Best way to self-host Flarum on Ubuntu VPS?

FlarumQuestion

How can I do this? I have seen a few guides from a few years back on the topic, but it seems either outdated or just doesn't make sense to me. Could someone do a simple step-by-step on how to accomplish this? Am using a Linux Ubuntu 22.04 VPS that has the required stuff like PHP, NGINX, etc. Have tried for probably 12hrs in total now and just can't figure it out.

clarkwinkelmann

FlarumQuestion do you have specific errors you would like help with ?

There are many valid ways to run Flarum, it's no more complicated than any other PHP based app. Most Laravel guides should perfectly apply to Flarum as well.

If you already have a webserver and database setup, you should be able to just follow the install guide from our documentation.

FlarumQuestion

clarkwinkelmann Sure! So, for the very first command composer create-project flarum/flarum . I get this error/warning/issue below, but then after this command, the guide said, "When everything is ready, navigate to your forum in a web browser." But uh, how? I never even specified a site/IP to anything for it to even know where my site would be....I have my own domain I would like the forums to go. www.domain.com/FORUMS

If you already have a webserver and database setup, you should be able to just follow the install guide from our documentation.

I am trying to use my VPS to host everything.

Is this fine? Can I move on with the rest of commands? Why am I getting this? Then, directly under it, instructions say: "You will need to make sure your webroot is set to /path/to/your/forum/public." Ok, great, but how do I do that? Then if I just go ahead to the next command on the guide, I get:

It's nothing but problems trying to figure this out...It mentions .ini files but I never even messed with .ini files during this whole process?? So then I go ahead and do as terminal says I can and run composer require flarum/extension-manager:* --ignore-platform-req=ext-dom which seems to lock a bunch of stuff and download 4 things, all in green text, so I guess this specific part is fine....

So the next thing on the guide it mentions is URL Rewrite, so I figured I'd try it with NGINX. So my NGINX .config file is at /var/www/flarum/.nginx.conf; but when I run include /var/www/flarum/.nginx.conf;, I get, "include: command not found." This is all such a headache. Would this installers get rid of all this headache and place files where they need to be? If so, which one of these do I even pick for Ubuntu VPS? My VPS is on PHP v8.1.2. I really don't know what "public path, yes or no" is all about either.

Please help.
EDIT: So, I went ahead and downloaded the 1st tar.gz in the photo above and extracted it with tar -xvzf flarum-v1.x-no-public-dir-php8.1.tar.gz. Now what? Here is my current directory:

I guess my question at this point is: What website/IP do I go to, to actually see the Flarum forum? Nowhere did I specify "www.mysite.com/forums" how I'd like it to be and at this point in the guide, I'm supposed to be seeing the Flarum page on my browser somewhere....

luceos

The directory is not empty error means the directory you tried to install Flarum in needs to be empty, you can check that from that directory with the command ls -la. It's a restriction by composer and makes sense if you think of it, you don't want your new software inside a directory not specifically for it.

The next command you executed failed because Flarum wasn't installed yet. Create an empty directory or empty the directory you wanted Flarum installed in, then use the create-project command again. If it errors, you can't blindly continue the guide as it will make things worse.

The include command not found error by nginx is also caused because the installation failed, because the directory is not empty.

FlarumQuestion

luceos Ok, I made a new directory under /home called "flarum". So, /home/flarum/

Ran command again and got:

luceos

FlarumQuestion your user wasn't able to create directories in /home/flarum.

FlarumQuestion

luceos But...why? It has sudo privileges. I've been creating folders and stuff everywhere else fine. Also: What website/IP do I go to, to actually see the Flarum forum? Nowhere did I specify "www.mysite.com/forums" how I'd like it to be and at this point in the guide, Just made a diff folder in same /home/ directory and it is working there.

luceos

FlarumQuestion running commands as sudo will create directories as root, no other user can write or read from them.

FlarumQuestion

luceos Ok, so I made a different folder and it let me use it this time. composer create-project flarum/flarum . worked. Next instruction is "You will need to make sure your webroot is set to /path/to/your/forum/public." How/Where do I do this?

Also, on this step: "Flarum includes a .nginx.conf file – make sure it has been uploaded correctly. Then, assuming you have a PHP site set up within Nginx, add the following to your server's configuration block: include /path/to/flarum/.nginx.conf;," My "PHP site within NGINX" is supposed to be my VPS since trying to self-host it to my own domain....

Here is my one NGINX server file:

server {
    listen 80;
    listen [::]:80;
    server_name www.forums.mysite.me;
    return 301 http://mysite.me$request_uri;
}	
server {
    listen 80;
    listen [::]:80;
    root /var/www/flarum/public;
    index index.php index.html index.htm;
    server_name forums.mysite.me;
    
    location ~ \.php$ {
        include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
        fastcgi_pass unix:/run/php/php7.4-fpm.sock;
        fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
    }
    
    location ~ /\. {
        deny all;
    }
    
    location = /favicon.ico {
        log_not_found off;
        access_log off;
    }
    
    location = /robots.txt {
        log_not_found off;
        access_log off;
        allow all;
    }
    include /var/www/flarum/.nginx.conf;
    include /home/username/flarum2/.nginx.conf;
}

Does this look correct? When I refresh my site's "www.mysite.com/forums" page, I still have my standard placeholder page there and not Flarum. I don't know why this is all so difficult. Am I supposed to point an A record on my DNS to my VPS IP for a subdomain for the forums or what?

EDIT: Update: Progress? I pointed an A record on domain DNS provider to my VPS' IP for forums and I am now getting a "Welcome to nginx!" page on my forums URL, but oddly enough, even though I did this on my one domain provider, it is showing my other domain provider's certificate since it's using same A record on the VPS IP....so now, how do I make this show up with Flarum instead?

clarkwinkelmann

FlarumQuestion if you installed Flarum using Composer in /home/flarum, then you can edit the nginx config line root /var/www/flarum/public; and replace it with root /home/flarum/public; (the path to the public folder that has been created by Composer in the Flarum folder)

After restarting nginx the forum should now be available at the root of the domain name, in this case would be http://forums.mysite.me

Installing on a subfolder of an existing web application (mysite.com/forum) is a bit more tricky, it doesn't seem to be what you are trying to do based on the nginx configuration file though. If you have an existing site on that hosting and want to install on a subfolder, please share the nginx file for that existing site.

Also consider setting up HTTPS before using the Flarum installation wizard. If you enable HTTPS later, you'll need to edit the URL in the config.php that gets created after using the Flarum web installation wizard.

FlarumQuestion

clarkwinkelmann So, I installed it at/home/username/flarum2/. The nginx.config file in THAT directory is:

# Pass requests that don't refer directly to files in the filesystem to index.php
location / {
  try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$query_string;
}

# Uncomment the following lines if you are not using a `public` directory
# to prevent sensitive resources from being exposed.
# <!-- BEGIN EXPOSED RESOURCES PROTECTION -->
# location ~* ^/(\.git|composer\.(json|lock)|auth\.json|config\.php|flarum|storage|vendor) {
#   deny all;
#   return 404;
# }
# <!-- END EXPOSED RESOURCES PROTECTION -->

# The following directives are based on best practices from H5BP Nginx Server Configs
# https://github.com/h5bp/server-configs-nginx

# Expire rules for static content
location ~* \.(?:manifest|appcache|html?|xml|json)$ {
  add_header Cache-Control "max-age=0";
}

location ~* \.(?:rss|atom)$ {
  add_header Cache-Control "max-age=3600";
}

location ~* \.(?:jpg|jpeg|gif|png|ico|cur|gz|svg|mp4|ogg|ogv|webm|htc)$ {
  add_header Cache-Control "max-age=2592000";
  access_log off;
}

location ~* \.(?:css|js)$ {
  add_header Cache-Control "max-age=31536000";
  access_log off;
}

location ~* \.(?:ttf|ttc|otf|eot|woff|woff2)$ {
  add_header Cache-Control "max-age=2592000";
  access_log off;
}

# Gzip compression
gzip on;
gzip_comp_level 5;
gzip_min_length 256;
gzip_proxied any;
gzip_vary on;
gzip_types
    application/atom+xml
    application/javascript
    application/json
    application/ld+json
    application/manifest+json
    application/rss+xml
    application/vnd.geo+json
    application/vnd.ms-fontobject
    application/x-font-ttf
    application/x-web-app-manifest+json
    application/xhtml+xml
    application/xml
    font/opentype
    image/bmp
    image/svg+xml
    image/x-icon
    text/cache-manifest
    text/css
    text/javascript
    text/plain
    text/vcard
    text/vnd.rim.location.xloc
    text/vtt
    text/x-component
    text/x-cross-domain-policy;

Unless you meant the flarum.config file in /etc/nginx/sites-available/, which is the actual server info where I put my site URL. I feel like I am so close. Current site is just Hugo + GitHub Pages on my domain. Also, when trying right now to stop or restart my NGINX server, I am getting: "Job for nginx.service failed because the control process exited with error code.
See "systemctl status nginx.service" and "journalctl -xeu nginx.service" for details." It allowed me to stop it, though.

If I do nginx -t or sudo nginx then I get:
nginx: [emerg] "gzip" directive is duplicate in /home/username/flarum2/.nginx.conf:43
nginx: configuration file /etc/nginx/nginx.conf test failed

If I get rid of the gzip stuff, I get:
nginx: [emerg] duplicate location "/" in /home/username/flarum2/.nginx.conf:2
nginx: configuration file /etc/nginx/nginx.conf test failed
Line 2 is the "location" line in:

# Pass requests that don't refer directly to files in the filesystem to index.php
location / {
  try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$query_string;
}

~~I feel like all I need to do is restart NGINX server and now this. Never had an issue with NGINX before....always something~~ Ok, fixed that by deleting a config file in /etc/nginx/sites-enabled.

I guess NGINX is started back since it's showing the welcome page again, but still no Flarum.....

FlarumQuestion

In addition to above reply: It might just be easier to give a visual:
Here is the directory that Flarum is in:

Inside the nginx.config file, it is:

# Pass requests that don't refer directly to files in the filesystem to index.php
location / {
  try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$query_string;
}

# Uncomment the following lines if you are not using a `public` directory
# to prevent sensitive resources from being exposed.
# <!-- BEGIN EXPOSED RESOURCES PROTECTION -->
# location ~* ^/(\.git|composer\.(json|lock)|auth\.json|config\.php|flarum|storage|vendor) {
#   deny all;
#   return 404;
# }
# <!-- END EXPOSED RESOURCES PROTECTION -->

# The following directives are based on best practices from H5BP Nginx Server Configs
# https://github.com/h5bp/server-configs-nginx

# Expire rules for static content
location ~* \.(?:manifest|appcache|html?|xml|json)$ {
  add_header Cache-Control "max-age=0";
}

location ~* \.(?:rss|atom)$ {
  add_header Cache-Control "max-age=3600";
}

location ~* \.(?:jpg|jpeg|gif|png|ico|cur|gz|svg|mp4|ogg|ogv|webm|htc)$ {
  add_header Cache-Control "max-age=2592000";
  access_log off;
}

location ~* \.(?:css|js)$ {
  add_header Cache-Control "max-age=31536000";
  access_log off;
}

location ~* \.(?:ttf|ttc|otf|eot|woff|woff2)$ {
  add_header Cache-Control "max-age=2592000";
  access_log off;
}

# Gzip compression
gzip on;
gzip_comp_level 5;
gzip_min_length 256;
gzip_proxied any;
gzip_vary on;
gzip_types
    application/atom+xml
    application/javascript
    application/json
    application/ld+json
    application/manifest+json
    application/rss+xml
    application/vnd.geo+json
    application/vnd.ms-fontobject
    application/x-font-ttf
    application/x-web-app-manifest+json
    application/xhtml+xml
    application/xml
    font/opentype
    image/bmp
    image/svg+xml
    image/x-icon
    text/cache-manifest
    text/css
    text/javascript
    text/plain
    text/vcard
    text/vnd.rim.location.xloc
    text/vtt
    text/x-component
    text/x-cross-domain-policy;

Inside my /etc/nginx/sites-available directory, there is one file in it called "flarum.config" and it looks like:

server {
    listen 80;
    listen [::]:80;
    server_name www.forums.mysite.me;
    return 301 http://mysite.me$request_uri;
}	
server {
    listen 80;
    listen [::]:80;
    root /home/username/flarum2/public;
    index index.php index.html index.htm;
    server_name forums.mysite.me;
    
    location ~ \.php$ {
        include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
        fastcgi_pass unix:/run/php/php7.4-fpm.sock;
        fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
    }
    
    location ~ /\. {
        deny all;
    }
    
    location = /favicon.ico {
        log_not_found off;
        access_log off;
    }
    
    location = /robots.txt {
        log_not_found off;
        access_log off;
        allow all;
    }
    include /home/username/flarum2/.nginx.conf;
}

In /home/username/flarum2/public I have:

Is this even setup properly? I also have an empty "nginx.config" file in /var/www/flarum/.
I also have something I self-host already on port 80, btw....also on NGINX. Would it be as simple as changing the port on Flarum config to, say, 81 instead of 80?

clarkwinkelmann

If you are hosting Flarum on a different domain or subdomain than your existing app, there shouldn't be any issue with the port being used. That's nginx work to route the request to the correct website based on the server_name directive.

The config file looks good with root /home/username/flarum2/public; and include /home/username/flarum2/.nginx.conf; which should be the only 2 lines that need customizing in the main nginx config.

Do you still not see the Flarum installation page when accessing the website? Make sure to restart nginx and use the domain name defined in the server_name directive. If the config file is correctly read by nginx, you should see Flarum or an error page, not the default nginx page.

FlarumQuestion

clarkwinkelmann Yeah, I just can't get it to work. Discourse was easy to setup on my VPS, though, so using that for now I guess. Wish I could use Flarum, though. Can't waste another 30+hrs of my life trying to get it to work, though.

luceos

FlarumQuestion you should probably look at using one of those free hosting control panels. Flarum is meant to be easily installable, the issues you are running into are on the level of a hosting provider.

Keiki

FlarumQuestion I can help you out set it up in ubuntu if you want. my discord is "xinnnsi."