Requirements

• A server
  • A virtual machine will do fine
  • At least 1 gig of RAM
• A domain name (a sub-domain will do fine)

Set up your domain name

You should point your domain name(s) to your server before your proceed. Even better is to point a wildcard subdomain. For example, we want all traffic to dev1.wikisuite.org or *.dev1.wikisuite.org as this makes it easy to create many projects, such as

• abc.dev1.wikisuite.org
• def.dev1.wikisuite.org
• etc.

You'll want something like this:

dev1	A record	(put your IP address here)
*.dev1	CNAME	dev1.wikisuite.org.

More info at Set up your domain name

How To Install Virtualmin

You should have a fresh instance of Ubuntu 20.04 LTS. It should work with Ubuntu 18.04 LTS and Debian 9 and 10 but this has not yet been tested. CentOS support is planned for 2021.

It is important that nothing else is installed on the server because Virtualmin will handle it. We'll use https://gitlab.com/wikisuite/virtualmin-installer/ to install Virtualmin which is then configured for optimal settings for WikiSuite.

Install Webmin and Virtualmin on Ubuntu OS
Download Virtualmin using the below script. It is basically a shell script that will handle rest of the installation once executed.

Log in to your server via SSH with the root user. (If you are not logged in as root, you should switch to root), Then

curl -o install-virtualmin.sh https://gitlab.com/wikisuite/virtualmin-installer/-/raw/master/install-virtualmin.sh

nano install-virtualmin.sh

bash install-virtualmin.sh

A web URL will be provided after installation is complete, you can access the Virtualmin by the provided URL Ex: https://example.org:10000 (GUI is at port 10000)

Update your system to latest available packages

apt-get update

apt-get upgrade

Create Virtual Servers

Virtualmin > Create Virtual Server
For more info: https://www.virtualmin.com/documentation/tutorial/virtual-server-basics

Suppose your desired domain is example.org, use the following pattern:
Create a Virtual Server for manager.example.org
And then, a Sub-Server for example.org

Top-level Virtual Server

Domain name (This will be for Tiki Manager): manager.example.org
Administration username (pick a descriptive word for that domain): example
Administration password: Set a Strong Password (if not, you will very likely get hacked)

Sub-server

Domain name (This will be for your site): example.org
No need to pick username and password like above because user you created can access both.

If a domain name is valid, free SSL (for https://) certificates from Let's Encrypt are automatically created.

So now, you should be able to visit both manager.example.org and example.org and see a placeholder page. If domain name is not set up, you can Preview Website via Virtualmin

Why not have example.org as the Virtual Server and manager.example.org as the Sub-Server? You could but it makes things more complicated later

Virtualmin has many other features like domain alias, domain rename, etc.

Installation of Tiki Manager

For more info, please see: https://doc.tiki.org/Manager

So now, you need to log in using SSH with the user you just created (and not as root)

1. Install Tiki Manager
Following on above, you will end up in a directory like /home/example/:

example@xyz:~$ pwd
/home/example/

$ mkdir tiki-manager

$ cd tiki-manager

$ git clone --depth 1 --branch master https://gitlab.com/tikiwiki/tiki-manager.git .

$ php tiki-manager.php manager:info

When asked "Enter passphrase (empty for no passphrase):", just click "Enter" unless you know that you need a passphrase (probably not)

Tiki Manager's web interface

More info: https://doc.tiki.org/Tiki-Manager-Web-UI

As of 2020-12-29, the web interface can't be used to install Tiki on Virtualmin (it assumes you are using root user for MySQL, which is not the case). Until this is resolved, you need to use the command line interface to install. However, you can use the web interface for other operations like upgrades and backups.

cd /home/example/tiki-manager/
php tiki-manager.php webmanager:enable

Recommended answers:

• This will enable the Tiki Manager administration web panel. Continue with this action?: yes
• WWW Tiki Manager directory: /home/example/public_html
• Pick a user name and password
• Restrict use to localhost: no because you want to access remotely

Virtualmin > file manager > Home > example > public_html
So now Tiki Manager will be accessible at manager.example.org, but the Virtualmin default page is still shown because index.htm takes precedence over index.php. So use the Virtualmin file manager to delete index.html (we will later improve install script so this is no longer necessary)

Create Tiki Instance through Command Line

So now to install Tiki, you need a database. Virtualmin actually already created one for you.

Here is video to give you an idea of the process, how to get database details

Now, Tiki Manager will create a fresh Tiki instance fetching files from Git, and using database mentioned above.

For more info, please see: https://doc.tiki.org/manager#instance

php tiki-manager.php instance:create

Recommended answers:

• Connection type: local (because Tiki Manager is installing on the same server, accessible to the same user.)
• WebURL: http://example.org (as above)
• Name: you can keep what it proposes. This is just cosmetic.
• Email: Your email so system can alert you of issues
• WebRoot: /home/example/domains/example.org/public_html
• You will get a warning (Target webroot folder is not empty). Installing a new Tiki instance, all files will be deleted. Do you want to continue? (yes/no): yes
• TempDir: /home/example/tmp/
• Backup user: (accept proposed value)
• Backup group: (accept proposed value)
• Backup file permissions: (accept proposed value)
• Branch: git : 21.x (this provides latest released version of branch 21 + unreleased bug fixes)
• Database host: (accept proposed value)
• Database user: username from the Virtual Server (not the Sub-Server)
• Database password: password from the Virtual Server (not the Sub-Server)
• Database name: name from the Sub-Server (not the Virtual Server)

Here is video to give you an idea of the process, but you should use recommended answers above

After you have answered all the questions, it will take quite some time to install your Tiki. Perhaps 20-30 minutes or more, depending on your context. Just be patient and let it run.

After Successfully Creating tiki-instance

You will get the Tiki HomePage as below.

Login with
u: admin
p: admin

And follow the instructions to set a strong password.

The Tiki Admin Dashboard looks like this:

If SSL set up was successful above, you can force all traffic to SSL:

To access the administration
{http://example.org/tiki-admin.php}

Control Panels > Security > General security >"check" Protect all sessions with HTTPS > Apply the changes

Setup Mail

Virtualmin > Edit User > Add a new user to this server

Configure email account to Tiki's webmail

For more info, please see: https://doc.tiki.org/Webmail

To access Control panel
https://example.org/tiki-admin.php

Control Panel > click on advance button > enable Webmail

or

To access Webmail

http://example.org/tiki-admin.php?page=webmail

Webmail

Tiki integrates the Cypht webmail, which can aggregate email from many accounts, using standards: POP, IMAP, SMTP, JMAP

Configuring webmail accounts

After enabling webmail from the features section of the admin panel you will be able to enter the webmail section from the application menu. In your first visit to the webmail you will be automatically redirected to the webmail configuration panel.

Configure SMTP Server
By default Tiki Manager uses sendmail to send email notifications. If you intend to use SMTP instead add the following lines to your .env file.
Virtualmin > file manager > Home > tiki-manager > .env dist

SMTP_HOST=<SERVER_ADDRESS>
SMTP_PORT=<SERVER_PORT>
SMTP_USER=(optional if authentication is required)
SMTP_PASS=(optional if authentication is required)

Extras

$ php apt-get install unoconv

For more info: https://doc.tiki.org/unoconv