Standalone server on a Raspberry Pi

[NormanRouxel]

Pi Server Setup capable of hosting SellerDeck sites.

This demo used Raw Images / Raspbian from http://www.raspberrypi.org/downloads

Install Raspbian:
Enabling SSH as part of the initial configuration / Advanced Options).
Also set a hostname like raspberrypi.

Now install Samba so we can see the Pi from Windows PC's on our LAN and connect to it by name:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install samba samba-common-bin

You can set up shares, etc but they aren't needed - we just want the hostname to show up on our LAN.
The Pi should appear on the LAN some time after this.

Alternatively / or (you can have both) we could set up static IP as per http://elinux.org/RPi_Setting_up_a_static_IP_in_Debian
This may be useful if you want to port forward on your router so to make the Pi accessible from the Internet at large.
Be wary of security implications if you let the world in.
My LAN is 192.168.0.nnn so I chose 192.168.0.141

From this point on, you no longer need a mouse, keyboard or screen on the Pi and can connect to it by SSH via putty.
See http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/
Run putty on your PC, select SSH and enter raspberrypi into Hostname. Open and login.

Setting up server as per http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Raspberry-Pi-Web-Server

Part 1 of 7: Skipped as the pi is already running.

Part 2 of 7: Did all of this as I'm using a freshly baked pi.

Part 3 of 7: Skipped this but you can do it if you want auto updating

Part 4 of 7: Skipped this as I enabled SSH when initially configuring Pi.
And I already have putty installed on my main machine.
Do the putty bit if you want SSH access.

Part 5 of 7: Did all of this.

Part 6 of 7: Skipped this as Mysql isn't needed for SD to run and we've a only a 512Mb machine.

Part 7 of 7: Did all of this.

That's the server and FTP up and running.
You should get the default page from http://raspberrypi or http://192.168.0.141

A change is needed to the FTP server to fix file permissions.

sudo nano /etc/vsftpd.conf

Scroll down (using down arrow keys) until you see a line:

#local_umask=022

Delete the inital # to get:

local_umask=022

Now save and exit the file by pressing CTRL-O, Enter, CTRL-X

Now we need to get Perl scripts running from the default cgi-bin that's in /usr/lib/cgi-bin

sudo chown pi /usr/lib/cgi-bin

And make sure permissions are good on our www folder.

sudo chmod 0777 -R /var/www

However the SellerDeck Search will fail with an internal server error message so we need to load some missing Perl modules.
First get cpanm installed:

sudo apt-get install curl gcc-4.7
sudo curl -L http://cpanmin.us | perl - --sudo App::cpanminus

Then the modules we need are loaded via:

sudo cpanm HTML::Entities Exporter File::Temp LWP::UserAgent CGI CGI::Carp Digest::MD5

Probably a good idea to reboot the pi after all this.

sudo shutdown -r now

To create a site, FTP to to e.g. raspberrypi and move to the www directory.
I'm expecting to upload more than 1 site so each one will go in it's own directory within www.
Create a new directory for your site. E.g. "testsite" within www.
Change permissions on testsite to be 777 (check any option to recurse these settings into sub-directories).

Now SD should run using these network settings.

Change SCRIPTID, all raspberrypi and FTPPASSWORD to suit.
Then copy them to a textfile and import them into network settings:

HTTPPROXYMODE	0
HTTPPROXYADDRESS	
HTTPPROXYPORT	80
HTTPPROXYUSER	
HTTPPROXYPASSWORD	
FTPPROXYMODE	0
FTPPROXYADDRESS	
FTPPROXYPORT	21
FTPPROXYUSER	
FTPPROXYPASSWORD	
SCRIPTID	12011
SCRIPTEXT	.pl
SMTPHOST	dummy
WEBSITEURL	http://raspberrypi/testsite/index.html
IGNOREPASSIVEERRORS	true
USERELATIVECGIURLS	false
PATHTOPERL	/usr/bin/perl -X
USEENHANCEFTP	true
FTPBUFFERSIZE	4
FTPCLIENTTIMEOUT	5000
FTPRETRYDELAY	3000
FTPKEEPALIVEINTERVAL	30000
FTPSILENT	false
FTPMAXRETRIES	3
FTPCONNECTTIMEOUT	15000
SMTPAUTHREQUIRED	false
SMTPUSERNAME	
SMTPPASSWORD	
COMPRESSIONPACKETSIZE	1024
COMPRESSEDUPLOAD	false
CATALOGURL	http://raspberrypi/testsite/acatalog/
ONLINESTOREFOLDERNAME	acatalog
CGIBINURL	http://raspberrypi/cgi-bin/
PATHFROMCGITOCATALOG	/home/pi/www/testsite/acatalog/
FTPHOST	raspberrypi
FTPUSERNAME	pi
FTPPASSWORD	*********
PATHTOCGIBIN	/usr/lib/cgi-bin/
USEPASSIVEFTP	true
FTPPATHFROMCGITOCATALOG

Note that no SMTP server is set-up so I've just used a dummy entry.

Upload your site.

Now you should be able to properly browse your site via http://raspberrypi/testsite

[NormanRouxel]

And if there are any Linix / Pi gurus out there, could they look at the last few paragraphs above as I've not been able to get vsftpd to upload files with permissions other than 600.

[swardell]

while since I configured one by hand but I think local_umask 022 in in vsftpd.conf will give you 755 (777-022=755)

[NormanRouxel]

Steve: I tried that on the bare-iron build I did and it wouldn't work. Just tried it on another Pi and it worked OK. Must have messed something in the vsftpd.conf while testing (it was very late at night). Copied vsftpd.conf from good Pi to bad and now both work. Have edited the big ReadMe above to include the local_umask 022 tweak.

[NormanRouxel]

Can a Mod change the Paspberry typo in the threads name please?

[Duncan Rounding]

Can a Mod change the Paspberry typo in the threads name please?

Done. Looks like you're having fun Norman.

[NormanRouxel]

It is fun. Once the initial install and SSH server is running, you can unplug all peripherals and plonk it out of site with just a LAN connection and power from the nearest spare USB port.

Then tinker from anywhere on your LAN with the added benefit that you can copy / paste from the pc into the putty command window (click the right mouse button within putty to paste).

[NormanRouxel]

And here are example network settings for a Pi that's accessible from the Internet.

Using a dyndns.org name and have told the router to forward incoming traffic on port 80 to port 80 on 192.168.0.141.

HTTPPROXYMODE	0
HTTPPROXYADDRESS	
HTTPPROXYPORT	80
HTTPPROXYUSER	
HTTPPROXYPASSWORD	
FTPPROXYMODE	0
FTPPROXYADDRESS	
FTPPROXYPORT	21
FTPPROXYUSER	
FTPPROXYPASSWORD	
SCRIPTID	12011
SCRIPTEXT	.pl
SMTPHOST	dummy
WEBSITEURL	http://<my_domain>.dyndns.org/testsite/index.html
IGNOREPASSIVEERRORS	true
USERELATIVECGIURLS	false
PATHTOPERL	/usr/bin/perl -X
USEENHANCEFTP	true
FTPBUFFERSIZE	4
FTPCLIENTTIMEOUT	5000
FTPRETRYDELAY	3000
FTPKEEPALIVEINTERVAL	30000
FTPSILENT	false
FTPMAXRETRIES	3
FTPCONNECTTIMEOUT	15000
SMTPAUTHREQUIRED	false
SMTPUSERNAME	
SMTPPASSWORD	
COMPRESSIONPACKETSIZE	1024
COMPRESSEDUPLOAD	false
CATALOGURL	http://<my_domain>.dyndns.org/testsite/acatalog/
ONLINESTOREFOLDERNAME	acatalog
CGIBINURL	http://<my_domain>.dyndns.org/cgi-bin/
PATHFROMCGITOCATALOG	/home/pi/www/testsite/acatalog/
FTPHOST	raspberrypi
FTPUSERNAME	pi
FTPPASSWORD	*************
PATHTOCGIBIN	/usr/lib/cgi-bin/
USEPASSIVEFTP	true
FTPPATHFROMCGITOCATALOG

Note that the FTP server in the Pi is not exposed to the Internet so uploading / downloading will have to be done from within the local LAN.