Learn how to – How to Install Latest Moodle on Ubuntu 18.04 / Debian 9

Learn how to – How to Install Latest Moodle on Ubuntu 18.04 / Debian 9.

Moodle is a free and open-source learning management system written in PHP and released under the GNU General Public License. You can create learning courses from Moodle and share them with your viewers/friends/students e.t.c.

Moodle Dependencies

Moodle has the following dependencies

• PHP
• Apache / Nginx Web server
• MySQL / MariaDB database server

In this tutorial, we will install and configure Moodle to use MariaDB database and Apache web server.

Step 1: Install PHP

PHP is available on both Debian and Ubuntu repositories. Install it by running the following commands

sudo apt -y install vim php-cli  php-intl php-xmlrpc php-soap php-mysql php-zip php-gd php-mbstring php-curl php-xml php-pear php-bcmath

Step 2: Install MariaDB Database Server

After installing PHP, next is to setup MariaDB database server using our guides below:

How to Install MariaDB 10.3 on Debian 9 / Debian 8

Install MariaDB 10.3 on Ubuntu 18.04 and CentOS 7

Once the database server is installed, open the configuration file

sudo vim /etc/mysql/mariadb.conf.d/50-server.cnf

Then add below lines under  [mysqld] section

innodb_file_format = Barracuda 
default_storage_engine = innodb
innodb_large_prefix = 1
innodb_file_per_table = 1

Save the changes and restart mysql service.

sudo systemctl restart mysql

Login to the mysql console as root user to create database and user.

$ mysql -u root -p

Create a database and user for Moodle

CREATE DATABASE moodle DEFAULT CHARACTER SET utf8mb4 COLLATE utf8mb4_unicode_ci;
GRANT ALL ON  moodle.* TO 'moodle'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY "StrongPassword";
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
QUIT

Step 3: Download and Configure Moodle

Download the latest release of Moodle from Github

sudo apt -y  install wget
wget https://download.moodle.org/download.php/direct/stable35/moodle-latest-35.tgz

Extract the downloaded file

tar xvf moodle-latest-35.tgz

Move the created directory to /srv directory

sudo mv moodle /srv/

Create an empty directory to hold Moodle files.

sudo mkdir /srv/moodledata

Set permissions for Moodle web directory

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /srv/moodle/ /srv/moodledata

Step 4: Install  & Configure Apache Web Server

We also need Apache web server to host our Moodle application. Install it like below:

sudo apt -y install apache2 vim libapache2-mod-php

Create an Apache VirtualHost configuration file

sudo vim /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/moodle.conf

Put the contents below into the file

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

     ErrorLog /var/log/apache2/moodle-error.log
     CustomLog /var/log/apache2/moodle-access.log combined
</VirtualHost>

Replace example.com with your domain name, save the file and exit.

Enable the Apache rewrite module

sudo a2enmod rewrite
sudo systemctl restart apache2

Step 5: Access Moodle Setup Wizard

Now browse to your Moodle server IP or Hostname to finish the setup of Moodle on Ubuntu 18.04 / Debian 9.

1. Choose your installation language for Moodle and click “Next”

2. Setup Web address, Moodle directory, and Data directory

3. On the next page, choose a database driver – Mariadb (native/mariadb)

4. Provide Database host, Database name, Database user and Database password

5. Confirm that you have read the conditions and understood them

6. If your server environment meets all minimum requirements, click Continue to finish the installation.

7. Create an admin user account on the next page

8. Configure your Front page settings

10. You should now get to Moodle dashboard.

Congratulation!!. You just installed Moodle E-Learning platform on Ubuntu 18.04 / Debian 9. Enjoy and stay connected for more nice how-to guides.