Kickstarting a better Ubuntu environment on Slicehost

(October 7, 2008)

To follow up with my previous entry about setting up OS X “my way” I decided to clean up my notes on how I setup my Ubuntu server environment (I happen to use Slicehost, but it shouldn’t matter).

I began with an “empty” Ubuntu 8.04 machine and the root password, at the end I have:

Disabled root login via ssh
Created your own user who can login via ssh public-key authentication
Updated your system with the latest Ubuntu packages
Installed various packages that most people expect on a Linux server
Setup simple mail forwarding (I forward bretthoerner.com to my Gmail account)

This assumes you already have a domain pointed at your server and that you have ssh keys stored locally in ~/.ssh.

Initial login

# Use your root password when prompted
(local)$ ssh root@DOMAIN

Replace `/bin/sh` symlink with a more fully featured shell

$ ln -sf /bin/bash /bin/sh

Create your user

# Add USER (using bash, with a home, in groups USER, users, and sudo)
$ useradd -G users,sudo -m -c "FULL NAME" -s /bin/bash USER
# Configure sudo to be password-less for users in group sudo
$ visudo
# Uncomment %sudo ALL=NOPASSWD: ALL

Setup `ssh` public-key login

# Login as user
$ su - USER

# Configure `ssh` public key login
$ mkdir ~/.ssh
$ chmod 700 ~/.ssh
$ vim ~/.ssh/authorized_keys
# Paste in your public key (from local ~/.ssh/id_[rd]sa.pub)

# Exit out of user
$ exit
# Exit out of root
$ exit

# Test login from your local machine
(local)$ ssh USER@DOMAIN # should work without a password

Disable root login

# Test sudo from your user before you disable root login
$ sudo whoami # should print 'root'

# Disable root ssh and password-based logins
$ sudo vim /etc/ssh/sshd_config
# Change "PermitRootLogin yes" to "PermitRootLogin no"
# Change "#PasswordAuthentication yes" to "PasswordAuthentication no"

# Reload the ssh config
$ sudo /etc/init.d/ssh reload

# Remove root's password
$ sudo passwd -d root

Update the local package repository and packages on your system

$ sudo apt-get update
$ sudo apt-get dist-upgrade -y

Install packages you’d expect to have on Linux

# Favorite editor and shell niceness
$ sudo apt-get install -y bash-completion command-not-found \
                          emacs-snapshot-nox exuberant-ctags vim-nox

# Postfix
$ sudo apt-get install -y postfix procmail
# Just hit enter through the setup for now

# Linux basics
$ sudo apt-get install -y dnsutils file info logrotate lsof \
                          mailx mlocate openssl rsync screen unzip

# Developer basics
$ sudo apt-get install -y autoconf build-essential cdecl colordiff \
                          git-core git-svn libtool make patch subversion

Re-configure `Postfix`

$ sudo dpkg-reconfigure postfix

General Type: Internet Site
System mail name: DOMAIN
Root receipt: USER
Destinations: localhost
Force synchronous updates: no
Local networks: 127.0.0.0/8 [::ffff:127.0.0.0]/104 [::1]/128
Use procmail for local delivery: yes
Mailbox size limit: 0
Local address extension character: +
Internet protocols to use: all

Edit the Postfix config

$ sudo vim /etc/postfix/main.cf
# Add the following
virtual_alias_domains = DOMAIN
virtual_alias_maps = hash:/etc/postfix/virtual
smtpd_helo_required = yes
strict_rfc821_envelopes = yes
disable_vrfy_command = yes

Create virtual users and aliases that forward to you

$ sudo vim /etc/postfix/virtual
# Add one USER@VIRTUAL_DOMAIN EMAIL_TO_FORWARD_TO per line, e.g.:
user@example.com user@gmail.com

$ sudo postmap /etc/postfix/virtual

$ sudo vim /etc/aliases
# Append the following line so that root mail goes to USER@DOMAIN
root: USER

$ sudo newaliases

# Restart postfix for changes to take effect
$ sudo /etc/init.d/postfix restart

That’s it. I’ll follow this up with more information on how I setup Apache, mod_wsgi, Django, nginx, etc.

Brett Hoerner's blog