Installing Redmine2.6.6 on CentOS6.5

CentOS is one of the most frequently chosen Linux operating systems for Linux based production environments. And Redmine is one of the best (if not THE best) open source issue tracking and project management applications, because of it is developed using Ruby on Rails, it feels like complex to deploy for anyone not familiar with the Ruby on Rails environment. The following steps will make the task simple as I am writing it side by doing all of the steps.

1.Login to Centos6.5 machine.

2.Update packages.

yum update

3.Reboot the machine after update.

reboot

Install the dependencies packages.

4.These are the basic software packages for environment settings and utility tools to compile other packages in the next section.

yum -y install nano zip unzip libyaml-devel zlib-devel curl-devel openssl-devel httpd-devel apr-devel apr-util-devel mysql-devel gcc ruby-devel gcc-c++ make postgresql-devel ImageMagick-devel sqlite-devel perl-LDAP mod_perl perl-Digest-SHA

Install Apache and MySQL

5.Apache is a server application for communicating over the HTTP protocol. Apache runs on operating systems such as Unix, Linux, Microsoft Windows, and other operating systems. Apache play an important role in the development of the internet and the world wide web. MySQL is the database management free open source most popular on the world, MySQL has high speed, stability and ease of use, portability, operating on multiple operating systems offer a large system is very powerful utility functions. With the speed and high security, MySQL is well suited for applications that access databases on the internet. Use the following command to install :

yum -y install httpd mysql mysql-server

Allow start services when OS boot :

chkconfig httpd on
chkconfig mysqld on
service httpd start
service mysqld start

Set the password for MySQL

/usr/bin/mysql_secure_installation

Because we not have a password for the root account so you press Enter to skip.

Enter current password for root (enter for none):

Select Yes to set the password for the MySQL root account.

Set root password? [Y/n] y

Enter and confirm your password, remove the anonymous user, select Yes

Remove anonymous users? [Y/n] y

Allow remote login to MySQL as root account, select No.

Disallow root login remotely? [Y/n] n

Delete the test database, select Yes

Remove test database and access to it? [Y/n] y

Reload privilege tables, select Yes

Reload privilege tables now? [Y/n] y

Turn off SELinux

SELinux is a security feature advanced for Linux operating system, when installing the system you need to turn off this feature to get the process done smoothly, after successful you can turn on back if you want.

nano /etc/selinux/config

Change the file content :

SELINUX=disabled

Set up the Hostname

By default when installing a new OS Centos not set the hostname, so we need to setting with the command :

nano /etc/hosts

Add your domain name or host name that you set on both the command line, save the file and exit, the server name will be changed when restarting.

Configuring the Firewall

We do not want to turn off the firewall because it's quite important, so you need to add rules to allow port 80 for HTTP and port 443 for HTTPS. In the Centos OS, you can configuration firewall by editing files iptables and ip6tables.

nano /etc/sysconfig/iptables

Press Enter to create a new line after the line of port 22, copy the following two commands and right click on the window to the Paste command.

-A INPUT -m state --state NEW -m tcp -p tcp --dport 80 -j ACCEPT
-A INPUT -m state --state NEW -m tcp -p tcp --dport 443 -j ACCEPT

Press CTRL + O to save the file and press CTRL + X to exit.

The same applies for IP6 firewall :

nano /etc/sysconfig/ip6tables

Add these lines to the file.

-A INPUT -m state --state NEW -m tcp -p tcp --dport 80 -j ACCEPT
-A INPUT -m state --state NEW -m tcp -p tcp --dport 443 -j ACCEPT

After you finish editing both files, run the commands to apply the new rules for firewall.

/etc/init.d/iptables restart
/etc/init.d/ip6tables restart

Allow turn on the firewall when reboot the operating system.

chkconfig iptables on
chkconfig ip6tables on

Finally, we need to restart the system to apply the changes to the SELinux and Hostname.

reboot

Install PHP and phpMyAdmin

Because we use MySQL database management system, so we need to install phpMyAdmin program management. phpMyAdmin is a free open source tool written by PHP language to manage MySQL database via a web browser. It can create, modify or delete databases, tables, fields or records, perform SQL statements, or managing users and permissions. The command to install PHP and the packages :

yum -y install php php-mysql php-gd php-imap php-ldap php-mbstring php-odbc php-pear php-xml php-xmlrpc php-pecl-apc php-soap

Restarting the Apache service :

service httpd restart

And install phpMyadmin :

rpm --import http://dag.wieers.com/rpm/packages/RPM-GPG-KEY.dag.txt
yum install http://pkgs.repoforge.org/rpmforge-release/rpmforge-release-0.5.3-1.el6.rf.x86_64.rpm
yum -y install phpmyadmin

Editing the virtual host file to allow remote login to the phpMyadmin.

nano /etc/httpd/conf.d/phpmyadmin.conf

Replace text "Allow from 127.0.0.1" to "Allow from all", save the file and exit.

Editing the configuration file for the phpMyadmin

nano /usr/share/phpmyadmin/config.inc.php

Replace text :

$cfg['Servers'][$i]['auth_type'] = 'cookie';

To :

$cfg['Servers'][$i]['auth_type'] = 'http';

Save the file and exit, restarting the Apache service :

service httpd restart

After successfully installed phpMyadmin, you can check at the address :

http://your-domain/phpmyadmin

Login with account : root / your_password With Password has been set at step install MySQL database in the above.

Note: If you install the Redmine system on the PC or in a virtual machine which not on the dedicated server, we need to switch the application phpMyadmin to run on port 8080 because port 80 will be used for Redmine in the next steps.

We need to add a port 8080 to the firewall and change the VirtualHost for phpMyadmin.

nano /etc/sysconfig/iptables

Add the command line :

-A INPUT -m state --state NEW -m tcp -p tcp --dport 8080 -j ACCEPT

The same applies for IP6 firewall :

nano /etc/sysconfig/ip6tables

Add the command line :

-A INPUT -m state --state NEW -m tcp -p tcp --dport 8080 -j ACCEPT

Restarting firewall service to allow the new port.

/etc/init.d/iptables restart
/etc/init.d/ip6tables restart

Editing the VirtualHost file to run phpMyadmin on the port 8080

nano /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf

Change the file content :

<VirtualHost *:8080>
    DocumentRoot /usr/share/phpmyadmin/
    ServerName your_domain.com
</VirtualHost>

Next, add the command to allows listening on the port 8080 in the file "httpd.conf"

nano /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf

Add the command line :

Listen 8080

Save the file and exit, restarting the Apache service :

service httpd restart

Now, phpMyadmin will run on the port 8080 at the address :

http://your-domain:8080

Install Ruby

Ruby is a object-oriented programming language, capable of reflection. Syntax inherited from Ada and Perl with object-oriented features of Smalltalk, and also share some features with Python, Lisp, Dylan and CLU, Ruby is a single phase interpreter. Ruby provides programming patterns, including functional programming, object-oriented, imperative, reflective, it uses dynamic variable and automatic memory management. Install Ruby interpreter with version management program RVM.

curl -L https://get.rvm.io | bash

Install Rubygems

Rubygems is a Ruby's packages management program, very popular in applications written by Ruby language and the Ruby On Rails framework.

yum -y install rubygems

Install Passenger

The full name of the Passenger is Phusion Passenger, known as mod_rails or mod_rack, it is a web application intergrate with Apache and it can operate as a standalone web server support for the Ruby On Rails applications. Execute the following commands :

gem install passenger
passenger-install-apache2-module

After completed, we copy a notification block in the window to create the configuration file in the next steps (select block notification and press C to copy).

 LoadModule passenger_module /usr/local/rvm/gems/ruby-1.9.3-p551/gems/passenger-5.0.15/buildout/apache2/mod_passenger.so
   <IfModule mod_passenger.c>
     PassengerRoot /usr/local/rvm/gems/ruby-1.9.3-p551/gems/passenger-5.0.15
     PassengerDefaultRuby /usr/local/rvm/gems/ruby-1.9.3-p551/wrappers/ruby
   </IfModule>

Create a new virtual host file for Passenger :

nano /etc/httpd/conf.d/passenger.conf

Paste the command blocks into the empty file and save it, then restart the Apache service.

service httpd restart

Create Database for Redmine Use MySQLAdmin to create an empty database for Redmine, saved password to fill in the configuration file in the next steps.

mysql --user=root --password=root_password_mysql
create database redmine_db character set utf8;
create user 'redmine_admin'@'localhost' identified by 'your_new_password';
grant all privileges on redmine_db.* to 'redmine_admin'@'localhost';
quit;

Install Redmine

Redmine is a main program of the project management system, we will download and install the program from the website of Redmine. Download Redmine version 2.6.x to directory "/var/www" on the Centos OS.

cd /var/www
wget http://www.redmine.org/releases/redmine-2.6.6.tar.gz

Extract the folder and rename directory

tar xvfz redmine-2.6.6.tar.gz
mv redmine-2.6.6 redmine
rm -rf redmine-2.6.6.tar.gz

Configuring the Database

The next, we need to configure the database was created from the above steps.

cd /var/www/redmine/config
cp database.yml.example database.yml
nano database.yml

Enter name for database, enter username and password of the database. Press CTRL + O to save the file and CTRL + X to exit.

Setting up Rails

Install the package library support for Rails using the Bundle.

cd /var/www/redmine
gem install bundler
bundle install
rake generate_secret_token

The next, we create the database table for the Redmine application.

RAILS_ENV=production rake db:migrate
RAILS_ENV=production rake redmine:load_default_data

Activate FCGI

cd /var/www/redmine/public
mkdir plugin_assets
cp dispatch.fcgi.example dispatch.fcgi
cp htaccess.fcgi.example .htaccess

Setting up Apache and FastCGI

cd /var/www/
rpm --import https://fedoraproject.org/static/0608B895.txt
wget http://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/6/x86_64/epel-release-6-8.noarch.rpm
rpm -ivh epel-release-6-8.noarch.rpm
yum -y install mod_fcgid
rm -rf epel-release-6-8.noarch.rpm

Creating Files Directory

This directory contains data files generated during the operation of Redmine as document or image file, we create a new directory in the "/opt".

mkdir -p /opt/redmine/files
chown -R apache:apache /opt/redmine
cd /var/www/redmine/config
cp configuration.yml.example configuration.yml
nano configuration.yml

Enter the directory path containing the data files you just created in the previous step into the line "attachments_storage_path".

Note: You must add a space at the begin of the path “/opt/redmine/files” after character “:”

Configuring Email

Another very important function of Redmine is using email to notify members when the contents of each project changes, Redmine can use many different methods to send email that is Sendmail, SMTP, GMail ... To configure the email we will edit the configuration file.

nano /var/www/redmine/config/configuration.yml

The simplest is you use features of the default SendMail in the Centos OS by settings :

  email_delivery:
   delivery_method: :sendmail

Note : Do not use the Tab key to indent when editing the configuration file, you need to use the space bar on the keyboard.

If you use GMail's SMTP, you need to register an email account with the login methods used password normal and disable two-step authentication by smart phone.

Enter your Gmail account as below :

  email_delivery:
   delivery_method: :smtp
   smtp_settings:
        enable_starttls_auto: true
        address: "smtp.gmail.com" 
        port: 587
        domain: "smtp.gmail.com" 
        authentication: :plain
        user_name: "your_email@gmail.com" 
        password: "your_password" 

Save and exit

Configuring SMTP

Configure sendmail on the machine so that it can send emails. In this particular case sendmail is configured to use mail.foo.com as SMART_HOST for sending emails outside.

cp {REDMINE_ROOT}/config/configuration.yml.example {REDMINE_ROOT}/config/configuration.yml

Edit the config/configuration.yml file and near the end where production: is present use:

            production:
               email_delivery:
                 delivery_method: :sendmail

• Login as administrator in redmine and go to “Administration -> Settings -> Email notifications” and choose appropriate defaults. In current configuration settings are:
• Emission email address:redmine@issues.foo.com
• Blind carbon copy for receipients
• Default notification: Only for things I am involved in
• Email notifications should be sent for issue added or issue updated (note, status, priority)

LDAP authentication

• Login as administrator
• Navigate to Administration > LDAP authentication
• Click on “New authentication mode”
• Enter the below values in corresponding fields

        Host: ldap.virtual-labs.ac.in 
        Port: 389 
        Base DN: dc=virtual-labs,dc=ac,dc=in 
        Login: uid 
        "On-the-fly user creation" checkbox 

• Save and Test the connection
• Login with an LDAP account
• Provide the additional details when prompted (name, email, etc.)
• Logout and login as administrator
• Navigate to Administration > Users
• Click on the user name used in last step
• Go to the Projects tab
• Choose a project name and select a role
• Click on Add to give the LDAP user access to the redmine project

Create Virtual Host for Redmine

Create an Apache configuration file for the Redmine application at the port 80.

nano /etc/httpd/conf.d/redmine.conf

Copy the text below and paste into the editor window, note the information to change your domain name.

<VirtualHost *:80>
        ServerName your_domain
        ServerAdmin your_domain@domain.com
        DocumentRoot /var/www/redmine/public/
        ErrorLog logs/redmine_error_log
        <Directory "/var/www/redmine/public/">
                Options Indexes ExecCGI FollowSymLinks
                Order allow,deny
                Allow from all
                AllowOverride all
        </Directory>
</VirtualHost>

Save the file configuration and exit.

Running Redmine

Before execute Redmine in the first time, we must permission for the directory installed Redmine and restart Apache service.

cd /var/www
chown -R apache:apache redmine
chmod -R 755 redmine
service httpd restart

Redmine will run at the following address URL :

http://your-domain

Login to system with an administrator account : admin / admin

You can change your password after successful login.

We can see Redmine has running but very primitive, in the next steps we will install the support plugins and customized Redmine to use professional.