elbblick Blog

Wer ist wieder da? Ni… Na, ich!

Mon, 21 Sep 2026 23:16:23 +0200

Ich kann gar nicht sagen, warum, aber ich habe wieder Bock aufs Bloggen. Mehr braucht’s eigentlich auch gar nicht. Ich will das hier nicht overengineeren, die Seite ist pures HTML, wird lokal generiert und dann hochgeladen. Einfacher geht es eigentlich gar nicht.

Themen? Wie gehabt: Bisschen was aus meinem Hauptjob, bisschen was aus meiner Freiberuflichkeit, inklusive der Lehre an der iu, und bisschen was aus meinem Gewerbe, zum Beispiel über Barcamps, barcamp.io und das KANBANcamp.

Und natürlich ganz viel Privates. Meinung. Politik und Gesellschaft. Und vor allem Musik.

Wie lange ich diesmal durchhalte? Keine Ahnung. Ne Woche? Einen Monat? Ein Jahr? Ewig? Abwarten.

Ich bin wieder da. Ohne Nina! Nina!

Nextcloud with Docker and NGINX on Ubuntu 22.04

Sat, 10 Feb 2024 23:45:26 +0100

There are a ton of cloud storage providers out there including the large players: Dropbox, OneDrive, Apple Cloud and so on. Though some of these have pretty good security, the files in those storages are still accessible to the admins of said services – and in extension to governments and other third party actors.

Do I have anything to hide? No. Do I want the government or random hackers and script kiddies looking at my personal picture archives? No again. So a self-hosted solution is the way to go.

Enter Nextcloud, an ownCloud fork. I decided to run the Docker version behind an NGINX proxy server.

It’s pretty simple this time, let’s jump into it!

Step 1 – Install Docker and docker-compose

We will use sudo, apt and apt-get for this. All these tools usually come with Ubuntu, so no need to install them. Let’s grab us some nice Docker stuff.

# Make sure everything is up to date
sudo apt update

# Get stuff
sudo apt-get install apt-transport-https ca-certificates curl gnupg-agent software-properties-common 

# Get ourselves some sweet gpg keys for docker
curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu/gpg | sudo apt-key add -

# Add the Docker repository
sudo add-apt-repository "deb [arch=amd64] https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu $(lsb_release -cs) stable"

# Get Docker
sudo apt update && sudo apt-get install docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io

# Get docker-compose (you may need to adjust the version number, 'v2.24.5') …
sudo curl -L "https://github.com/docker/compose/releases/download/v2.24.5/docker-compose-$(uname -s)-$(uname -m)" -o /usr/local/bin/docker-compose
# … and make it writeable
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/docker-compose

In addition, you might need to add the server user for the website to the Docker group (and create a docker group, if not in place already):

sudo groupadd docker
sudo usermod -aG docker usernameobviouslyuseyourwebsiteusernamehere

That’s all the installation stuff server-wise. Next, let’s set up NGINX.

Step 2 – Set up NGINX

Let’s create a configuration file for the webpage (or add a new server to an existing configuration file).

/etc/nginx/sites-available/example.com
server {
 server_name cloud.example.com; # Website URL
 root "/var/www/example.com/cloud.example.com"; # Website Folder
 
 location / {
 proxy_pass http://localhost:3000/; # Port as set in docker-compose (we'll do this later)
 proxy_set_header Host $host;
 proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
 proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
 proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;

 client_max_body_size 0;
 add_header Strict-Transport-Security "max-age=31536000; includeSubDomains; preload";

 access_log /var/log/nginx/example.com.access.log;
 error_log /var/log/nginx/example.com.error.log;
 }

 location = /.well-known/carddav {
 return 301 $scheme://$host/remote.php/dav;
 }

 location = /.well-known/caldav {
 return 301 $scheme://$host/remote.php/dav;
 }
 
 listen 80;
}

At this point you’d typically make sure to add a certificate, e. g. utilising certbot --nginx to do so. I won’t cover that here.

Step 3 – Add docker-compose.yml and db.env

Let’s start with the docker-compose.yml file. You can copy it from here, just make sure to use a free port. 30xx should be fine. Use netstat -tunlep | grep LISTEN | awk '{print $4}' to make sure.

version: '3'

services:
 db:
 image: mariadb
 command: --transaction-isolation=READ-COMMITTED --binlog-format=ROW
 restart: always
 volumes:
 - ./db:/var/lib/mysql
 env_file:
 - db.env

 redis:
 image: redis
 restart: always

 app:
 image: nextcloud:latest
 build: ./app
 restart: always
 ports:
 - 127.0.0.1:3000:80 
 # remember the port (3000) in the nginx file? 
 # Make sure this one is the same. And it's not in use, of course.
 volumes:
 - ./nextcloud:/var/www/html
 environment:
 - MYSQL_HOST=db
 env_file:
 - db.env
 depends_on:
 - db
 - redis

 cron:
 build: ./app
 restart: always
 volumes:
 - ./nextcloud:/var/www/html
 entrypoint: /cron.sh
 depends_on:
 - db
 - redis

volumes:
 db:
 nextcloud:

Save and add another file, this time db.env:

db.env
MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD=UseSomeCrypticPasswordHere
MYSQL_PASSWORD=UseAnotherCrypticPasswordHere
MYSQL_DATABASE=nextcloud
MYSQL_USER=nextcloud

Step 4 – Add the Dockerfile and the redis configuration file

Create a folder named app in your site directory, and add two files to it.

mkdir app
cd app
touch Dockerfile
touch redis.conf.php

Add some content to those files.

app/Dockerfile
FROM nextcloud:apache
COPY redis.config.php /usr/src/nextcloud/config/redis.config.php

app/redis.config.php
<?php
$CONFIG = array (
 'memcache.local' => '\\OC\\Memcache\\Redis',
 'memcache.locking' => '\\OC\\Memcache\\Redis',
 'filelocking.enabled' => 'true',
 'redis' => array(
 'host' => 'redis',
 'port' => 6379,
 ),
);

Step 5 – Cross your fingers and …

… run docker-compose.

docker-compose up

Check the output for errors. If you don’t see any, terminate the containers with Ctrl-C (once!).

Step 6 – Fire up a detached container

Run docker-compose again, so it starts some detached containers. Head to your website, and you should be able to follow the frontend installation process.

docker-compose up -d

If everything went well, you should have a running Nextcloud instance. If not, let me know and I might add more to this tutorial.

WordPress with NGINX, PHP-FPM and MariaDB (for MySQL) on Ubuntu 22.04

Wed, 02 Aug 2023 04:16:42 +0200

There are a lot of ways to run WordPress. Here is the one I chose, maybe it helps you as well. If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to leave them in the comments. I will try my best to help you out. I am assuming you install this on your own server and have root access, or at least sudo access with your account.

That being said: Let’s jump into it!

Step 1 – Install packages
Step 2 – Set up the database
Step 3 – Set up PHP-FPM
Step 4 – Install WordPress
Step 5 – Configure WordPress
Step 6 – Set up NGINX

Step 1 – Install packages

Before you start installing and configuring WordPress, you need to make sure you have all the tools you need. Use apt to install all the needed packages:

sudo apt install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository -y ppa:ondrej/php
sudo apt update

sudo apt install nginx
sudo apt install php-fpm 
sudo apt install mariadb-server 

Step 2 – Set up the database

The next step is setting up the database. This should be done rather quickly. All you need to do is login to mysql.

sudo systemctl status mariadb # check if mariadb is up and running
sudo mariadb

If you have set a password for mysql, use the interactive mode instead.

sudo systemctl status mariadb # check if mariadb is up and running
sudo mariadb -u root -p

“Inside” we need to create a database, a user and then grant the needed privileges for the database to the generated user.

mariadb
CREATE DATABASE wordpress CHARACTER SET utf8mb4 COLLATE utf8mb4_general_ci;
CREATE USER 'user'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'password';
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON wordpress.* TO 'user'@'localhost';
QUIT;

You can change the database name, user and password as you like. Make sure to jot them down, you will need them later.

Step 3 – Set up PHP-FPM

For this you will use PHP-FPM to handle everything php, passed on by NGINX. This utilizes a pool, for that we need to create a file in /etc/php/8.2/fpm/pool.d. Replace “8.2” with the version of php that you are using.

php -v # find out which php-version you are using, I will use 8.2 here
sudo vim /etc/php/8.2/fpm/pool.d/example.com.conf
# replace <example.com> with your domain or anything you like

In that file is the configuration for php, if used through the FastCGI Process Manager (FPM). Here is an example configuration. Remember to activate the vim insert mode by typing i, before you paste it in.

/etc/php/8.2/fpm/pool.d/example.com.conf
[examplecom] ; change to a unique name

; replace with the user and group of your php files:
user = example_com
group = example_com

; replace example-com with your domain
listen = /run/php/example-com-fpm.sock

; should be user and group of your web server, probably leave it be:
listen.owner = www-data 
listen.group = www-data

pm = dynamic
pm.max_children = 120
pm.start_servers = 12
pm.min_spare_servers = 6
pm.max_spare_servers = 18
clear_env = no

php_admin_value[opcache.save_comments] = 1
php_admin_value[opcache.interned_strings_buffer] = 16
php_admin_value[opcache.revalidate_freq] = 60
php_admin_value[opcache.validate_timestamps] = 0

env[HOSTNAME] = $HOSTNAME
env[PATH] = /usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin
env[TMP] = /tmp
env[TMPDIR] = /tmp
env[TEMP] = /tmp

; you can use your domain here as well
php_admin_value[error_log] = /var/log/fpm-php.example-com.log
php_admin_flag[log_errors] = on
php_admin_value[memory_limit] = 1G

That should do it. Write to the file and exit vim by typing :wq. After that, restart PHP-FPM.

sudo systemctl restart php8.2-fpm

Step 4 – Install WordPress

Change into your web root folder and create a folder for your page. Change path and folder name as needed. If you do not know how to do this, you probably should not have root access, tbh. … 😬

mkdir /var/www/html/example.com
cd /var/www/html/example.com

In that folder, download wordpress and untar it.

wget https://wordpress.org/latest.tar.gz
tar --strip-components=1 -xvzf latest.tar.gz
rm latest.tar.gz

Note that --strip-components=1 strips the first part of the files’ paths, in this case the folder wordpress it would normally extract into.

That should do it for now, next we need to configure your WordPress.

Step 5 – Configure WordPress

We will do this by editing the wp-config.php with our editor of choice, which of course is vim.

cp wp-config-sample.php wp-config.php
vim wp-config.php

We’ll make it a short one, of course you can keep all the comments in there. If you want to put in more stuff, you can find a generator at generatewp.com.

Link for the salt: api.wordpress.org

wp-config.php
<?php
/* MySQL settings */
define( 'DB_NAME', 'wordpress' ); // database from step 2
define( 'DB_USER', 'user' ); // user from step 2
define( 'DB_PASSWORD', 'password' ); // password from step 2
define( 'DB_HOST', 'localhost' );
define( 'DB_CHARSET', 'utf8mb4' );

/* MySQL database table prefix. */
$table_prefix = 'wp_';

/* Authentication Unique Keys and Salts. */
/* head to https://api.wordpress.org/secret-key/1.1/salt/ and copy it here */
define('AUTH_KEY', 'I$RCe|Avd6q<^q~}r@!mwq^ds-f+{po');
define('SECURE_AUTH_KEY', '3.}i|OH|UEG3Ap|p#bJ+P{P%4N-WP)^');
define('LOGGED_IN_KEY', '0(a gw|-/d7z3T=yN)fh?WD,sWCjDD%');
define('NONCE_KEY', 'm}(s:T%xu]gwKgwuHcThe_TEY9l7v_?');
define('AUTH_SALT', 'JrRb)}~KaZcL5P?v|)h{m$(:m!wb9EU');
define('SECURE_AUTH_SALT', 'enY94*k/e80(F]]_+Z}4as|B&+KX)b1');
define('LOGGED_IN_SALT', '=;ir6WRQj,ahn=5$? /h6|~&%0QWg=q');
define('NONCE_SALT', 'c&hjS7e9xe{x*ip=7LoYMO@|t4d`w5B');


/* Absolute path to the WordPress directory. */
if ( !defined('ABSPATH') )
	define('ABSPATH', dirname(__FILE__) . '/');

/* Sets up WordPress vars and included files. */
require_once(ABSPATH . 'wp-settings.php');

Aaaand with that done, all we finally need to do is configure NGINX to do what it’s supposed to do.

Step 6 – Set up nginx

In order to do that, we are going to create a file in the sites-available folder of NGINX.

sudo vim /etc/nginx/sites-available/example.com

/etc/nginx/sites-available/example.com
server {
 listen 80;
 root /var/www/html/example.com; # replace example.com
 index index.php index.html index.htm;
 server_name example.com; # replace example.com

 client_max_body_size 500M;

 location / {
 try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$args;
 }

 location = /favicon.ico {
 log_not_found off;
 access_log off;
 }

 location ~* \.(js|css|png|jpg|jpeg|gif|ico)$ {
 expires max;
 log_not_found off;
 }

 location = /robots.txt {
 allow all;
 log_not_found off;
 access_log off;
 }

 location ~ \.php$ {
 include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
 # replace example-com-fpm with socket from step 3
 fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/example-com-fpm.sock;
 fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
 include fastcgi_params;
 }
}

Save it with :wq, link the example.com file from /etc/nginx/sites-enabled, test and restart NGINX.

sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/example.com /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/
sudo nginx -t
sudo systemctl restart nginx

That’s it. Head to example.com and finish the installation from the web installer. Happy blogging!

Edit: You still need to install a Certificate for the website, but that's not part of this post. If you need any help with that, let me know and I will add a tutorial for Let's Encrypt.

Batch change permissions for folders and files

Tue, 01 Aug 2023 01:50:18 +0200

If you ever need to change permissions for a bunch of folder and/or files without a GUI, you can utilize find and xargs to achieve that in the shell in a flash:

find -xtype d | xargs chmod 755 # directories, standard permissions
find -xtype f | xargs chmod 644 # files, standard permissions

find -xtype d | xargs chmod 775 # directories, writeable for group
find -xtype f | xargs chmod 664 # files, writeable for group

Basically what we are doing here is using find to find every directory or file, depending on the type. The option xtype, followed by d or f, helps us limit the (recursive) search to directories and files respectively. xtype includes symbolic links into the results, while type would not. the resulting directory/file names are then piped into xargs, which applies the command it is followed by (here: chmod 755 and chmod 644) to the list it receives from the pipe.

#1476107295 TYPO3\CMS\Core\Error\Exception

Mon, 17 Jul 2023 02:34:38 +0200

I ran into a a small problem after activating the TYPO3 debug mode in my ddev TYPO3 development installation. When opening the Configuration Presets again, I was greeted with the following error:

Something went wrong
Please use Check for broken extensions to see if a loaded extension breaks this part of the install tool and unload it.

The box below may additionally reveal further details on what went wrong depending on your debug settings. It may help to temporarily switch to debug mode using Settings > Configuration Presets > Debug settings.

If this error happens at an early state and no full exception back trace is shown, it may also help to manually increase debugging output in %config-dir%/system/settings.php:['BE']['debug'] => true, ['SYS']['devIPmask'] => '*', ['SYS']['displayErrors'] => 1,['SYS']['exceptionalErrors'] => 12290

Upon investigating the Ajax error shown below the message I saw it was throwing an exception:

/typo3/module/tools/settings
(1/1) #1476107295 TYPO3\CMS\Core\Error\Exception
PHP Runtime Deprecation Notice: str_contains(): Passing null to parameter #1 ($haystack) of type string is deprecated in /var/www/html/vendor/typo3/cms-install/Classes/Configuration/Image/ImageMagick6Preset.php line 85

Instead of increasing the debugging output as suggested, I guessed that – short of fixing the underlying function – deactivating deprecation notices would do the trick for now, hoping that the TYPO3 devs will fix this in an upcoming release. So I jumped into the console, navigated to /config/system and edited the file additional.php, and found the following lines:

/config/system/additional.php
'SYS' => [
	'trustedHostsPattern' => '.*.*',
	'devIPmask' => '*',
	'displayErrors' => 1,
],

A little addition, and everything worked out fine:

/config/system/additional.php
'SYS' => [
	'trustedHostsPattern' => '.*.*',
	'devIPmask' => '*',
	'displayErrors' => 1,
	'exceptionalErrors' => 8191
],

I might need to adjust this, if other errors show up, but for now it’s fine. On the downside I will not catch any deprecated stuff for now, but I can live with that.

Documentation used:

https://docs.typo3.org/m/typo3/reference-coreapi/main/en-us/Configuration/Typo3ConfVars/SYS.html#exceptionalerrors

https://www.php.net/manual/en/errorfunc.constants.php