7 ### Operating system and web server
9 Shaarli can be hosted on dedicated/virtual servers, or shared hosting. The smallest DigitalOcean VPS (Droplet with 1 CPU, 1 GiB RAM and 25 GiB SSD) costs about $5/month and will run any Shaarli installation without problems.
11 You need write access to the Shaarli installation directory - you should have received instructions from your hosting provider on how to connect to the server using SSH (or FTP for shared hosts).
13 Examples in this documentation are given for [Debian](https://www.debian.org/), a GNU/Linux distribution widely used in server environments. Please adapt them to your specific Linux distribution.
15 ### Network and domain name
17 Try to host the server in a region that is geographically close to your users.
19 A **domain name** ([DNS record](https://opensource.com/article/17/4/introduction-domain-name-system-dns)) pointing to the server's public IP address is required to obtain a SSL/TLS certificate and setup HTTPS to secure client traffic to your Shaarli instance.
21 You can obtain a domain name from a [registrar](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domain_name_registrar) ([1](https://www.ovh.co.uk/domains), [2](https://www.gandi.net/en/domain)), or from free subdomain providers ([1](https://freedns.afraid.org/)). If you don't have a domain name, please set up a private domain name ([FQDN](ttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fully_qualified_domain_name)) in your clients' [hosts files](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hosts_(file)) to access the server (direct access by IP address can result in unexpected behavior).
23 Setup a **firewall** (using `iptables`, [ufw](https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-set-up-a-firewall-with-ufw-on-debian-10), [fireHOL](https://firehol.org/) or any frontend of your choice) to deny all incoming traffic except `tcp/80` and `tcp/443`, which are needed to access the web server (and any other posrts you might need, like SSH). If the server is in a private network behind a NAT, ensure these **ports are forwarded** to the server.
25 Shaarli makes outbound HTTP/HTTPS connections to websites you bookmark to fetch page information (title, thumbnails), the server must then have access to the Internet as well, and a working DNS resolver.
30 Supported PHP versions:
32 Version | Status | Shaarli compatibility
37 7.0 | EOL: 2018-12-03 | Yes (up to Shaarli 0.10.x)
38 5.6 | EOL: 2018-12-31 | Yes (up to Shaarli 0.10.x)
39 5.5 | EOL: 2016-07-10 | Yes
40 5.4 | EOL: 2015-09-14 | Yes (up to Shaarli 0.8.x)
41 5.3 | EOL: 2014-08-14 | Yes (up to Shaarli 0.8.x)
43 Required PHP extensions:
45 Extension | Required? | Usage
47 [`openssl`](http://php.net/manual/en/book.openssl.php) | All | OpenSSL, HTTPS
48 [`php-json`](http://php.net/manual/en/book.json.php) | required | configuration parsing
49 [`php-mbstring`](http://php.net/manual/en/book.mbstring.php) | CentOS, Fedora, RHEL, Windows, some hosting providers | multibyte (Unicode) string support
50 [`php-gd`](http://php.net/manual/en/book.image.php) | optional | required to use thumbnails
51 [`php-intl`](http://php.net/manual/en/book.intl.php) | optional | localized text sorting (e.g. `e->รจ->f`)
52 [`php-curl`](http://php.net/manual/en/book.curl.php) | optional | using cURL for fetching webpages and thumbnails in a more robust way
53 [`php-gettext`](http://php.net/manual/en/book.gettext.php) | optional | Use the translation system in gettext mode (faster)
55 Some [plugins](Plugins.md) may require additional configuration.
60 We recommend setting up [HTTPS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTPS) on your webserver for secure communication between clients and the server.
62 For public-facing web servers this can be done using free SSL/TLS certificates from [Let's Encrypt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Let's_Encrypt), a non-profit certificate authority provididing free certificates.
64 - [How to secure Apache with Let's Encrypt](https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-secure-apache-with-let-s-encrypt-on-debian-10)
65 - [How to secure Nginx with Let's Encrypt](https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-secure-nginx-with-let-s-encrypt-on-debian-10)
66 - [How To Use Certbot Standalone Mode to Retrieve Let's Encrypt SSL Certificates](https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-use-certbot-standalone-mode-to-retrieve-let-s-encrypt-ssl-certificates-on-debian-10).
72 sudo apt install certbot
74 # stop your webserver if you already have one running
75 # certbot in standalone mode needs to bind to port 80 (only needed on initial generation)
76 sudo systemctl stop apache2
77 sudo systemctl stop nginx
79 # generate initial certificates - Let's Encrypt ACME servers must be able to access your server!
80 sudo certbot certonly --standalone --noninteractive --agree-tos --email "admin@shaarli.mydomain.org" -d shaarli.mydomain.org
81 # this will generate a private key and certificate at /etc/letsencrypt/live/shaarli.mydomain.org/{privkey,fullchain}.pem
83 # restart the web server
84 sudo systemctl start apache2
85 sudo systemctl start nginx
88 If you don't want to rely on a certificate authority, or the server can only be accessed from your own network, you can also generate self-signed certificates. Not that this will generate security warnings in web browsers/clients trying to access Shaarli:
90 - [How To Create a Self-Signed SSL Certificate for Apache](https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-create-a-self-signed-ssl-certificate-for-apache-on-debian-10)
91 - [How To Create a Self-Signed SSL Certificate for Nginx](https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-create-a-self-signed-ssl-certificate-for-nginx-on-debian-10)
93 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
97 The following examples assume a Debian-based operating system is installed. On other distributions you may have to adapt details such as package installation procedures, configuration file locations, and webserver username/group (`www-data` or `httpd` are common values).
99 In these examples we assume the document root for your web server/virtualhost is at `/var/www/shaarli.mydomain.org/`:
102 sudo mkdir -p /var/www/shaarli.mydomain.org/
105 You can install Shaarli at the root of your virtualhost, or in a subdirectory as well. See [Directory structure](Directory-structure)
111 # Install apache + mod_php and PHP modules
113 sudo apt install apache2 libapache2-mod-php php-json php-mbstring php-gd php-intl php-curl php-gettext
115 # Edit the virtualhost configuration file with your favorite editor
116 sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/shaarli.mydomain.org.conf
121 ServerName shaarli.mydomain.org
122 DocumentRoot /var/www/shaarli.mydomain.org/
124 # Log level. Possible values include: debug, info, notice, warn, error, crit, alert, emerg.
127 ErrorLog /var/log/apache2/error.log
128 CustomLog /var/log/apache2/access.log combined
130 # Redirect HTTP requests to HTTPS
132 RewriteRule ^.well-known/acme-challenge/ - [L]
133 # except for Let's Encrypt ACME challenge requests
134 RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} =shaarli.mydomain.org
135 RewriteRule ^ https://shaarli.mydomain.org%{REQUEST_URI} [END,NE,R=permanent]
139 ServerName shaarli.mydomain.org
140 DocumentRoot /var/www/shaarli.mydomain.org/
142 # Log level. Possible values include: debug, info, notice, warn, error, crit, alert, emerg.
145 ErrorLog /var/log/apache2/error.log
146 CustomLog /var/log/apache2/access.log combined
148 # SSL/TLS configuration (for Let's Encrypt certificates)
150 SSLCertificateFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/shaarli.mydomain.org/fullchain.pem
151 SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/letsencrypt/live/shaarli.mydomain.org/privkey.pem
153 # Let's Encrypt settings from https://github.com/certbot/certbot/blob/master/certbot-apache/certbot_apache/_internal/tls_configs/current-options-ssl-apache.conf
154 SSLProtocol all -SSLv2 -SSLv3 -TLSv1 -TLSv1.1
155 SSLCipherSuite ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:ECDHE-ECDSA-CHACHA20-POLY1305:ECDHE-RSA-CHACHA20-POLY1305:DHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:DHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384
156 SSLHonorCipherOrder off
157 SSLSessionTickets off
158 SSLOptions +StrictRequire
160 # SSL/TLS configuration (for self-signed certificates)
162 #SSLCertificateFile /etc/ssl/certs/ssl-cert-snakeoil.pem
163 #SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/ssl/private/ssl-cert-snakeoil.key
165 # Optional, log PHP errors, useful for debugging
166 #php_flag log_errors on
167 #php_flag display_errors on
168 #php_value error_reporting 2147483647
169 #php_value error_log /var/log/apache2/shaarli-php-error.log
171 <Directory /var/www/shaarli.mydomain.org/>
172 # Required for .htaccess support
178 <LocationMatch "/\.">
179 # Prevent accessing dotfiles
180 RedirectMatch 404 ".*"
183 <LocationMatch "\.(?:ico|css|js|gif|jpe?g|png)$">
184 # allow client-side caching of static files
185 Header set Cache-Control "max-age=2628000, public, must-revalidate, proxy-revalidate"
188 # serve the Shaarli favicon from its custom location
189 Alias favicon.ico /var/www/shaarli.mydomain.org/images/favicon.ico
195 # Enable the virtualhost
196 sudo a2ensite shaarli
198 # mod_ssl must be enabled to use TLS/SSL certificates
199 # https://httpd.apache.org/docs/current/mod/mod_ssl.html
202 # mod_rewrite must be enabled to use the REST API
203 # https://httpd.apache.org/docs/current/mod/mod_rewrite.html
206 # mod_version must only be enabled if you use Apache 2.2 or lower
207 # https://httpd.apache.org/docs/current/mod/mod_version.html
208 # sudo a2enmod version
210 # restart the apache service
211 systemctl restart apache
214 See [How to install the Apache web server](https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-install-the-apache-web-server-on-debian-10) for a complete guide.
218 This examples uses nginx and the [PHP-FPM](https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-install-linux-nginx-mariadb-php-lemp-stack-on-debian-10#step-3-%E2%80%94-installing-php-for-processing) PHP interpreter. Nginx and PHP-FPM must be running using the same user and group, here we assume the user/group to be `www-data:www-data`.
222 # install nginx and php-fpm
224 sudo apt install nginx php-fpm
226 # Edit the virtualhost configuration file with your favorite editor
227 sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/shaarli.mydomain.org
233 server_name shaarli.mydomain.org;
235 # redirect all plain HTTP requests to HTTPS
236 return 301 https://shaarli.mydomain.org$request_uri;
241 server_name shaarli.mydomain.org;
242 root /var/www/shaarli.mydomain.org;
245 # combined log format prepends the virtualhost/domain name to log entries
246 access_log /var/log/nginx/access.log combined;
247 error_log /var/log/nginx/error.log;
249 # paths to private key and certificates for SSL/TLS
250 ssl_certificate /etc/ssl/shaarli.mydomain.org.crt;
251 ssl_certificate_key /etc/ssl/private/shaarli.mydomain.org.key;
253 # Let's Encrypt SSL settings from https://github.com/certbot/certbot/blob/master/certbot-nginx/certbot_nginx/_internal/tls_configs/options-ssl-nginx.conf
254 ssl_session_cache shared:le_nginx_SSL:10m;
255 ssl_session_timeout 1440m;
256 ssl_session_tickets off;
257 ssl_protocols TLSv1.2 TLSv1.3;
258 ssl_prefer_server_ciphers off;
259 ssl_ciphers "ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:ECDHE-ECDSA-CHACHA20-POLY1305:ECDHE-RSA-CHACHA20-POLY1305:DHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:DHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384";
261 # increase the maximum file upload size if needed: by default nginx limits file upload to 1MB (413 Entity Too Large error)
262 client_max_body_size 100m;
264 # relative path to shaarli from the root of the webserver
266 # default index file when no file URI is requested
268 try_files $uri /index.php$is_args$args;
271 location ~ (index)\.php$ {
273 # slim API - split URL path into (script_filename, path_info)
274 fastcgi_split_path_info ^(.+\.php)(/.+)$;
275 # pass PHP requests to PHP-FPM
276 fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php-fpm/php-fpm.sock;
277 fastcgi_index index.php;
278 include fastcgi.conf;
282 # deny access to all other PHP scripts
283 # disable this if you host other PHP applications on the same virtualhost
288 # deny access to dotfiles
293 # deny access to temp editor files, e.g. "script.php~"
297 location = /favicon.ico {
298 # serve the Shaarli favicon from its custom location
299 alias /var/www/shaarli/images/favicon.ico;
302 # allow client-side caching of static files
303 location ~* \.(?:ico|css|js|gif|jpe?g|png)$ {
305 add_header Cache-Control "public, must-revalidate, proxy-revalidate";
306 # HTTP 1.0 compatibility
307 add_header Pragma public;
314 # enable the configuration/virtualhost
315 sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/shaarli.mydomain.org /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/shaarli.mydomain.org
316 # reload nginx configuration
317 sudo systemctl reload nginx
320 See [How to install the Nginx web server](https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-install-nginx-on-debian-10) for a complete guide.
325 If Shaarli is hosted on a server behind a [reverse proxy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_proxy) (i.e. there is a proxy server between clients and the web server hosting Shaarli), configure it accordingly. See [Reverse proxy](Reverse-proxy.md) configuration.
329 ## Allow import of large browser bookmarks export
331 Web browser bookmark exports can be large due to the presence of base64-encoded images and favicons/long subfolder names. Edit the PHP configuration file.
333 - Apache: `/etc/php/<PHP_VERSION>/apache2/php.ini`
334 - Nginx + PHP-FPM: `/etc/php/<PHP_VERSION>/fpm/php.ini` (in addition to `client_max_body_size` in the [Nginx configuration](#nginx))
338 # (optional) increase the maximum file upload size:
341 # (optional) increase the maximum file upload size:
342 upload_max_filesize = 100M
345 To verify PHP settings currently set on the server, create a `phpinfo.php` in your webserver's document root
349 echo '<?php phpinfo(); ?>' | sudo tee /var/www/shaarli.mydomain.org/phpinfo.php
350 #give read-only access to this file to the webserver user
351 sudo chown www-data:root /var/www/shaarli.mydomain.org/phpinfo.php
352 sudo chmod 0400 /var/www/shaarli.mydomain.org/phpinfo.php
355 Access the file from a web browser (eg. <https://shaarli.mydomain.org/phpinfo.php> and look at the _Loaded Configuration File_ and _Scan this dir for additional .ini files_ entries
357 It is recommended to remove the `phpinfo.php` when no longer needed as it publicly discloses details about your webserver configuration.
360 ## Robots and crawlers
362 To opt-out of indexing your Shaarli instance by search engines, create a `robots.txt` file at the root of your virtualhost:
369 By default Shaarli already disallows indexing of your local copy of the documentation by default, using `<meta name="robots">` HTML tags. Your Shaarli instance may still be indexed by various robots on the public Internet, that do not respect this header or the robots standard.
371 - [Robots exclusion standard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robots_exclusion_standard)
372 - [Introduction to robots.txt](https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/6062608?hl=en)
373 - [Robots meta tag, data-nosnippet, and X-Robots-Tag specifications](https://developers.google.com/search/reference/robots_meta_tag)
374 - [About robots.txt](http://www.robotstxt.org)
375 - [About the robots META tag](https://www.robotstxt.org/meta.html)
380 [fail2ban](http://www.fail2ban.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page) is an intrusion prevention framework that reads server (Apache, SSH, etc.) and uses `iptables` profiles to block brute-force attempts. You need to create a filter to detect shaarli login failures in logs, and a jail configuation to configure the behavior when failed login attempts are detected:
383 # /etc/fail2ban/filter.d/shaarli-auth.conf
387 failregex = \s-\s<HOST>\s-\sLogin failed for user.*$
392 # /etc/fail2ban/jail.local
396 filter = shaarli-auth
397 logpath = /var/www/shaarli.mydomain.org/data/log.txt
398 # allow 3 login attempts per IP address
399 # (over a period specified by findtime = in /etc/fail2ban/jail.conf)
401 # permanently ban the IP address after reaching the limit
407 - [Apache/PHP - error log per VirtualHost - StackOverflow](http://stackoverflow.com/q/176)
408 - [Apache - PHP: php_value vs php_admin_value and the use of php_flag explained](https://ma.ttias.be/php-php_value-vs-php_admin_value-and-the-use-of-php_flag-explained/)
409 - [Server-side TLS (Apache) - Mozilla](https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Server_Side_TLS#Apache)
410 - [Nginx Beginner's guide](http://nginx.org/en/docs/beginners_guide.html)
411 - [Nginx ngx_http_fastcgi_module](http://nginx.org/en/docs/http/ngx_http_fastcgi_module.html)
412 - [Nginx Pitfalls](http://wiki.nginx.org/Pitfalls)
413 - [Nginx PHP configuration examples - Karl Blessing](http://kbeezie.com/nginx-configuration-examples/)
414 - [Apache 2.4 documentation](https://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.4/)
415 - [Apache mod_proxy](https://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.4/mod/mod_proxy.html)
416 - [Apache Reverse Proxy Request Headers](https://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.4/mod/mod_proxy.html#x-headers)
417 - [HAProxy documentation](https://cbonte.github.io/haproxy-dconv/)
418 - [Nginx documentation](https://nginx.org/en/docs/)
419 - [`X-Forwarded-Proto`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/X-Forwarded-Proto)
420 - [`X-Forwarded-Host`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/X-Forwarded-Host)
421 - [`X-Forwarded-For`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/X-Forwarded-For)
422 - [Server-side TLS (Nginx) - Mozilla](https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Server_Side_TLS#Nginx)
423 - [How to Create Self-Signed SSL Certificates with OpenSSL](http://www.xenocafe.com/tutorials/linux/centos/openssl/self_signed_certificates/index.php)
424 - [How do I create my own Certificate Authority?](https://workaround.org/certificate-authority)
425 - [Travis configuration](https://github.com/shaarli/Shaarli/blob/master/.travis.yml)
426 - [PHP: Supported versions](http://php.net/supported-versions.php)
427 - [PHP: Unsupported versions (EOL/End-of-life)](http://php.net/eol.php)
428 - [PHP 7 Changelog](http://php.net/ChangeLog-7.php)
429 - [PHP 5 Changelog](http://php.net/ChangeLog-5.php)
430 - [PHP: Bugs](https://bugs.php.net/)
431 - [Transport Layer Security](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transport_Layer_Security)
432 - Hosting providers: [DigitalOcean](https://www.digitalocean.com/) ([1](https://www.digitalocean.com/docs/droplets/overview/), [2](https://www.digitalocean.com/pricing/), [3](https://www.digitalocean.com/docs/droplets/how-to/create/), [How to Add SSH Keys to Droplets](https://www.digitalocean.com/docs/droplets/how-to/add-ssh-keys/), [4](https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/initial-server-setup-with-debian-8), [5](https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/an-introduction-to-securing-your-linux-vps)), [Gandi](https://www.gandi.net/en), [OVH](https://www.ovh.co.uk/), [RackSpace](https://www.rackspace.com/), etc.