# Installing Monica on Debian <!-- omit in toc -->

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Monica can run on Debian Buster.

- [Prerequisites](#prerequisites)
- [Installation steps](#installation-steps)
  - [1. Clone the repository](#1-clone-the-repository)
  - [2. Setup the database](#2-setup-the-database)
  - [3. Configure Monica](#3-configure-monica)
  - [4. Configure cron job](#4-configure-cron-job)
  - [5. Configure Apache webserver](#5-configure-apache-webserver)
  - [Final step](#final-step)

## Prerequisites

Monica depends on the following:

-   A Web server, like [Apache httpd webserver](https://httpd.apache.org/)
-   [Git](https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Getting-Started-Installing-Git)
-   PHP 7.4+
-   [Composer](https://getcomposer.org/)
-   [Node.js](https://nodejs.org)
-   [Yarn](https://yarnpkg.com)
-   MySQL / MariaDB

An editor like vim or nano should be useful too.

**Apache:** Install Apache with:

```sh
sudo apt update
sudo apt install -y apache2
```

**Git:** Install Git with:

```sh
sudo apt install -y git
```

**PHP:**

If you are using Debian 10 or lower, PHP 7.4 is not available from the Debian project directly.  Instead use the [deb.sury.org](https://deb.sury.org/) package repository from Ondřej Surý, maintainer of the mainline Debian packages.

```sh
sudo wget -q https://packages.sury.org/php/apt.gpg -O /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/php-sury.gpg
echo "deb https://packages.sury.org/php/ $(lsb_release -sc) main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/php-sury.list
sudo apt update
```


Install PHP 7.4 with these extensions:

```sh
sudo apt install -y php7.4 php7.4-bcmath php7.4-curl php7.4-gd php7.4-gmp \
    php7.4-intl php7.4-mbstring php7.4-mysql php7.4-redis php7.4-xml php7.4-zip
```

**Composer:** After you're done installing PHP, you'll need the Composer dependency manager.

```sh
wget -q -O - https://getcomposer.org/installer | sudo php -- --install-dir=/usr/local/bin/ --filename=composer
```

**Node.js:** Install node.js with package manager.

```sh
wget -q -O - https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_16.x | sudo bash -
sudo apt install -y nodejs
```

**Yarn:** Install yarn with npm.

```sh
sudo npm install --global yarn
```

**MariaDB:** Install MariaDB. Note that this only installs the package, but does not setup Mysql. This is done later in the instructions:

```sh
sudo apt install -y mariadb-server
```

## Installation steps

Once the softwares above are installed:

### 1. Clone the repository

You may install Monica by simply cloning the repository. Consider cloning the repository into any folder, example here in `/var/www/monica` directory:

```sh
cd /var/www/
sudo git clone https://github.com/monicahq/monica.git
```

You should check out a tagged version of Monica since `main` branch may not always be stable.
Find the latest official version on the [release page](https://github.com/monicahq/monica/releases)

```sh
cd /var/www/monica
# Get latest tags from GitHub
sudo git fetch
# Clone the desired version
sudo git checkout tags/v2.18.0
```

### 2. Setup the database

First make the database a bit more secure.

```sh
sudo mysql_secure_installation
```

Next log in with the root account to configure the database.

```sh
sudo mysql -uroot -p
```

Create a database called 'monica'.

```sql
CREATE DATABASE monica CHARACTER SET utf8mb4 COLLATE utf8mb4_unicode_ci;
```

Create a user called 'monica' and its password 'strongpassword'.

```sql
CREATE USER 'monica'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'strongpassword';
```

We have to authorize the new user on the `monica` db so that he is allowed to change the database.

```sql
GRANT ALL ON monica.* TO 'monica'@'localhost';
```

And finally we apply the changes and exit the database.

```sql
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
exit
```

### 3. Configure Monica

`cd /var/www/monica` then run these steps with `sudo`:

1. `cp .env.example .env` to create your own version of all the environment variables needed for the project to work.
2. Update `.env` to your specific needs
    - set `DB_USERNAME` and `DB_PASSWORD` with the settings used behind.
    - configure a [mailserver](/docs/installation/mail.md) for registration & reminders to work correctly.
    - set the `APP_ENV` variable to `production`, `local` is only used for the development version. Beware: setting `APP_ENV` to `production` will force HTTPS. Skip this if you're running Monica locally.
3. Run `composer install --no-interaction --no-dev` to install all packages.
4. Run `yarn install` to install frontend packages, then `yarn run production` to build the assets (js, css).
5. Run `php artisan key:generate` to generate an application key. This will set `APP_KEY` with the right value automatically.
6. Run `php artisan setup:production -v` to run the migrations, seed the database and symlink folders.
    - You can use `email` and `password` parameter to setup a first account directly: `php artisan setup:production --email=your@email.com --password=yourpassword -v`
7. _Optional_: Setup the queues with Redis, Beanstalk or Amazon SQS: see optional instruction of [generic installation](generic.md#setup-queues)
8. _Optional_: Setup the access tokens to use the API follow optional instruction of [generic installation](generic.md#setup-access-tokens)

### 4. Configure cron job

Monica requires some background processes to continuously run. The list of things Monica does in the background is described [here](https://github.com/monicahq/monica/blob/main/app/Console/Kernel.php#L63).
Basically those crons are needed to send reminder emails and check if a new version is available.
To do this, setup a cron that runs every minute that triggers the following command `php artisan schedule:run`.

Run the crontab command:

```sh
sudo crontab -u www-data -e
```

Then, in the `crontab` editor window you just opened, paste the following at the end of the document:

```sh
* * * * * php /var/www/monica/artisan schedule:run >> /dev/null 2>&1
```

### 5. Configure Apache webserver

1. Give proper permissions to the project directory by running:

```sh
sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/monica
sudo chmod -R 775 /var/www/monica/storage
```

2. Enable the rewrite module of the Apache webserver:

```sh
sudo a2enmod rewrite
```

3. Configure a new monica site in apache by doing:

```sh
sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/monica.conf
```

Then, in the `nano` text editor window you just opened, copy the following - swapping the `**YOUR IP ADDRESS/DOMAIN**` with your server's IP address/associated domain:

```html
<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerName **YOUR IP ADDRESS/DOMAIN**

    ServerAdmin webmaster@localhost
    DocumentRoot /var/www/monica/public

    <Directory /var/www/monica/public>
        Options Indexes FollowSymLinks
        AllowOverride All
        Require all granted
    </Directory>

    ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log
    CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined
</VirtualHost>
```

4. Apply the new `.conf` file and reload Apache. You can do that by running:

```sh
sudo a2dissite 000-default.conf
sudo a2ensite monica.conf
sudo systemctl reload apache2
```

### Final step

The final step is to have fun with your newly created instance, which should be up and running to `http://localhost`.