Install GUI in Ubuntu Server

May 8, 2009 · Server · Email This Post

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We have already discussed how to install ubuntu 9.04 LAMP server .If you are a new user and
not familiar with command prompt you can install GUI for your ubuntu LAMP server using the
2 options

1) Install desktop Environment

2) Install Webmin

1) Install desktop Environment

First you nee to make sure you have enabled Universe and multiverse repositories in
/etc/apt/sources.list file once you have enable you need to use the following command
to install GUI

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install ubuntu-desktop

The above command will install GNOME desktop

If you wan to install a graphical desktop manager without some of the desktop addons
like Evolution and OpenOffice, but continue to use the server flavor kernel use the
following command

sudo aptitude  install --no-install-recommends ubuntu-desktop

If you want to install light weight desktop install xfce using the following command

sudo apt-get install xubuntu-desktop

If you want to install KDE desktop use the following command

sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop

2) Install Webmin in Ubuntu

Webmin is a web-based interface for system administration for Unix. Using any modern
web browser, you can setup user accounts, Apache, DNS, file sharing and much more.
Webmin removes the need to manually edit Unix configuration files like /etc/passwd,
and lets you manage a system from the console or remotely.Currently There is no
Webmin package in the Ubuntu repositories.This tutorial will explain how to Install
Webmin in Ubuntu Jaunty

You can install webmin for your server web interface to configure apache2,mysql,FTp
servers and many more.Now we will see how to install webmin in Ubuntu 9.04

Preparing your system

First you need to install the following packages

sudo aptitude install perl libnet-ssleay-perl openssl libauthen-pam-perl libpam-runtime

libio-pty-perl libmd5-perl

Now download the latest webmin using the following command or from here

wget http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/webadmin/webmin_1.470_all.deb

Now we have webmin_1.470_all.deb package install this package using the following
command

sudo dpkg -i webmin_1.470_all.deb

This will complete the installation.

Using the Webmin APT repository

If you like to install and update Webmin via APT, edit the /etc/apt/sources.list file on
your system

sudo vi /etc/apt/sources.list

add the line

deb http://download.webmin.com/download/repository sarge contrib

Save and exit the file

You should also fetch and install my GPG key with which the repository is signed, with
the commands : cd /root

wget http://www.webmin.com/jcameron-key.asc

sudo apt-key add jcameron-key.asc

You will now be able to install with the commands

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install webmin

All dependencies should be resolved automatically.

Ubuntu in particular don’t allow logins by the root user by default. However, the user
created at system installation time can use sudo to switch to root. Webmin will allow
any user who has this sudo capability to login with full root privileges.

Now you need to open your web browser and enter the following

https://your-server-ip:10000/

Now you should see similar to the following Screen

After login if you want to configure Apache,Mysql server you need to click on Servers
on your lefthand side you should many servers are ready to configure

This is very Easy to configure most of the servers and Enjoy your new Ubuntu Jaunty
LAMP Server.

Installing Webmin on Ubuntu Server 10.04 LTS (Lucid)

Webmin installed on Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Lucid

I had some trouble installing Webmin 1.510 on Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Server (aka Lucid). The problem is that Webmin uses a deprecated Perl module (a wrapper around Digest::MD5 for users of an
ancient MD5 library) and both Debian and Ubuntu refuse to put it back into their respective repositories. Entirely within their rights, of course, but not so good for us weekend admins who want
a painless install process.

Okay, so let’s get to work. I’m installing Webmin 1.510 via the remaining Debian packages.

Install the (easy) dependencies

Run this from a terminal. Expect some trouble from ‘libmd5-perl’.
$ sudo aptitude -y install perl libnet-ssleay-perl openssl libauthen-pam-perl libpam-runtime libio-pty-perl libmd5-perl apt-show-versions libapt-pkg-perl

You should find an error like this:

Couldn't find any package whose name or description matched "libmd5-perl"

The reason for this is that ‘libmd5-perl’ is persona non grata at both Debian and Ubuntu, as mentioned.

Install the deprecated dependencies

Download the libmd5-perl deb file and install it manually:

Open a browser and get the newest libmd5-perl package (from 2004 – lol)

http://ftp.debian.org/pool/main/libm/libmd5-perl/

The likely package is named: libmd5-perl_2.03-1_all.deb

so we download it and install it:

[email protected]:~$ wget http://ftp.debian.org/pool/main/libm/libmd5-perl/libmd5-perl_2.03-1_all.deb

--2010-05-22 19:50:45-- http://ftp.debian.org/pool/main/libm/libmd5-perl/libmd5-perl_2.03-1_all.deb

Resolving ftp.debian.org... 130.89.149.226, 2001:610:1908:a000::149:226

Connecting to ftp.debian.org|130.89.149.226|:80... connected.

HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK

Length: 5700 (5.6K) [application/x-debian-package]

Saving to: `libmd5-perl_2.03-1_all.deb'

100%[=======================================================================>] 5,700 30.3K/s in 0.2s

2010-05-22 19:50:46 (30.3 KB/s) - `libmd5-perl_2.03-1_all.deb' saved [5700/5700]

[email protected]:~$ sudo dpkg -i libmd5-perl_2.03-1_all.deb

Selecting previously deselected package libmd5-perl.

(Reading database ... 50494 files and directories currently installed.)

Unpacking libmd5-perl (from libmd5-perl_2.03-1_all.deb) ...

Setting up libmd5-perl (2.03-1) ...

Processing triggers for man-db ...

[email protected]:~$

Install Webmin
The dependencies should all be installed now. We can download the Webmin deb package from Sourceforge.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/webadmin/files/

Use the most recent deb package. In my case it was ‘webmin_1.510-2_all.deb‘

Sourceforge will generate a link for you to use from their web site. My link was:

[email protected]:~$ wget http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/webadmin/webmin/1.510/webmin_1.510-2_all.deb?use_mirror=cdnetworks-us-1

--2010-05-22 19:53:44-- http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/webadmin/webmin/1.510/webmin_1.510-2_all.deb?use_mirror=cdnetworks-us-1

Resolving downloads.sourceforge.net... 216.34.181.59

Connecting to downloads.sourceforge.net|216.34.181.59|:80... connected.

HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 302 Found

Location: http://cdnetworks-us-1.dl.sourceforge.net/project/webadmin/webmin/1.510/webmin_1.510-2_all.deb [following]

--2010-05-22 19:53:44-- http://cdnetworks-us-1.dl.sourceforge.net/project/webadmin/webmin/1.510/webmin_1.510-2_all.deb

Resolving cdnetworks-us-1.dl.sourceforge.net... 174.35.19.11

Connecting to cdnetworks-us-1.dl.sourceforge.net|174.35.19.11|:80... connected.

HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK

Length: 14504260 (14M) [application/octet-stream]

Saving to: `webmin_1.510-2_all.deb'

100%[===================================================================>] 14,504,260 512K/s in 21s

2010-05-22 19:54:06 (664 KB/s) - `webmin_1.510-2_all.deb' saved [14504260/14504260]

[email protected]:~$ sudo dpkg -i webmin_1.510-2_all.deb

Selecting previously deselected package webmin.

(Reading database ... 50500 files and directories currently installed.)

Unpacking webmin (from webmin_1.510-2_all.deb) ...

Setting up webmin (1.510-2) ...

Webmin install complete. You can now login to https://example.com:10000/

as root with your root password, or as any user who can use sudo

to run commands as root.

Processing triggers for ureadahead ...

ureadahead will be reprofiled on next reboot

You should now be able to visit your webmin login page on port 10000 (use your own IP number):

http://192.168.0.5:10000/

Ideally, the Webmin gurus will refactor the old MD5 code dependencies, but this seems to work fine for now.