Install Mantis Bug Tracker on Ubuntu 18.04?

f you are a developer you know that bugs are always present in the process of building a program. Especially if we work as a team on certain projects. Therefore, it is necessary to have software that can distribute the workflow of the project or simply track these problems. That is why today I will show you how to install Mantis Bug tracker on a server with Ubuntu 18.04.

Mantis Bug Tracker is an open source application that is used to test automated solutions, keeping a historical record of alterations and managing work teams remotely.

On the other hand, Mantis Bug Tracker allows the team to report errors and organize who can take care of them. Users are able to get started in minutes and start managing their projects while collaborating with their teammates and clients effectively.

So, let us start.

1.- Install Apache web server and PHP

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Mantis Bug Tracker requires a web server to work. You can use Apache or Nginx but in this case, I will use Apache because it is very easy to use.

So, open a terminal and run:

:~$ sudo apt install apache2

After that, enable and start the Apache web server service.

:~$ sudo systemctl enable apache2
:~$ sudo systemctl start apache2

Next, you have to install PHP and wget. The program is built using PHP as the programming language. Wget is a CLI tool for download files.

:~$ sudo apt install php php-cli php-fpm php-mysql php-zip php-gd php-mbstring php-curl php-xml php-pear php-bcmath

Then, you have to test the PHP installation. Create a file in the /var/www/html/ folder named test.php.

:~$ sudo nano /var/www/html/test.php

Now, put the following:

<?php
phpinfo();
?>

Now, save the changes by pressing CTRL + O and next close the file by pressing CTRL + X.

Next, restart Apache.

:~$ sudo systemctl restart apache2

After that, open the web browser and go to http://SERVER_IP/test.php.

So, PHP and Apache are correctly installed.

2. Install MariaDB

The next step to install Mantis Bug Tracker is to install a database driver. Currently, Mantis is compatible with MariaDB, MySQL, and PostgreSQL. I will choose MariaDB because it is in the official repositories.

:~$ sudo apt install mariadb-server

After that, set a root password using the mysql_secure_installation script.

:~$ sudo mysql_secure_installation

7.- Using the mysql_secure_installation script

You can also make other settings by answering each question. I’ll do it this way: Y, N, Y, Y.

Then, it is necessary to create a new database and user for Mantis.

:~$ sudo mysql -u root -p
CREATE DATABASE mantisdb;
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON mantisdb.* TO 'mantisuser'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'mantispss';
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
exit;

3. Install Mantis Bug Tracker

At the time of writing this post the latest stable version of Mantis is 2.19.0 so let’s download it.

:~$ wget https://liquidtelecom.dl.sourceforge.net/project/mantisbt/mantis-stable/2.19.0/mantisbt-2.19.0.zip

Next, decompress it.

:~$ unzip mantisbt-2.19.0.zip

And move it to the /srv folder.

:~$ sudo mv mantisbt-release-2.19.0/ /srv/mantis/

Set the right permissions to the folder.

:~$ sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /srv/mantisbt-2.19.0/
:~$ sudo chmod -R 755 /srv/mantisbt-2.19.0/

Create a new virtual host for Mantis.

:~$ sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/mantis.conf

Then, add the following.

<VirtualHost *:80>
        ServerAdmin [email protected]
        DocumentRoot "/srv/mantisbt-2.19.0"
        ServerName bt.osradar.lan
        ServerAlias www.bt.osradar.lan
        ErrorLog "/var/log/apache2/mantisbt-error_log"
        TransferLog "/var/log/apache2/mantisbt-access_log"
        <Directory "/srv/mantisbt-2.19.0">
                DirectoryIndex index.php index.html
                Options FollowSymLinks
                AllowOverride None
                Require all granted
                Options MultiViews FollowSymlinks
        </Directory>
</VirtualHost>