How to Build LAMP Server on CentOS 6.4

I’ve explained how to build a LAMP server (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP) on CentOS but this page will focus mainly on CentOS 6.4. The whole steps are basically similar but I will show it again in shorter way assuming you knew some basic skills already. So read on!

Some FYIs:

• This example use CentOS 6.4 x32 VPS hosted by DigitalOcean. This VPS has 512MB of RAM.
• Proceed with caution
• You better read: Basic CentOS Setup Before Building A Working Server

How to Install Apache, MySQL, PHP on CentOS 6.4 Server

Step 1 – Add Remi repository (optional but you better do this):

The command syntax for CentOS 6.4 on 32bit server:

rpm -Uvh http://download.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/6/i386/epel-release-6-8.noarch.rpm
rpm -Uvh http://rpms.famillecollet.com/enterprise/remi-release-6.rpm

The command syntax for CentOS 6.4 on 64bit server:

rpm -Uvh http://download.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/6/x86_64/epel-release-6-8.noarch.rpm
rpm -Uvh http://rpms.famillecollet.com/enterprise/remi-release-6.rpm

Step 2 – It’s time to use the magic spell: a single command syntax to install Apache, MySQL5 and PHP5 on CentOS 6.4:

yum --enablerepo=remi,remi-test install httpd mysql mysql-server php php-common

Step 3 – Install some necessary PHP modules (I’ve explained it already in most of my tutorials). Use this command to check all available modules:

yum search php

In my example I will install:

1. MySQL (php-mysql) – A extension for PHP applications that use MySQL databases.
2. PostgreSQL (php-pgsql) – A extension for PostgreSQL database for PHP.
3. MongoDB (php-pecl-mongo) – A driver for MongoDB database.
4. SQLite (php-sqlite) – Extension for SQLite Database Engine.
5. Memcache (php-pecl-memcache) – Memcached caching daemon.
6. Memcached (php-pecl-memcached) – Memcached caching daemon.
7. GD (php-gd) – GD extension for PHP application to serve graphics.
8. XML (php-xml) – XML Parser for PHP applications.
9. MBString (php-mbstring) – Mbstring extension is used to handle multi-byte string in PHP applications.
10. MCrypt (php-mcrypt) – A Mcrypt library for PHP scripts.
11. APC (php-pecl-apc) – APC module used to optimize and cache PHP code.
12. CLI (php-cli) – Command-line interface for PHP.
13. PEAR (php-pear) – Application Repository framework for PHP.
14. PDO (php-pdo) – Database access module for PHP applications.

So the final command syntax looks like this:

yum --enablerepo=remi,remi-test install php-mysql php-pgsql php-pecl-mongo php-sqlite php-pecl-memcache php-pecl-memcached php-gd php-mbstring php-mcrypt php-xml php-pecl-apc php-cli php-pear php-pdo

Step 4 – You have to also configure your system to start Apache and MySQL service at boot time:

chkconfig --levels 235 httpd on
chkconfig --levels 235 mysqld on

Step 5 – Fire up Apache (start it to run at the very first time):

/etc/init.d/httpd start

Step 6 – Also start MySQL service:

/etc/init.d/mysqld start

That’s it. Catch all tutorials about CentOS here.

Further reading:

1. Top Most Common Basic MySQL Commands
2. How To Zip (Compress) and Unzip (Extract) Files
3. How To Move Website From cPanel-based Hosting To Your Server
4. Using SFTP To Upload and Manage Files On Your Server