How to Install Restyaboard on CentOS 7

Author: Liptan Biswas

Restyaboard is a free and open-source Kanban board application. It is the best self-hosted alternative to Trello. It is written in PHP and uses PostgreSQL to store its database.

In this tutorial, we will install Restyaboard on CentOS 7 server.

Prerequisite

Minimal CentOS 7 server
Root privileges

Step 1 - Install Nginx

Before installing any package it is recommended that you update the packages and repository using the following command.

yum -y update

Nginx is not available on default CentOS YUM repository, hence we will need to install EPEL repository also. You can install EPEL by typing:

yum -y install epel-release

Now you can install nginx by typing:

yum -y install nginx

Once the installation is finished, you can run the following commands to start nginx and enable it to automatically start at boot time using following commands.

systemctl start nginx systemctl enable nginx

Nginx should be running on your server now.

Step 2 - Install and Configure PHP-FPM with Mbstring

Restyaboard supports PHP 7.0, hence we will install PHP 7.0 for maximum security and performance. PHP 7.0 is not available in YUM or EPEL repository, hence we will need to install Webtatic repository for same. Run the following command to install Webtatic repository.

rpm -Uvh https://mirror.webtatic.com/yum/el7/webtatic-release.rpm

Now Install PHP 7.0 with PHP-FPM along with other required modules.

yum -y install php70w php70w-fpm php70w-devel php70w-cli php70w-curl php70w-pgsql php70w-mbstring php70w-ldap php70w-pear php70w-imap php70w-xml php70w-pecl-imagick ImageMagick

Once the installation finishes, we will need to configure few things. By default PHP-FPM is configured to use with Apache, you will need to change the users so that it can work with nginx also. Edit the /etc/php-fpm.d/www.conf file using your favorite text editor. In this tutorial, we will be using nano editor. If you do not have nano installed, you can run yum -y install nano.

nano /etc/php-fpm.d/www.conf

Now find the following lines and change apache to nginx.

; RPM: apache Choosed to be able to access some dir as httpd
user = nginx
; RPM: Keep a group allowed to write in log dir.
group = nginx

Instead of using a server port, we will use a socket file for PHP-FPM. Find the following line.

listen = 127.0.0.1:9000

and Change it to the following line.

listen = /run/php-fpm/php7.0-fpm.sock

Next, find the following lines.

;listen.owner = nobody
;listen.group = nobody
;listen.mode = 0660

Change the values to the following:

listen.owner = nginx
listen.group = nginx
listen.mode = 0660

Further, you will need to set the timezone in PHP configuration file. Edit PHP configuration file using the command:

nano /etc/php.ini

Find the following line and Uncomment the line and set the timezone according to your region. For example:

[Date]
; Defines the default timezone used by the date functions
; http://php.net/date.timezone
date.timezone = Asia/Kolkata

Uncomment the cgi.fix_pathinfo line and change value to 0.

cgi.fix_pathinfo=0

Further you will also need to install GeoIP. Run the following command to install GeoIP.

yum -y install GeoIP-devel

Now enable GeoIP extension by adding the following line at the end of the /etc/php.ini

extension=geoip.so

Start PHP-FPM and enable it to start at boot time using the following commands.

systemctl start php-fpm systemctl enable php-fpm

Then restart nginx using the following command.

systemctl restart nginx

Step 3 - Installing and Configuring PostgreSQL data

PostgreSQL is an open source Object - relational database management system. Restyaboard uses PostgreSQL to store its database.

PostgreSQL is not available in YUM or EPEL repository, you will need to install PostgreSQL repository.

rpm -Uvh https://download.postgresql.org/pub/repos/yum/9.6/redhat/rhel-7-x86_64/pgdg-centos96-9.6-3.noarch.rpm

To install PostgreSQL run the following command.

yum -y install postgresql96-server postgresql96-contrib

The above command will install PostgreSQL along with all the required dependencies in your system, before using the software, we will need to run the following command to initialize the database.

/usr/pgsql-9.6/bin/postgresql96-setup initdb

Once PostgreSQL is installed, it time to configure it. Edit the /var/lib/pgsql/9.6/data/pg_hba.conf to enable MD5 based authentication.

nano /var/lib/pgsql/9.6/data/pg_hba.conf

Find the following lines and change peer to trust and idnet to md5.

# TYPE  DATABASE        USER            ADDRESS                 METHOD

# "local" is for Unix domain socket connections only
local   all             all                                     peer
# IPv4 local connections:
host    all             all             127.0.0.1/32            ident
# IPv6 local connections:
host    all             all             ::1/128                 ident

Once updated, the configuration should look like shown below.

# TYPE  DATABASE        USER            ADDRESS                 METHOD

# "local" is for Unix domain socket connections only
local   all             all                                     trust
# IPv4 local connections:
host    all             all             127.0.0.1/32            md5
# IPv6 local connections:
host    all             all             ::1/128                 md5

Now start PostgreSQL server and enable it to automatically start at boot time using the following commands:

systemctl start postgresql-9.6 systemctl enable postgresql-9.6

Now change the password for the default PostgreSQL user which was created during the installation of PostgreSQL.

passwd postgres

Now login using PostgreSQL user using the following command.

su - postgres

The above command will login to the shell of postgres

Now create a new user by typing:

createuser rb_user

Now switch to the PostgreSQL shell using the following command.

psql

You will see the prompt on the shell has changed to postgres - #. Now run the following query to set a password for the newly created user for Restyaboard database.

ALTER USER rb_user WITH ENCRYPTED password 'StrongPassword';

Make sure to use a semicolon at the end of the query. The above query will ask you for the password of the rb_user twice. Now create a new database for PostgreSQL database using the following query.

CREATE DATABASE rb_data OWNER rb_user ENCODING 'UTF8' TEMPLATE template0;

The above query will create a database named rb_data with UTf8 encoding using template0 and the ownership will be provided to rb_user.

Exit from the psql shell to the normal shell user shell of postgres user using the following command.

\q

and switch to the root user again using exit command.

Step 4 - Download Restyaboard

As we have all the dependencies ready, we can now download Restyaboard. Run the following command to download the ready deployable version.

cd /usr/share/nginx/html wget https://github.com/RestyaPlatform/board/releases/download/v0.4.2/board-v0.4.2.zip

You can always find the link to the latest version on the Restyaboard Github page.

Now extract the archive using following commands. If you do not have unzip installed, you can run yum -y install unzip.

unzip board-v0.4.2.zip -d board

Once the archive is extracted, import the SQL file using the following command.

psql -d rb_data -f "/usr/share/nginx/html/board/sql/restyaboard_with_empty_data.sql" -U rb_user

Now edit the Restyaboard configuration file to update database credentials.

nano /usr/share/nginx/html/board/server/php/config.inc.php

Find the following lines.

define('R_DB_HOST', 'localhost');
define('R_DB_USER', 'restya');
define('R_DB_PASSWORD', 'hjVl2!rGd');
define('R_DB_NAME', 'restyaboard');
define('R_DB_PORT', 5432);

Change it according to the database name, username and password of the database we have recently created to store Restyaboard data. Once done, it should look like shown below.

define('R_DB_HOST', 'localhost');
define('R_DB_USER', 'rb_user');
define('R_DB_PASSWORD', 'StrongPassword');
define('R_DB_NAME', 'rb_data');
define('R_DB_PORT', 5432);

Step 5 - Configure Nginx Server Block

Restyboard nginx server block configuration comes packaged with the zip archive. You can copy the configuration file to nginx configuration file location using the following command.

cp /usr/share/nginx/html/board/restyaboard.conf /etc/nginx/conf.d

Now you will need to make few changes into the file. Open the configuration file using your favorite text editor.

nano /etc/nginx/conf.d/restyaboard.conf

At the start of the configuration, find the following line.

server {
        listen 80 default_server;
        server_name _;

Remove default_server text and provide your domain name after server name. It should look like as shown below.

server {
        listen 80;
        server_name board.yourdomain.com;

Also find the following line:

 root /usr/share/nginx/html;

and

 location / {
                root /usr/share/nginx/html/client;
        }

and

root /usr/share/nginx/html/client;

Change the above line according to the Restyaboard installation folder. It should look like shown below.

root /usr/share/nginx/html/board;

and

 location / {
                root /usr/share/nginx/html/board/client;
        }

and

root /usr/share/nginx/html/board/client

Also find the line:

fastcgi_pass    unix:/run/php/php7.0-fpm.sock;

Change it to the following:

fastcgi_pass    unix:/run/php-fpm/php7.0-fpm.sock;

You can close the file now. Now provide appropriate ownership and permission using the following commands.

chown -R nginx:nginx /usr/share/nginx/html/board/
chmod -R go+w "/usr/share/nginx/html/board/media"
chmod -R go+w "/usr/share/nginx/html/board/client/img"
chmod -R go+w "/usr/share/nginx/html/board/tmp/cache"
chmod -R 0755 /usr/share/nginx/html/board/server/php/shell/*.sh

Finally, add the cron entries to enable scheduled tasks to run using following commands.

echo "*/5 * * * * /usr/share/nginx/html/board/server/php/shell/instant_email_notification.sh" >> /var/spool/cron/root
echo "0 * * * * /usr/share/nginx/html/board/server/php/shell/periodic_email_notification.sh" >> /var/spool/cron/root
echo "*/30 * * * * /usr/share/nginx/html/board/server/php/shell/imap.sh" >> /var/spool/cron/root
echo "*/5 * * * * /usr/share/nginx/html/board/server/php/shell/webhook.sh" >> /var/spool/cron/root
echo "*/5 * * * * /usr/share/nginx/html/board/server/php/shell/card_due_notification.sh" >> /var/spool/cron/root

Now you will need to disable your SELinux because Proxy configuration does not work with SELinux policies. To temporary disable SELinux without restarting the server, run the following command.

setenforce 0

To completely disable the SELinux you will need to edit /etc/selinux/config file.

nano /etc/selinux/config

Find the following line:

SELINUX=enforcing

Change it to:

SELINUX=disabled

Then restart Nginx using the following command.

systemctl restart nginx

You can now access the server by going to the following URL.

http://board.yourdomain.com

You will see following login screen.

Now login using the username admin and password restya. Once you are logged in, you will seethe following screen.

To create a new Board, click on the arrow at the left corner of the page and click on Add Board or Organization.

Provide a name and choose a template to create a new board.

Once you have created the Board, It will look like shown below.

To access the Admin panel, you can click on Admin button at the bottom right corner and then click on Settings on the top bar.

Restyaboard is now installed on your server, you can now use the kanban board to improve the workflow of your project.

How to Install Restyaboard on CentOS 7