Takiyah Noble's picture

Hello,

Bear with me ... because I am a complete newbie to the point of it inducing pain! LOL! But, in all fairness, I am a quick learner.

Okay, so I want to install Wordpress on Amazon EC2, poking around the documentation and video tutorials, I gather that I am supposed to download a Virtual Box from virtualbox.org to make it work.

Here's where I am confused... am I supposed to download the VirtualBox for Linux hosts (hence the name Turnkey Linux) option to my personal computer although my operating system is Windows 7? Or am I supposed to click on the VirtualBox for Windows hosts because I am operating Windows?

If I am supposed to click on the VirtualBox for Linux hosts, then what option am I supposed to choose to download and run on my computer. Here's what the virtualbox page I am looking at says:

VirtualBox 4.1.2 for Linux

Note: The package architecture has to match the Linux kernel architecture, that is, if you are running a 64-bit kernel, install the appropriate AMD64 package (it does not matter if you have an Intel or an AMD CPU). Mixed installations (e.g. Debian/Lenny ships an AMD64 kernel with 32-bit packages) are not supported. To install VirtualBox anyway you need to setup a 64-bit chroot environment.

Please choose the appropriate package for your Linux distribution:

  • Ubuntu 11.04 ("Natty Narwhal") i386 | AMD64
  • Ubuntu 10.10 ("Maverick Meerkat") i386 | AMD64
  • Ubuntu 10.04 LTS ("Lucid Lynx") i386 | AMD64
  • Ubuntu 8.04 LTS ("Hardy Heron") i386 | AMD64
  • Debian 6.0 ("Squeeze") i386 | AMD64
  • Debian 5.0 ("Lenny") i386 | AMD64
  • openSUSE 11.4 i386 | AMD64
  • openSUSE 11.3 i386 | AMD64
  • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 (SLES11) i386 | AMD64
  • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 (SLES10) i386 | AMD64
  • Fedora 15 ("Lovelock") i386 | AMD64
  • Fedora 14 ("Laughlin") i386 | AMD64
  • Mandriva 2010.0 / 2010.1 i386 | AMD64
  • Mandriva 2009.1 i386 | AMD64
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 ("RHEL6") / Oracle Linux 6 ("OL6") i386 | AMD64
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 ("RHEL5") / Oracle Linux 5 ("OL5") / CentOS 5 i386 | AMD64
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 ("RHEL4") / Oracle Linux 4 ("OL4") / CentOS 4 i386
  • All distributions i386 | AMD64

?????????????????????????????????

Have no clue. Please help.

Sincerely,

Takiyah

Forum: 
Jeremy Davis's picture

I'm assuming tha the reference to VirtualBox is is from the tutorial. That is just given as an example. TKL can also run in a range of other virtualisation solutions and bare metal hardware - as well as EC2 and other VPS providers that offer TKL images.

The best way to run TKL on EC2 is to use the Hub. It should be fairly self explanatory, but there is help text there from memory and you will find a fair bit more info in a couple of blog posts by the core devs, as well as lots of forums posts by the community (use the search box - top right of the page).

And for completeness: In answer to your question regarding VBox (which is somewhat irrelevant for you at this point, but I'll give you the info anyway - who knows...) If you wish to run TKL under VirtualBox then you need to choose the installer/package for your host system not your guest system (host is the base OS, guest is the virtualised OS). SO if your host computer runs Windows 7, then you need the appropriate Windows installer (exe/msi), Debian; the appropriate deb, RedHat; the appropriate rpm, etc.

Jeremy Davis's picture

I have only used the tklapp.com domain (the free one) or just used the IP to connect to my instance so I can only give you basic guidance there (and domain registrars are different and I have no experience with Namecheap). Also I think the Hub 'home' page (where it says you're 77% done) is a little misleading, especially for newbs. My hub home page always says I'm 77% done and I've been using it for years!

You don't need to have TKLBAM configured to use your server (although it's not a bad idea if you want to backup your data). But it should be pretty easy to set up, once you have access to your site (AFAIK you can use Webmin to do it, so you shouldn't even need to use the commandline).

From my understanding you were on the right track. When you update the nameservers with Namecheap it may take up to 24 hours (or perhaps even longer for some domain registrars - Namecheap should have an FAQ somewhere that can give you some idea of how long this should take, in my experience it only took a few hours but each registrar is different). But it is highly unlikely that it will be instant. You'll just need to be patient with that one!

But even without your domain name set up you can access your server by IP. So you can set up TKLBAM and start work on your site before the nameservers have propagated. If you go to the 'servers' page in the Hub (links in the top right of the page) and then click on your server. Your server details should dropdown. Now look for 'Public IP' and there should be an IP address next to it which is a link. Click on that and you should be on your site! You can now also configure TKLBAM.

If you want to follow the directions suggesting you use the commandline then log into Webshell by adding the port number 12320 to the IP eg if the IP was 192.168.1.1 then in the address bar of your browser you would type https://192.168.1.1:12320

OTOH as a newb I would recommend that you use Webmin. Same as above (ie use https and add the port number to the IP) but use the port 12321

Hope that helps. :)

Takiyah Noble's picture

Jeremey, I just want to thank you for your help so far!!! You have been extremely patient and kind and thoughtful in your responses... and not all "techies" are that way to us "newbs." LOL!

That's freaking amazing that I'm looking at a Wordpress site on Amazon EC2!

My extreme newbieness is going to shine through again ... but, there is an end in sight! I just have a few more questions and I promise I'll be out of your hair! Promise! LOL!

1. So, I'm trying to log into Webmin ... but I can't. I am not quite sure what username and password is that I should be typing in. Everything that I thought it would be is not allowing access. Is there anywhere from within my profile where I can set or reset the Webmin username and password login information? Or was this a generic username and password that was set for all users, and we customize it after successful login with the generic username and password?

2. Can we install subdirectories in this Turnkey Linux Wordpress installation?

3. Can we set up our FTP client (I use FileZilla) to work with this Turnkey Linux Wordpress installation?

4. When setting up the Dynamic Name Servers to mask the IP address in the browser for the Turnkey Hub applications ... I noticed that you said that we need to do that via the APT (Package manager) found in the Webmin. (But I can't access it). How can I do that if I can't access it?

5. You also mention that we can install the Dynamic Name Server IP Masking through the command line in the web shell too, right? Well, every time I launch that... it asks me for my Wordpress Login: so I type in admin. Then, when it promps me to type in the password, I try to type, but it won't register anything I type. It remains blank. Then, after a while, it times out... and logs me out of the session. What do I do?

Sincerely,

Takiyah

Jeremy Davis's picture

Firstly, no worries on the help, I've been there myself! Glad that I've been able to get you going in the right direction. Anyway here's the answers:

  1. You need to use the username 'root' and the root password that you set intially when you created the appliance. [FYI the root account is basically equivalent to the administrator account in Windows].
  2. Yes but I'm not sure how. You'll need to do a bit of research on exactly how you will be able to acheive your desired results there. wordpress.org may have some info on what you are after (keep in mind that TKL v11.x appliances are based on Ubuntu 10.04/Lucid).
  3. Yes. I too use Filezilla. Basically you'll need to use the IP address again (although you will be able to use the domain name once it has propagated). SIn a "new server", select SFTP and 'normal' log in (or 'ask password' if you want to use your password each time). Use the username 'root' and again your root password (see 1).
  4. Not quite sure about that one. I suggest you read more about the TKL domain management and DNS in a recent blog post.
  5. Log in to Webshell using the same detail as Webmin (ie 'root' with root password). An idiosyncrasy of Linux commandline login is that the password is not displayed at all - ie it is normal behaviour for it to appear nothing is happening as you type your password. Just ype your password and hit enter.

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