow remote access to MySQL (MariaDB)
This is only required if you need your databases to be accessible over the network
firewall-cmd --permanent --zone=public --add-service=mysql
firewall-cmd --reload
Install phpMyAdmin (optional)
phpMyAdmin is not included in default CentOS repository therefore we'll nee to add EPEL (Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux) repo.
EPEL can be installed by running:
yum install epel-release
Check repository list and make sure EPEL is now present:
yum repolist
Install phpMyAdmin:
yum install phpmyadmin
Navigate to /etc/httpd/conf.d and edit file phpMyAdmin.conf.
You need to fine lines: Require ip 127.0.0.1 and Allow from 127.0.0.1, and next to them add new lines with the same test replacing 127.0.0.1 with the IP you will be connecting from.
Restart Apache:
systemctl restart httpd.service
To make sure that phpMyAdmin is working, connect to the server's ip address, adding /phpMyAdmin at the end on the URL (i.e. http://192.168.1.10/phpMyAdmin) and you should be greeted with phpMyAdmin login page
Install Sendmail (optional)
If you intend to use Sendmail, install it by running:
yum install sendmail
yum install sendmail-cf
To restart Sendmail service:
service sendmail restart
Sendmail path:
/usr/sbin/sendmail
Email logs are located in:
/var/log/maillog