Install Apache, PHP 7 on Ubuntu 18.04 with 3 Steps only (via Ansible)

Nowadays, If we want to search "how to install apache with PHP", we will find out, there are many tutorials out there. All the tutorials have a long step-by-step and sometimes it doesn't work in the end. After all, It makes all of us frustrated.

So, I've decided to create a role/script which I can re-use every time I need it without a long step. At this time, I would like to share this role and how to use it. It only needs a three-step to do.

The First Step:

We have to prepare the ingredients we need in our workstation.
The Prerequisites:

ansible 2.9.4
python version = 2.7.17 (default, Nov  7 2019, 10:07:09) [GCC 7.4.0]
Python 3.6.9
ansible-playbook 2.9.4
ansible-galaxy 2.9.4

you can refer to this docs for more details.
You need to have all the prerequisites above before continuing the next step. Keep in mind, a different version may have different behavior when executing the roles. So, make sure everything already set up before doing the next step.

When creating this tutorial, I use ubuntu derivative, Install all prerequisites in Linux Mint 19.3. If you use another distro or OS, you need to refer to the docs above.

sudo apt-add-repository ppa:ansible/ansible
sudo apt install ansible

After installing all the prerequisites, You need to add some configuration at your hosts to make your process easier. This is what should you do:

nano/vim(depends on your favourite text editor)`/etc/ansible/hosts`

After that, add this value at hosts file (change server_IP, server_ssh_port, ssh_user accordingly with your server)

<Server_IP> ansible_ssh_port=<Server_SSH_port> ansible_ssh_user=<ssh_user> ansible_host_key_checking=false ansible_python_interpreter=/usr/bin/python3

The second step:

After the first step, Right now, we can create a file with our roles inside. I will give a name for this file with requirements.yml. Make sure to give this file with extension yml.

- src: iilness2.ans_common
- src: iilness2.ans_apache
- src: iilness2.ans_php7_2_fpm
- src: iilness2.ans_app

All the roles, you can check at my galaxy here or see the code at my git here. you can use my git directly also for using my roles like in the example below:

- src: https://github.com/iilness2/ans-common
- src: https://github.com/iilness2/ans-apache
- src: https://github.com/iilness2/ans-php7.2-fpm
- src: https://github.com/iilness2/ans-app

After everything settled, you can run this command ansible-galaxy install -r requirements.yml --force to start the process. I used --force here, so if accidentally, you already use my roles before, the process still can be executed.

The third step:

In this step, we will create main.yml as our main YAML file which we will use to run our ansible. This is inside of our main YAML script we need.

---
- name: Install Apache and PHP
  hosts: all
  become: true
  roles:
    - iilness2.ans_common
    - iilness2.ans_apache
    - iilness2.ans_php7_2_fpm
    - iilness2.ans_app

After that, you can run your script with this command ansible-playbook main.yml. And you can start to see the process of our script installing our roles to our server

After all process finish, We can try to access our server with <Server_IP> we input before to see the result. If everything ok, You can see the result like below:

I use PHP info for this tutorial, to see if all my roles can be installed properly. You can used another php file for playing around or made a suggestion or collaboration to my git, if you have better idea.

I think that's what I want to share right now for this article. Leave a comment below about your thoughts! Thanks.