KChat is an open-source chat application written primarily in PHP. It is designed to be easy to install and to run on a wide range of platforms. In this tutorial, we will go through the steps to install KChat on Kali Linux, the latest version of the popular penetration testing operating system.
Before we begin, you will need the following:
The first step is to install the necessary software for running KChat, which includes PHP and Apache. To do this, first, update the package manager and then install Apache and PHP:
sudo apt update
sudo apt install apache2 php libapache2-mod-php
Once the installation is complete, start the Apache service using the following command:
sudo systemctl start apache2
And then enable it at boot time:
sudo systemctl enable apache2
Next, we need to download KChat from the project's GitHub repository. We can do this by cloning the repository into a directory named kchat in the web server's default document root:
sudo git clone https://github.com/php-kchat/kchat.git /var/www/html/kchat
Before we can start using KChat, we need to configure it. To do this, we need to edit the configuration file located in the config directory:
sudo nano /var/www/html/kchat/config/config.php
In this file, we need to update the following variables:
DB_USER - the username for the MySQL user that KChat will use to connect to the databaseDB_PASSWORD - the password for the MySQL userDB_NAME - the name of the MySQL database that KChat will useDB_HOST - the host address for the MySQL serverYou may also want to update the SITE_NAME and SITE_URL variables to reflect your own site name and URL.
Save the file and exit the editor.
Next, we need to create the database for KChat. To do this, log in to your MySQL server as the root user:
sudo mysql -u root -p
Enter your MySQL root password when prompted.
Create the KChat database with the following command:
CREATE DATABASE kchat;
Then create a new MySQL user that KChat will use to connect to the database. Replace kchatuser and password with your own chosen username and password. Grant the user all privileges to the kchat database:
CREATE USER 'kchatuser'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'password';
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON kchat.* TO 'kchatuser'@'localhost' WITH GRANT OPTION;
Exit the MySQL console:
exit
Before we can use KChat, we need to install its dependencies. To do this, navigate to the KChat directory and use the following command:
cd /var/www/html/kchat
sudo composer install
Finally, we need to set the file permissions for the KChat directory:
sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/html/kchat
sudo chmod -R 755 /var/www/html/kchat
We're now ready to access KChat in our web browser. Open your web browser and navigate to http://localhost/kchat or to the IP address of your Kali Linux machine followed by /kchat.
You should see the KChat login screen. Log in with the username admin and the password password.
Congratulations! You have successfully installed KChat on Kali Linux. You can now use KChat to chat with others on your network or make it available to the public by enabling remote access to your Kali Linux machine.
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