In this tutorial, we will guide you on how to install ILIAS on MXLinux that is an open-source learning management system. ILIAS is developed by the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Information Technology FIT and is used as the basis for the OpenU service of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia.
Before installing ILIAS, you should update your MXLinux system to make sure that you have the latest updates and packages. Follow the below command to update your system.
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y
ILIAS requires a webserver to run, so we need to install the Apache web server on our system. Run the following command to install it.
sudo apt install apache2 -y
After the installation is complete, the Apache service will start automatically.
ILIAS is written in PHP, so we need to install PHP on our system. To do that, run the following command.
sudo apt install php php-curl php-xmlrpc php-gd php-mysql php-ldap php-mbstring php-xml -y
ILIAS uses MySQL as its database backend; therefore, we need to install MySQL server on our system. Use the following command to install MySQL.
sudo apt install mysql-server -y
Once the installation is complete, you need to secure your MySQL installation. Run the below command for setup:
sudo mysql_secure_installation
This command will take you through a series of prompts. The prompts will ask you to provide a new password that meets the criteria for a secure password, remove anonymous users, disallow root login remotely, and remove the test database.
After the Secure installation of MySQL, now create a database and a user for ILIAS. Login with the MySQL console with the following command:
sudo mysql -u root -p
Next, create a new database by running the following command:
CREATE DATABASE ilias_db;
Similarly, create a new user and grant permissions to the newly created database:
CREATE USER 'ilias_user'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'password';
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON ilias_db.* TO 'ilias_user'@'localhost' WITH GRANT OPTION;
Ensure that the user's password meets the recommended complexity requirements. You can replace "password" with a secure password.
Now, let's download and install ILIAS on our system. Use the below command to download the latest version of ILIAS:
wget https://www.ilias.de/docu/ilias-latest.zip
To unzip the archive file, you need to install the unzip package:
sudo apt install unzip
Now, unzip the downloaded archive file:
unzip ilias-latest.zip -d /var/www/html/
Once the extraction is complete, rename the extracted directory as "ilias":
sudo mv /var/www/html/ilias-* /var/www/html/ilias
Set the directory’s ownership and permission to the Apache user account:
sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/html/ilias
sudo chmod -R 775 /var/www/html/ilias
Finally, modify the Apache VirtualHost configuration file for ILIAS by creating a new file under the /etc/apache2/sites-available/ directory:
sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/ilias.conf
Add the following content to the file:
<VirtualHost *:80>
ServerAdmin admin@example.com
DocumentRoot /var/www/html/ilias
ServerName ilias.example.com
<Directory /var/www/html/ilias>
Options FollowSymLinks
AllowOverride All
Require all granted
</Directory>
ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/ilias_error.log
CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/ilias_access.log combined
</VirtualHost>
In the above configuration, replace admin@example.com with your email address, ilias.example.com with your ILIAS domain name, and /var/www/html/ilias with your ILIAS installation directory.
Save and close the file.
Next, enable the newly created VirtualHost:
sudo a2ensite ilias.conf
Reload Apache for the changes to take effect:
sudo systemctl reload apache2
Finally, complete the ILIAS installation process using the web interface. Open a web browser and enter http://ilias.example.com in the address bar (replace ilias.example.com with your domain name). You will be redirected to the ILIAS installation page.
Follow the installation steps as described in the graphical user interface, such as selecting your language, setting up the administrator account, and configuring the database settings.
Once the installation is complete, you can access the ILIAS web interface by entering the domain name you used during the installation process. The default administrator account is root with the password homer. It is recommended to change the password after the first login.
Congratulations! You have successfully installed ILIAS on MXLinux using Apache and MySQL. You can now start exploring and using ILIAS to create and manage your e-learning platform.
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