Installing Moodle on Ubuntu 18.04 LTS

This post assumes you already have apache, mysql, php, and phpmyadmin installed. If not then you can read this post here to do the installation which is a pre-requisiste if you want moodle installed properly.

Nevertheless, this post will touch on a few areas on the above where certain configurations are needed. However, overall it looks at the moodle open source content management system which is written and based on php. It allows educational institutions to create a very powerpul system for courses, students, and teachers. It’s used all across the world by many universities, and most importantly it’s free and released to the general public.

Step 1 – Minor Apache Configuration

In the previous post we left our html directory open to the general public. Hence, if someone new our IP address or landed on it and tried browsing what’s in our html directory they. So, we want to disable the directly listing for security purposes using the following command:

sudo sed -i “s/Options Indexes FollowSymLinks/Options FollowSymLinks/” /etc/apache2/apache2.conf

Next, run the commands below to stop, start and enable Apache2 service to always start up with the server boots.

sudo systemctl stop apache2.service
sudo systemctl start apache2.service
sudo systemctl enable apache2.service

Step 2 – Install PhP Related Module & Configure

In the previous post we installed PhP, however moodle needs certain modules that are required in order for it to function properly. We install them using the following command:

sudo apt install php7.1 libapache2-mod-php7.1 php7.1-common php7.1-mbstring php7.1-xmlrpc php7.1-soap php7.1-gd php7.1-xml php7.1-intl php7.1-mysql php7.1-cli php7.1-mcrypt php7.1-ldap php7.1-zip php7.1-curl

After install PHP, run the commands below to open PHP-FPM default file.

sudo nano /etc/php/7.1/apache2/php.ini

Then change the following lines below in the file and save (it’s a very long file, so you might want to search for the keywords and look for those in particular). You may increase the value to suite your environment.

file_uploads = On
allow_url_fopen = On
memory_limit = 256M
upload_max_filesize = 100M
max_execution_time = 360
cgi.fix_pathinfo = 0
date.timezone = America/Belize

Step 3 – Create Moodle database

Now that you’ve installed all the packages that are required, you are ready to start dealing with moodle. First run the commands below to create a blank Moodle database.

Run the commands below to logon to MySql database server:

sudo mysql -u root -p

Next, create a database, in this instance we’ll call it moodle but you can use anyname you prefer.

CREATE DATABASE moodle;

We will now create a database user. Here we are calling our user moodle user, with a new password. The new_password_here is where you put a password you like.

CREATE USER ‘moodleuser’@’localhost’ IDENTIFIED BY ‘new_password_here’;

Your user needs full access to the database created and so we’ll grant full access.

GRANT ALL ON moodle.* TO ‘moodleuser’@’localhost’ IDENTIFIED BY ‘user_password_here’ WITH GRANT OPTION;

Now save your changes, and exit.

FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
EXIT;

Step 4: Download Moodle & Create Directories

At the time of this post moodle 3.7 was the latest version, I would suggest going to the moodle.org website and check what’s the latest and change the link from the command below. Here we’re downloading moodle in the temp folder, extracting it and moving to the html directory. We’re also ensuring the permissions are properly set. Moreover, please note for security purposes the moodledata folder should never be placed in your html folder.

cd /tmp/ && wget https://download.moodle.org/download.php/stable37/moodle-3.7.tgz

tar -zxvf moodle-latest-33.tgz
sudo mv moodle /var/www/html/moodle
sudo mkdir /var/moodledata

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/html/moodle/
sudo chmod -R 755 /var/www/html/moodle/
sudo chown www-data /var/moodledata/
sudo chmod -R 755 /var/moodledata/

Step 5: Configure Apache2

Finally, configure Apahce2 site configuration file for Moodle. This file will control how users access Moodle content. Run the commands below to create a new configuration file called moodle.conf

sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/moodle.conf

Now copy and paste the content below into the file and save it. Replace the domain example.com with the domain you are gonig to be using.

VirtualHost *:80>
     ServerAdmin admin@example.com
     DocumentRoot /var/www/html/moodle/
     ServerName example.com
     ServerAlias www.example.com
 
     <Directory /var/www/html/moodle/>
        Options +FollowSymlinks
        AllowOverride All
        Require all granted
     </Directory>

     ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log
     CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined

</VirtualHost>

After configuring the VirtualHost above, enable it by running the commands below, and then restarting apache as follows:

sudo a2enmod rewrite
sudo a2ensite moodle.conf
sudo systemctl restart apache2.service

Step 6: Finishing the Installation

Finally, we’re ready to start the moodle installation process. Go to your domain that you set in your virtual host in the step above, for instance in ours it was example.com. You should be prompted with the first screenshot below. The screenshots below consist of certain steps that are to be taken. Screenshot 2 should have had the example.com on the web address, and the moodle directory should have been var/www/html/moodle , it just shows different since another different route was taken here. If you feel the installation is taking long, please wait! Depending on your connection it may take a while.