👈Prev🏡Primary Notes

Deploying Applications

Registering a Domain Name

  • Make it memorable
  • Shorter is better
  • Most registrars charge £10 - £12 per year

Server for Applications

  • use a small computer you own
  • Use a shard host with the domain registrar of Platform as a service
    • Advantages
      • Server is preconfigured
      • Simple to use
    • Disadvantages
      • Large cost as scale
      • Limited control over software stack
      • May not be able to run certain messages e.g Message Queues
  • Use a cloud based virtual server
    • Advantages
      • Can have fill control over the software stack
      • Cheap to run
    • Disadvantages
      • Security can be your problem
      • Limited Hardware
  • Buy a server and find a data centre
    • Advantages
      • Free Hardware choice
      • Full software choice
    • Disadvantages
      • Security
      • Cost
  • Build you own data centre
    • Disadvantages
      • Expensive

Software Stack Choices

Database options include

  • mySQL
  • PostgreSQL

Many different versions Don’t use SQLite3

Webserver Apache / nginx are both good choices

Configuring the System

After the OS is installed the software stack can be installed form the source or with a package manager

  1. Install apache apt-get install apache2
  2. Setup the virtual host file in /etc/apache2/sites-available/example.com
  3. Create the directories /srv/www/example.com/public_html and logs
  4. Enable the sire a2ensite example.com
  5. Reload apache service apache reload

Installing mysql

  1. apt-get install mysql-server
  2. Secure the basic installation mysql_secure_installation
  3. Start a database session mysql -u root -p
  4. Create a user for the application
  5. Create a database for you application
  6. Grant privileges for your application

Installing PHP

  1. apt-get install php8.0 php8.0-mysql
  2. restart apache service apache2 reload

Additional Software

  1. Imagemagik - Manipulating uploaded images
  2. sendmail - Acts as a mail server
  3. logrotate - To rotate the log files and delete old ones

Updating the DNS

  1. Got to the registrar and register the IP address with the Domain Name
  2. Add a record for www. which points to the server
  3. Save changes
  4. It can take some time for any changes to propagate

Securing the Server

As a minimum always

  • Install fail2ban blocks ssh users form an IP for failed logins
  • Configure the firewall to only accept SSH and HTTP(s) traffic
  • Modify SSH to only accept key based logins from non designated IPs

Maintenance

  • Keep an eye on the server
  • Need to install monitoring Software to alert you to issues
  • Check logs on a daily basis
    • Setup an email script
  • Monitor usage to ensure everyone can use the site