Configuring-Linux-Web-Server

This project involves how to access, secure, and perform the initial configuration of a bare-bones Linux server. And also how to install and configure a web and database server and actually host a web application

Project Overview

You will take a baseline installation of a Linux server and prepare it to host your web applications. You will secure your server from a number of attack vectors, install and configure a database server, and deploy one of your existing web applications onto it.

Why this Project?

A deep understanding of exactly what your web applications are doing, how they are hosted, and the interactions between multiple systems are what define you as a Full Stack Web Developer. In this project, you’ll be responsible for turning a brand-new, bare bones, Linux server into the secure and efficient web application host your applications need.

Create AWS instance

• create an account in aws here []
• Mark down the public Ip address from console of the instance created

Logging in as a dafault user

• Download the public key from your aws account.
• Log in as root by copying the command from console of your aws instance: ssh -i "aws_key.pem" ubuntu@ec2-52-15-235-1.us-east-2.compute.amazonaws.com

Upgrading and Updating the available package

• sudo apt-get update
• sudo apt-get upgrade
• sudo apt-get install unattended-upgrades

Downloading Apache2, Git, Postgres, mod-wsgi

1. Apache2

• sudo apt-get install apache2 libapache2-mod-wsgi git
• Enable mod_wsgi: sudo a2enmod wsgi

3. Postgresql

• sudo apt-get install libpq-dev python-dev
• sudo apt-get install postgresql postgresql-contrib
• Check for prohibiting remote connections sudo cat /etc/postgresql/9.3/main/pg_hba.conf

Installing Flask and dependencies

• sudo apt-get install python-pip
• sudo pip install Flask
• sudo pip install httplib2 oauth2client sqlalchemy psycopg2 sqlalchemy_utils
• sudo pip install requests

Creating a new user

• sudo adduser grader

Giving sudoers access to the grader

• sudo nano /etc/sudoers.d/grader
• Add this line: grader ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL and save the file

Generating encryption key pair

• Generate key on you local machine by:
• ssh-keygen
• Give the path name and then fileName as /path/fileName
• Other fields are optional.

Installing public key

• Get the ssh-key generated from localhost from the file: cat .ssh/fileName.pub
• Paste this copied ssh-key in the authorized_keys by :
  1. /home/grader/mkdir .ssh
  2. /home/grader/.ssh/touch authorized_keys
  3. nano /home/grader/.ssh/authorized_keys & paste & save the file in grader user.
• Add permissions to the .ssh directory by chmod 700 .ssh and to the authorized_keys file by chmod 644 .ssh/authorized_keys
• Restart the service :sudo service ssh restart

Log in as a grader user

• `ssh -i ~/.ssh/fileName grader@52.15.235.1 -p 2200

Forcing key based authentication

• sudo nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config
• Make changes inside the file by making PasswordaAthentication no from yes and save the file
• Restart the service sudo service ssh restart

Changing ssh port

• sudo nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config
• Search for the line of port no and change it from 22 to 2200
• sudo service ssh restart

Disabling root login

• sudo nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config
• Search for the line PermitRootUser and change it to no
• sudo service ssh restart

Changing Firewall settigs

• sudo ufw status
• sudo ufw default deny incoming
• sudo ufw default allow outgoing

Configuring ports in UFW

• sudo ufw allow ssh
• sudo ufw allow 2200/tcp
• sudo ufw allow www
• sudo ufw allow ntp
• To activate and enable Firewall on system startup sudo ufw enable

Configure local timezone to UTC

• sudo dpkg-reconfigure tzdata
• For better synchronization of server's time : sudo apt-get install ntp

Log in using ssh key generated

• Logout from the root and log in as grader user using ssh -i <fileName>.pub grader@x.x.x.x -p 2200

Get into postgresql

• sudo su - postgres
• psql
• CREATE USER <username> WITH PASSWORD '<password>'; //Creating user
• CREATE DATABASE <databaseName> WITH OWNER <username>; //Creating databse
• \c <databaseName>; //Connecting to database
• REVOKE ALL ON SCHEMA public FROM public; //Revoking all rights from public
• GRANT ALL ON SCHEMA public TO <username>; //Granting all rights to user
• EXIT; //Exit from postgres and go back to grader

Changing FLask application database connections

• engine = create_engine('postgresql://:@localhost/')
• make the similar change in main ".py" file and also in the dump database file.

CLoning the Item-Catalog App

• sudo mkdir /var/www/catalog

• sudo chown -R grader:grader /var/www/catalog

• git clone https://github.com/username/project_name.git catalog

• nano <filename.wsgi> file and paste the following content into it: import sys import logging logging.basicConfig(stream=sys.stderr) sys.path.insert(0, "/var/www/catalog/")

  from <filename> import app as application

Editing the virtual file

• sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/000-default.conf and add the following content:

  <VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerName XX.XX.XX.XX
    ServerAdmin kanishkamakhija007@gmail.com
    WSGIScriptAlias / /var/www/catalog/<filename.wsgi>
    <Directory /var/www/catalog/>
        Order allow,deny
        Allow from all
    </Directory>
    Alias /static /var/www/catalog/static
    <Directory /var/www/catalog/static/>
        Order allow,deny
        Allow from all
    </Directory>
  </VirtualHost>
  
  

• sudo service apache2 restart

Creating database and adding dumps to it

• cd /var/www/catalog
• python database_setup.py
• python lotsofmenu.py

Start the apache2 server

• sudo service apache2 restart

Link to my project is:

• Restaurant-Catalog