Guides - Deploy a LEMP Stack through the Linode Marketplace

The LEMP stack (Linux, NGINX, MySQL, PHP) is a popular, free, and open-source web software bundle used for hosting websites on the Linux operating system. While similar to the LAMP Stack, a LEMP stack uses the NGINX web server instead of Apache. NGINX is preferred by many users for a variety of reasons, including its flexibility, speed, and ability to perform under high load.

Deploying a Marketplace App

The Linode Marketplace allows you to easily deploy software on a Compute Instance using the Cloud Manager. See Get Started with Marketplace Apps for complete steps.

1. Log in to the Cloud Manager and select the Marketplace link from the left navigation menu. This displays the Linode Create page with the Marketplace tab pre-selected.

2. Under the Select App section, select the app you would like to deploy.

3. Complete the form by following the steps and advice within the Creating a Compute Instance guide. Depending on the Marketplace App you selected, there may be additional configuration options available. See the Configuration Options section below for compatible distributions, recommended plans, and any additional configuration options available for this Marketplace App.

4. Click the Create Linode button. Once the Compute Instance has been provisioned and has fully powered on, wait for the software installation to complete. If the instance is powered off or restarted before this time, the software installation will likely fail.

To verify that the app has been fully installed, see Get Started with Marketplace Apps > Verify Installation. Once installed, follow the instructions within the Getting Started After Deployment section to access the application and start using it.

Configuration Options

• Supported distributions: Ubuntu 22.04 LTS
• Recommended minimum plan: 1GB Shared Compute Instance or higher, depending on the number of sites and size of the sites you plan on hosting.

LEMP Stack Options

• Email address (required): Enter the email address to use for generating the SSL certificates.

  Note

  The password for the MySQL root user is automatically generated and provided in the file /home/$USERNAME/.credentials when the LEMP deployment completes.

Limited Sudo User

You need to fill out the following fields to automatically create a limited sudo user, with a strong generated password for your new Compute Instance. This account will be assigned to the sudo group, which provides elevated permissions when running commands with the sudo prefix.

• Limited sudo user: Enter your preferred username for the limited user. No Capital Letters, Spaces, or Special Characters.

  Locating The Generated Sudo Password

  A password is generated for the limited user and stored in a .credentials file in their home directory, along with application specific passwords. This can be viewed by running: cat /home/$USERNAME/.credentials

  For best results, add an account SSH key for the Cloud Manager user that is deploying the instance, and select that user as an authorized_user in the API or by selecting that option in the Cloud Manager. Their SSH pubkey will be assigned to both root and the limited user.

• Disable root access over SSH: To block the root user from logging in over SSH, select Yes. You can still switch to the root user once logged in, and you can also log in as root through Lish.

  Accessing The Instance Without SSH

  If you disable root access for your deployment and do not provide a valid Account SSH Key assigned to the authorized_user, you will need to login as the root user via the Lish console and run cat /home/$USERNAME/.credentials to view the generated password for the limited user.

Custom Domain (Optional)

If you wish to automatically configure a custom domain, you first need to configure your domain to use Linode’s name servers. This is typically accomplished directly through your registrar. See Use Linode’s Name Servers with Your Domain. Once that is finished, you can fill out the following fields for the Marketplace App:

• Linode API Token: If you wish to use the Linode’s DNS Manager to manage DNS records for your custom domain, create a Linode API Personal Access Token on your account with Read/Write access to Domains. If this is provided along with the subdomain and domain fields (outlined below), the installation attempts to create DNS records via the Linode API. See Get an API Access Token. If you do not provide this field, you need to manually configure your DNS records through your DNS provider and point them to the IP address of the new instance.
• Subdomain: The subdomain you wish to use, such as www for www.example.com.
• Domain: The domain name you wish to use, such as example.com.

Getting Started After Deployment

After your LEMP stack has finished deploying, you can view it and upload your own files using one of the methods below:

• Log in to your new Compute Instance through Lish or SSH using either the root user or limited user and the associated password you entered when creating the instance. Your application’s web files are located in the /var/www/html directory.

• Navigate to the domain entered during the creation of the Linode instance. If you did not enter a domain, you can also use your Compute Instance’s rDNS, which may look like 123-0-123-0.ip.linodeusercontent.com. See the Managing IP Addresses guide for information on viewing and setting the rDNS value.

• Consult the following guides to learn more about working with the various components of the LEMP stack:

  • Secure HTTP Traffic with Certbot
  • How to Configure NGINX
  • How to Optimize MySQL Performance Using MySQLTuner

• Upload files to your web root directory with an SFTP application like FileZilla. Use the same root credentials that you would use for SSH.

Software Included

The LEMP Stack Marketplace App installs the following software on your Compute Instance:

Going Further

• Marketplace Apps Repository: Review the deployment Ansible playbooks.

More Information

You may wish to consult the following resources for additional information on this topic. While these are provided in the hope that they will be useful, please note that we cannot vouch for the accuracy or timeliness of externally hosted materials.

• NGINX Getting Started