There is a new version of this tutorial available for Ubuntu 18.04 (Bionic Beaver).

Install and Configure Pico CMS on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS

Pico is a free and an open source Content Management System released under the MIT license. It is a flat-file CMS, so it doesn't require any database and administration backend. Pico is very simple, lightweight and fast. Pico makes it easier to create and edit a website using a simple markdown editor. Pico comes with lot's of plugins, this makes it very easy for you to add new features to your website.

This tutorial will help you to install and configure Pico CMS on Ubuntu 16.04 server.

Requirements

  • A server running Ubuntu 16.04.
  • A not-root user with sudo privileges setup on your server.

Getting Started

Before starting, install all the necessary packages and update your system with the latest version. You can do this with the following command:

sudo apt-get install git unzip curl wget -y
sudo apt-get update -y
sudo apt-get upgrade -y

Once your system is fully updated, restart the system and log in with sudo user.

Install PHP and NGINX

Pico runs on Nginx web server and written in PHP. So you will need to install Nginx and PHP to your system. By default, the latest version of the Nginx is not available in Ubuntu 16.04 default repository. So you will need to add the Nginx repository to your system. You can do this by running the following command:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nginx/stable

Next, update your repository with the following command:

sudo apt-get update -y

Finally, install Nginx, PHP and other required libraries with the following command:

sudo apt-get install nginx php7.0 php7.0-fpm php7.0-cli php7.0-json php7.0-curl php7.0-gd php7.0-zip -y

Once all the required packages are installed, start Nginx and PHP-FPM service and enable them to start on boot with the following command:

sudo systemctl start nginx
sudo systemctl enable nginx
sudo systemctl start php7.0-fpm
sudo systemctl enable php7.0-fpm

Download Pico CMS

Next, you will need to download the latest version of the Pico CMS from Git repository. You can easily download it using the git clone command:

cd /var/www/html
sudo git clone https://github.com/picocms/Pico.git

Next, you will also need to install Composer to your system. Composer is a dependency manager for PHP that is used to install all the required libraries for your project. You can install Composer by using the curl command as shown below:

cd /usr/local/bin/
sudo curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php

Next, install all the libraries required by PHP using the following command:

cd /var/www/html/Pico
sudo composer install

Next, give proper permission to the Nginx web root directory:

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/html/Pico

Configure Nginx

Next, you will need to create an Nginx server block for Pico CMS. You can do this by creating pico.conf file inside /etc/nginx/sites-available/ directory.

sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/pico.conf

Add the following lines:

server {
listen 80;
server_name yourdomain.com;
root /var/www/html/Pico;
index index.php index.html index.htm;

location / {
try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php;
}

access_log /var/log/nginx/pico.access.log;
error_log /var/log/nginx/pico.error.log;

location ~ \.php$ {
fastcgi_split_path_info ^(.+\.php)(/.+)$;
fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php7.0-fpm.sock;
fastcgi_index index.php;
include fastcgi_params;
fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
fastcgi_buffer_size 16k;
fastcgi_buffers 4 16k;
}

}

Save and close the file when you are finished. Then, activate the server block by creating a symbolic link:

sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/pico.conf /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/

Next, test the Nginx configuration and restart Nginx and PHP-FPM service with the following command:

sudo nginx -t
sudo systemctl restart nginx
sudo systemctl restart php7.0-fpm

Access Pico Web Interface

Before accessing the Pico CMS Web Interface, you will need to allow HTTP service through UFW firewall. By default UFW is disabled on your system, so you need to enable it first. You can enable it with the following command:

sudo ufw enable

Once UFW firewall is enabled, you can allow HTTP service by running the following command:

sudo ufw allow http

Next, reload the UFW firewall rule with the following command:

sudo ufw reload

Next, Open your web browser and type the URL http://yourdomain.com. You should be redirected to the Pico CMS default web page as shown in the below image:

Pico CMS installed on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS

Conclusion

Congratulations! you have successfully installed Pico CMS on Ubuntu 16.04 server. You can now simply create your own content folder in Pico's root directory, create .md files in the content directory and those files become your pages.

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