Production Server

Note

This guide explains how to set up a production server on Ubuntu 20.04.3 LTS (Focal Fossa). Other linux distributions should work just fine, but we don’t provide detailed instructions for them.

System requirements

1. Upgrade all:

   sudo apt update && sudo apt -y upgrade
   

2. Install system requirements:

   sudo apt -y install python3-venv python3-pip libpq-dev ffmpeg
   

YCMS CMS Package

1. Choose a location for your installation, e.g. /opt/ycms/:

   sudo mkdir /opt/ycms
   sudo chown www-data:www-data /opt/ycms
   

2. Create config and log files and set more restrictive permissions:

   sudo touch /var/log/ycms.log /etc/ycms.ini
   sudo chown www-data:www-data /var/log/ycms.log /etc/ycms.ini
   sudo chmod 660 /var/log/ycms.log /etc/ycms.ini
   

3. Change to a shell with the permissions of the webserver’s user www-data:

   sudo -u www-data bash
   

4. Create a virtual environment:

   cd /opt/ycms
   python3 -m venv .venv
   source .venv/bin/activate
   

5. Install the ycms cms inside the virtual environment:

   pip3 install ycms
   

6. Create a symlink to the https://github.com/charludo/ycms/blob/develop/ycms_cms/core/wsgi.py file to facilitate the Apache configuration:

   ln -s $(python -c "from ycms_cms.core import wsgi; print(wsgi.__file__)") .
   

7. Set the initial configuration by adding the following to /etc/ycms.ini (for a full list of all possible configuration values, have a look at https://github.com/charludo/ycms/blob/develop/example-configs/ycms.ini):

   [ycms]
   
   SECRET_KEY = <your-secret-key>
   FCM_KEY = <your-firebase-key>
   BASE_URL = https://cms.ycms-app.de
   LOGFILE = /var/ycms.log
   

8. Leave the www-data shell:

   exit
   

Static Files

1. Create root directories for all static files. It’s usually good practise to separate code and data, so e.g. create the directory /var/www/ycms/ with the sub-directories static and media:

   sudo mkdir -p /var/www/ycms/{static,media}
   

2. Make the Apache user www-data owner of these directories:

   sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/ycms
   

3. Add the static directories to the config in /etc/ycms.ini:

   STATIC_ROOT = /var/www/ycms/static
   MEDIA_ROOT = /var/www/ycms/media
   

4. Collect static files:

   cd /opt/ycms
   sudo -u www-data bash
   source .venv/bin/activate
   ycms-cli collectstatic
   exit
   

Webserver

1. Install an Apache2 server with mod_wsgi:

   sudo apt -y install apache2 libapache2-mod-wsgi-py3
   

2. Enable the rewrite and wsgi:

   sudo a2enmod rewrite wsgi
   

3. Setup a vhost for the ycms by using our example config: https://github.com/charludo/ycms/blob/develop/example-configs/apache2-ycms-vhost.conf and edit the your domain and the paths for static files.

Database

1. Install a PostgreSQL database on your system:

   sudo apt -y install postgresql
   

2. Create a database user ycms and set a password:

   sudo -u postgres createuser -P -d ycms
   

3. Create a database ycms:

   sudo -u postgres createdb -O ycms ycms
   

4. Add the database credentials to the config in /etc/ycms.ini:

   DB_PASSWORD = <your-password>
   

5. Execute initial migrations:

   cd /opt/ycms
   sudo -u www-data bash
   source .venv/bin/activate
   ycms-cli migrate
   

Email configuration

1. Add your SMTP credentials to /etc/ycms.ini (for the default values, see https://github.com/charludo/ycms/blob/develop/example-configs/ycms.ini):

   EMAIL_HOST = <your-smtp-server>
   EMAIL_HOST_USER = <your-username>
   EMAIL_HOST_PASSWORD = <your-password>