How to Install Boonex Dolphin 7 on an Ubuntu VPS

boonex dolphin vpsIn this tutorial we are going to provide you with step-by-step instructions on how to install Boonex Dolphin 7 on an Ubuntu VPS.
Boonex Dolphin is a popular social networking platform used by many webmasters. It allows them to build easy to use community and social media oriented websites.

This install guide assumes that Apache, MySQL, PHP and a fully functional mail server are already installed and configured on your server. At the time of this writing, the latest version of Dolphin is 7.1.6 and it requires:

  • PHP >= 5.3.0 (PHP 5.5 or later is recommended) with the following PHP extensions enabled: curl, fileinfo, ftp, GD Graphics Library version 2.0.x+ compiled with FreeType fonts (or ImageMagick), JSON, mbstring, mysql,  openssl, xsl and zip.
  • Apache Web Server >= 2.0 compiled with mod_rewrite module
  • A mail server for sending emails (Sendmail, Postfix etc.)
  • MySQL >= 4.1.2 installed on your Linux virtual server (MySQL 5.5 or later is recommended)
  • Java 1.6 or higher (some of Dolphin’s features require media streaming capabilities)
  • Ability to create ​cron-jobs and execute files.

Download the latest version of Dolphin available at ‘http://www.boonex.com/downloads?product=Dolphin-v.7.1’ to the server and extract it using the following commands:

cd /opt
wget http://get.boonex.com/Dolphin-v.7.1 -O dolphin-v.7.1.6.zip
unzip dolphin-v.7.1.6.zip

Move the unpacked Dolphin files to the document root of your website:

mv Dolphin-v.7.1.6 /var/www/html/dolphin

Set the proper file permissions for the Apache web server to write to certain files and directories:

chown www-data:www-data -R /var/www/html/dolphin

Also, run the following command to make the ‘ffmpeg.exe’ file executable:

chmod 755 /var/www/html/dolphin/flash/modules/global/app/ffmpeg.exe

Install Java and ImageMagick:

apt-get install openjdk-7-jdk
apt-get install ImageMagick

Create a new database for Dolphin and assign a MySQL user with privileges for accessing and modifying the Dolphin database:

mysql -u root -p
mysql> CREATE DATABASE dolphindb;
mysql> GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON dolphindb.* TO 'dolphinuser'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'your-password' WITH GRANT OPTION;
mysql> FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
mysql> quit

Create a new virtual host directive in Apache. For example, create a new Apache configuration file named ‘dolphin.conf’ on your virtual server:

touch /etc/apache2/sites-available/dolphin.conf
ln -s /etc/apache2/sites-available/dolphin.conf /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/dolphin.conf
vi /etc/apache2/sites-available/dolphin.conf

then, add the following lines to it:

<VirtualHost *:80>
ServerAdmin admin@yourdomain.com
DocumentRoot /var/www/html/dolphin/
ServerName your-domain.com
ServerAlias www.your-domain.com
<Directory /var/www/html/dolphin/>
Options FollowSymLinks
AllowOverride All
</Directory>
ErrorLog /var/log/apache2/your-domain.com-error_log
CustomLog /var/log/apache2/your-domain.com-access_log common
</VirtualHost>

Edit the php.ini configuration file and add/modify the following lines:

vi /etc/php5/apache2/php.ini
memory_limit = 128M 
file_uploads = On	
allow_url_fopen = On
allow_url_include = Off
register_globals = Off	
safe_mode = Off
short_open_tag = On
magic_quotes_gpc = Off	
default_charset = "UTF-8"

Make sure that ‘exec’ PHP function is allowed (i.e. it is not listed in disable_functions) and ‘open_basedir’ is not set:

#php -i | grep -i disable_functions
disable_functions => no value => no value
#php -i | grep -i open_basedir
open_basedir => no value => no value

Restart the Apache web server for the changes to take effect:

Need a fast and easy fix?
✔ Unlimited Managed Support
✔ Supports Your Software
✔ 2 CPU Cores
✔ 2 GB RAM
✔ 50 GB PCIe4 NVMe Disk
✔ 1854 GeekBench Score
✔ Unmetered Data Transfer
NVME 2 VPS

Now just $43 .99
/mo

GET YOUR VPS
service apache2 restart

Open http://your-domain.com/install/index.php in your favorite web browser and follow the easy instructions: Check if the file and directory permissions are set correctly, check the paths to website’s document root and scripts, enter 3306 as database host port number, then enter database name, database user and password, enter site title, site description and create a new administrator user.
To keep your website secure, remove the write flag from the ‘inc’ directory:

chmod -w /var/www/html/dolphin/inc/

Set a new cron job. For example, run the following command:

crontab -e

and add the following lines:

MAILTO=admin@emailaddress.com
* * * * * cd /var/www/html/dolphin/periodic; /usr/bin/php -q cron.php

Do not forget to change ‘admin@emailaddress.com’ with your actual email address, then run:

service cron restart

After finishing the installation, it is recommended to delete all files and subdirectories from the install directory located to your Dolphin website document root as a security precaution, so run the following command:

rm -rf /var/www/html/dolphin/install/

That is it. The Dolphin installation is now complete. Proceed to the admin panel to configure Dolphin according to your needs, install additional modules etc.

boonex dolphin back-end
Of course you don’t have to do any of this if you use one of our Linux VPS Hosting services, in which case you can simply ask our expert Linux admins to install Boonex Dolphin for you. They are available 24×7 and will take care of your request immediately.
PS. If you liked this post please share it with your friends on the social networks using the buttons on the left or simply leave a reply below. Thanks.

Leave a Comment