How to Install WordPress with Lighttpd Web Server on Ubuntu 20.04

Lighttpd is a free, open-source, and lightweight web server known for its fast speed. It is simple and easy to install and it provides a web-based interface to control and manage the application.

WordPress is a free and open-source content management system that allows you to create a blog and website from a web-based interface. Installing WordPress with Lighttpd will increase the speed and performance of your website.

In this post, we will show you how to install WordPress with a Lighttpd web server on Ubuntu 20.04.

Step 1 – Install Lighttpd, MariaDB, and PHP

First, install the Lighttpd, MariaDB, PHP, and other PHP extensions using the following command:

apt-get install mysql-server lighttpd php php-fpm php-mysql php-cli php-curl php-xml php-json php-zip php-mbstring php-gd php-intl php-cgi -y

The above command will also install the Apache package to your server, so you will need to remove it and stop the Apache service.

apt-get remove apache2 -y
systemctl stop apache2

Next, start the Lighttpd service and enable it to start at system reboot:

systemctl start lighttpd
systemctl enable lighttpd

Step 2 – Configure PHP-FPM to Work with Lighttpd

Next, you will need to configure PHP-FPM to work with Lighttpd. To do so, edit the www.conf file:

nano /etc/php/7.4/fpm/pool.d/www.conf

Find the following line:

listen = /run/php/php7.4-fpm.sock

And, replace it with the following line:

listen = 127.0.0.1:9000

Save and close the file, then edit the 15-fastcgi-php.conf file:

nano /etc/lighttpd/conf-available/15-fastcgi-php.conf

Find the following lines:

"bin-path" => "/usr/bin/php-cgi",
"socket" => "/var/run/lighttpd/php.socket",

And, replaced them with the following lines:

"host" => "127.0.0.1",
"port" => "9000",

Save and close the file, then enable the required modules with the following command:

lighty-enable-mod fastcgi
lighty-enable-mod fastcgi-php

Next, restart the Lighttpd and PHP-FPM service to apply the changes:

systemctl restart lighttpd
systemctl restart php7.4-fpm

Step 3 – Create a Database for WordPress

Next, log in to the MariaDB with the following command:

mysql

Once you are log in, create a database and user with the following command:

CREATE DATABASE wpdb;
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES on wpdb.* TO 'wpuser'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'password';

Next, flush the privileges and exit from the MariaDB:

FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
EXIT;

Step 4 – Install WordPress

Next, change the directory to the Lighttpd web root directory and download the latest version of WordPress using the following command:

cd /var/www/html
wget https://wordpress.org/latest.tar.gz

Once the download is completed, extract the downloaded file with the following command:

tar -xvzf latest.tar.gz

Next, change the directory to WordPress and rename the sample configuration file:

cd wordpress
mv wp-config-sample.php wp-config.php

Next, edit the configuration file and define your database settings:

nano wp-config.php

Change the following lines:

/** The name of the database for WordPress */
define( 'DB_NAME', 'wpdb' );

/** MySQL database username */
define( 'DB_USER', 'wpuser' );

/** MySQL database password */
define( 'DB_PASSWORD', 'password' );

/** MySQL hostname */
define( 'DB_HOST', 'localhost' );

/** Database Charset to use in creating database tables. */
define( 'DB_CHARSET', 'utf8' );

Save and close the file, then set proper permissions and ownership with the following command:

chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/html/wordpress
chmod -R 755 /var/www/html/wordpress

Step 5 – Configure Lighttpd for WordPress

First, create a directory to store the virtual host configuration file:

mkdir -p /etc/lighttpd/vhosts.d/

Next, edit the Lighttpd configuration file:

nano /etc/lighttpd/lighttpd.conf

Add mod_rewrite in the following block:

server.modules = (
        "mod_access",
        "mod_alias",
        "mod_compress",
        "mod_redirect",
        "mod_rewrite",
)

And define the path of your virtual host configuration directory:

include_shell "cat /etc/lighttpd/vhosts.d/*.conf"

Save and close the file. Then, create a new virtual host configuration file for WordPress:

nano /etc/lighttpd/vhosts.d/wordpress.conf

Add the following lines:

$HTTP["host"] =~ "(^|.)wordpress.example.com$" {
server.document-root = "/var/www/html/wordpress"
server.errorlog = "/var/log/lighttpd/wordpress-error.log"

}

Save and close the file, then restart the Lighttpd service to apply the changes:

systemctl restart lighttpd

Step 6 – Access WordPress Dashboard

Now, open your web browser and access the WordPress installation wizard using the URL http://wordpress.example.com. You should see the following page:

Select your language and click on the Continue button. You should see the following page:

Provide your site information and click on the Start the installation button. Once the installation is completed, you should see the following screen:

Click on the Login button. You should see the WordPress login page;

Provide your admin username and password and click on the Login button. You should see the WordPress admin dashboard on the following screen:

Conclusion

Congratulations! You have successfully installed WordPress with Lighttpd on Ubuntu 20.04. You can now create a high-performance website or blog from the WordPress dashboard on your dedicated server from Atlantic.Net.