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PHP

How to install PHP 7.2.latest on Ubuntu 16.04

November 17, 2018 by Simon

How to install PHP 7.2.latest on Ubuntu 16.04/ Ubuntu 18.04/Debian etc/

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I have a number of guides on moving away from CPanel, Setting up VM’s on UpCloud, AWS, Vultr or Digital Ocean along with installing and managing WordPress from the command line. PHP is my programming language of choice.

PHP has a support page that declares the support date ranges and support types: http://php.net/supported-versions.php

 

PHP 7.0 going EOL

A version of PHP is either actively supported, security fix supported or end of life. Read this post to check WordPress for PHP compatibility.

 

From time to time vulnerabilities come up that require PHP updates to be applied.

Multiple flaw found in #PHP, most severe of which could allow arbitrary code execution

Affected Versions:
PHP 7.2 —prior to 7.2.5
PHP 7.1 —prior to 7.1.17
PHP 7.0 —prior to 7.0.30
PHP 5.0 —prior to 5.6.36https://t.co/TtiqXePoHu

Upgrade to the latest version of PHP immediately

— The Hacker News (@TheHackersNews) May 1, 2018

#PHP 7.2.12 has been released https://t.co/iNXGYTs0PX

— Neustradamus (@neustradamus) November 9, 2018

Source Link here

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I have guides on setting up PHP 7 here on Digital Ocean, here on AWS and here on Vultr. I have tried upgrading to PHP 7.1 in the past with no luck (I forgot to change something and rolled back to 7.0).

FYI: I have a guide on setting up PHP child workers so the output from some commands below may be different than yours. Here are the steps I performed to install PHP 7.2 alongside 7.0 then switch. to 7.2.

Backup your system

Do perform a Snapshot or Backup before proceeding. Nothing beats a quick restore if things fail.

Note: Use this information at your own risk.

Updating php 7.2.12 to 7.2.12

Update your Ubuntu systems

Shell
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apt-get update && apt-get upgrade

Updating from an older php (e.g 5.x, 7.1, 7.1 to say 7.2.12)

Backup PHP

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cd /etc/php
zip -r php7.0backup.zip 7.0/

Install Helper

This software provides an abstraction of the used apt repositories. It allows you to easily manage your distribution and independent software vendor software sources. More Info

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apt-get install python-software-properties

Add the main PHP repo (more information)

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add-apt-repository ppa:ondrej/php

Update the package lists

“In a nutshell, apt-get update doesn’t actually install new versions of the software. Instead, it updates the package lists for upgrades for packages that need upgrading, as well as new packages that have just come to the repositories.” from here

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apt-get update

List Installed Packages (optional)

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dpkg -l

Install PHP 7.2

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apt-get install php7.2

Install common PHP modules

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apt-get install php-pear php7.2-curl php7.2-dev php7.2-mbstring php7.2-zip php7.2-mysql php7.2-xml

Install PHP FPM

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apt-get install php7.2-fpm

Update all packages (may be needed to update from php 7.2.4 to 7.2.5)

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sudo apt-get upgrade

Edit your NGINX sites-available config

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sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/default
# I set: fastcgi_pass /run/php/php7.2-fpm.sock;

Edit your NGINX sites-enabled config

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sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default
# I set: fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php7.2-fpm.sock;

I edited these lines

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location ~ \.php$ {
    ...
    fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php7.2-fpm.sock;
    ...
}

Edit your PHP config (and make desired changes)

Shell
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sudo nano /etc/php/7.2/fpm/php.ini

Edit your PHP pool config file (as required). See this guide here.

e.g.

> cgi.fix_pathinfo=0
> max_input_vars = 1000
> memory_limit = 1024M
> max_file_uploads = 8M
> post_max_size = 8M

Shell
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sudo nano /etc/php/7.2/fpm/pool.d/www.conf

Make sure you set: listen = /run/php/php7.2-fpm.sock

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Set PHP 7.2 as the default PHP

Shell
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update-alternatives --set php /usr/bin/php7.2

Check your PHP version

Shell
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php -v

Reload PHP

Shell
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sudo service php7.2-fpm reload

Reload NGINX

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nginx -t
nginx -s reload
/etc/init.d/nginx restart

Check the status of your PHP (and child workers)

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sudo service php7.2-fpm status
● php7.2-fpm.service - The PHP 7.2 FastCGI Process Manager
   Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/php7.2-fpm.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
   Active: active (running) since Fri 2018-05-04 19:02:27 AEST;
     Docs: man:php-fpm7.2(8)
  Process: 123456 ExecReload=/bin/kill -USR2 $MAINPID (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
Main PID: 123456 (php-fpm7.2)
   Status: "Processes active: 0, idle: 10, Requests: 0, slow: 0, Traffic: 0req/sec"
    Tasks: 11
   Memory: 30.5M
      CPU: 10.678s
   CGroup: /system.slice/php7.2-fpm.service
           ├─16494 php-fpm: master process (/etc/php/7.2/fpm/php-fpm.conf)
           ├─16497 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─16498 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─16499 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─16500 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─16501 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─16502 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─16503 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─16504 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─16505 php-fpm: pool www
           └─16506 php-fpm: pool www

Check your website.

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Troubleshooting

Guides that helped me.

https://thishosting.rocks/install-php-on-ubuntu/

https://websiteforstudents.com/wordpress-supports-php-7-2-heres-how-to-install-with-nginx-and-mariadb-support/

Check your log files

Shell
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tail /var/log/nginx/error.log

Debug FPM Service

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systemctl status php7.2-fpm.service
● php7.2-fpm.service - The PHP 7.2 FastCGI Process Manager
   Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/php7.2-fpm.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
   Active: active (running) since Sun 2018-05-06 00:18:55 AEST; 7min ago
     Docs: man:php-fpm7.2(8)
  Process: 123456 ExecReload=/bin/kill -USR2 $MAINPID (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
Main PID: 123 (php-fpm7.2)
   Status: "Processes active: 0, idle: 10, Requests: 44, slow: 0, Traffic: 0req/sec"
    Tasks: 11
   Memory: 212.6M
      CPU: 12.052s
   CGroup: /system.slice/php7.2-fpm.service
           ├─438 php-fpm: master process (/etc/php/7.2/fpm/php-fpm.conf)
           ├─441 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─442 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─443 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─444 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─445 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─446 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─447 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─449 php-fpm: pool www
           ├─450 php-fpm: pool www
           └─451 php-fpm: pool www
 
May 06 00:18:55 server systemd[1]: Stopped The PHP 7.2 FastCGI Process Manager.
May 06 00:18:55 server systemd[1]: Starting The PHP 7.2 FastCGI Process Manager...
May 06 00:18:55 server systemd[1]: Started The PHP 7.2 FastCGI Process Manager.

Remove PHP 7.0

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sudo apt-get purge php7.0-common
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
  libaspell15 libauthen-pam-perl libc-client2007e libio-pty-perl libmcrypt4 librecode0 libtidy-0.99-0 libxmlrpc-epi0 linux-headers-4.4.0-109
  linux-headers-4.4.0-109-generic linux-headers-4.4.0-112 linux-headers-4.4.0-112-generic linux-headers-4.4.0-87
  linux-headers-4.4.0-87-generic linux-headers-4.4.0-96 linux-headers-4.4.0-96-generic linux-image-4.4.0-109-generic
  linux-image-4.4.0-112-generic linux-image-4.4.0-87-generic linux-image-4.4.0-96-generic linux-image-extra-4.4.0-109-generic
  linux-image-extra-4.4.0-112-generic linux-image-extra-4.4.0-87-generic linux-image-extra-4.4.0-96-generic mlock
Use 'sudo apt autoremove' to remove them.
The following packages will be REMOVED:
  php7.0-cli* php7.0-common* php7.0-curl* php7.0-fpm* php7.0-gd* php7.0-imap* php7.0-intl* php7.0-json* php7.0-mbstring* php7.0-mcrypt*
  php7.0-mysql* php7.0-opcache* php7.0-pspell* php7.0-readline* php7.0-recode* php7.0-sqlite3* php7.0-tidy* php7.0-xml* php7.0-xmlrpc*
  php7.0-xsl*

PHP 7.0 Removed 🙂

Remove other unused packages

Shell
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sudo apt autoremove

At the time of writing (November the 18th 2018) PHP 7.2.12 is the latest version of PHP and PHP 7.3 will be out at the end of the year.

Good luck and I hope this guide helps someone

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Revision History

v1.4 Updated the post to mention PHP 7.0 EOL

v1.3 Updated to add PHP 7.2.12 information

v1.2 PHP 7.2.9 and PHP 7.2 updates

v1.1 Remove PHP 7.0 steps

v1.0 Initial post

Filed Under: Patch, PHP, php72, Security, Ubuntu Tagged With: 16.04, 7.2.latest, How, install, on, php, to, ubuntu

Check the compatibility of your WordPress theme and plugin code with PHP Compatibility Checker

November 7, 2018 by Simon

This is how I checked the compatibility of my WordPress theme and plugin (code) with PHP Compatibility Checker

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Aside

I have a number of guides on moving away from CPanel, Setting up VM’s on AWS, Vultr or Digital Ocean along with installing and managing WordPress from the command line. PHP is my programming language of choice.

Now on with the post

Snip from: https://wordpress.org/plugins/php-compatibility-checker/

What is PHP Compatibility Checker

> The WP Engine PHP Compatibility Checker can be used by any WordPress website on any web host to check PHP version compatibility.

> This plugin will lint theme and plugin code inside your WordPress file system and give you back a report of compatibility issues for you to fix. Compatibility issues are categorized into errors and warnings and will list the file and line number of the offending code, as well as the info about why that line of code is incompatible with the chosen version of PHP. The plugin will also suggest updates to themes and plugins, as a new version may offer compatible code.

> This plugin does not execute your theme and plugin code, as such this plugin cannot detect runtime compatibility issues.
Please note that linting code is not perfect. This plugin cannot detect unused code-paths that might be used for backwards compatibility, and thus might show false positives. We maintain a whitelist of plugins that can cause false positives. We are continuously working to ensure the checker provides the most accurate results possible.
This plugin relies on WP-Cron to scan files in the background. The scan will get stuck if the site’s WP-Cron isn’t running correctly. Please see the FAQ for more information.

Install PHP Compatibility Checker

PHP Compatibility Checker

 

I instaled by SSH’ing to my server and opening my WP Plugins folder

Shell
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cd /www-root/wp-content/plugins/

I grabbed the latest download URL from here (hover over the download button), at the time of writing this was the latest version: https://downloads.wordpress.org/plugin/php-compatibility-checker.1.4.6.zip

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I downloaded the plugin on my server (then unzipped it and deleted the zip)

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wget https://downloads.wordpress.org/plugin/php-compatibility-checker.1.4.6.zip
unzip php-compatibility-checker.1.4.6.zip
rm php-compatibility-checker.1.4.6.zip

Enable PHP Compatibility Checker Plugin

I enabled the plugin

Enable the Plugin

I clicked on the following message

> You have just activated the PHP Compatibility Checker. Start scanning your plugins and themes for compatibility with the latest PHP versions now!

Start Scan

I already have PHP 7.2 installed so let’s scan my site. PHP 7.3 will be available in December and it is already being tested in beta.

Scan PHP 7.2

PHP Versions

PHP Versions

Site Scanning

PHP Compatibility Checker site scanning is very business like

Site Scan Progress

PHP Compatability Checker Scan Results

2 of 22 plugins I use were not PHP 7.2 compatible (WordFence and WP Meta SEO)?

PHP Compatibility Report

I read on twitter that Wordfence may be a false positive.

Clicking toggle details reveal why the scan failed. A Two Factor Auth plugin was all OK.

Scan Results

Your results will hopefully be…

> PHP 7.2 compatible

Of if errors exist it should explain why it did not pass.

FILE: /www-root/wp-content/plugins/wp-meta-seo/jutranslation/jutranslation.php
> —————————————————————————————-
> FOUND 1 ERROR AFFECTING 1 LINE
> —————————————————————————————-
> 251 | ERROR | The function is_countable() is not present in PHP version 7.2 or earlier
> —————————————————————————————-

I can’t wait for PHP 7.3 scanning.  I will update this post in December 2018 after PHP 7.3 is released.

 

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Good luck and I hope this guide helps someone

Ask a question or recommend an article

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Revision History

v1.0 Initial post

Filed Under: Compatibility, PHP Tagged With: and, check, Checker, code, compatibility, of, php, plugin, the, theme, with, wordpress, your

I moved my domain to UpCloud (on the other side of the world) from Vultr (Sydney) and could not be happier with the performance.

October 27, 2018 by Simon

I moved my domain to UpCloud (on the other side of the world) from Vultr (Sydney) and could not be happier with the performance. Here is what I did to set up a complete Ubuntu 18.04 system (NGINX, PHP, MySQL, WordPress etc). This is not a paid review (just me documenting my steps over 2 days).

Background (CPanel hosts)

In 1999 I hosted my first domain (www.fearby.com) on a host in Seattle (for $10 USD a month), the host used CPanel and all was good.  After a decade I was using the domain more for online development and the website was now too slow (I think I was on dial-up or ADSL 1 at the time). I moved my domain to an Australian host (for $25 a month).

After 8 years the domain host was sold and performance remained mediocre. After another year the new host was sold again and performance was terrible.

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Page load times were near 30 seconds.

I started receiving Resource Limit Is Reached warnings (basically this was a plot by the new CPanel host to say “Pay us more and this message will go away”).

This is a screenshot of my old host giving a Usage Limit Exceeded error

The straw that broke the camel’s back was their demand of $150/year for a dodgy SSL certificate.

This is a screenshot of a crappy C rated SSL certificate (measured at ssl labs)

I needed to move to a self-managed server where I was in control.

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Buying a Domain Name

Buy a domain name from Namecheap here.

Domain names for just 88 cents!

Self Managed Server

I found a good web IDE ( http://www.c9.io/ ) that allowed me to connect to a cloud VM.  C9 allowed me to open many files and terminal windows and reconnect to them later. Don’t get excited, though, as AWS have purchased C9 and it’s not the same.

C9 IDE

C9 IDE

I spun up a Digital Ocean Server at the closest data centre in Singapore. Here was my setup guide creating a Digital Ocean VM, connecting to it with C9 and configuring it. I moved my email to G Suite and moved my WordPress to Digital Ocean (other guides here and here).

I was happy since I could now send emails via CLI/code, set up free SSL certs, add second domain email to G Suite and Secure G Suite. No more usage limit errors either.

Self-managing servers requires more work but it is more rewarding (flexible, faster and cheaper).  Page load times were now near 20 seconds (10-second improvement).

Latency Issue

Over 6 months, performance on Digital Ocean (in Singapore) from Australia started to drop (mentioned here).  I tried upgrading the memory but that did not help (latency was king).

Moved the website to Australia

I moved my domain to Vultr in Australia (guide here and here). All was good for a year until traffic growth started to increase.

 

Blog Growth

I tried upgrading the memory on Vultr and I setup PHP child workers, setup Cloudflare.

GT Metrix scores were about a “B” and Google Page Speed Scores were in the lower 40’s. Page loads were about 14 seconds (5-second improvement).

Tweaking WordPress

I set up an image compression plugin in WordPress then set up a cloud image compression and CDN Plugin from the same vendor.  Page Speed info here.

GT Metrix scores were now occasionally an “A” and Page Speed Scores were in the lower 20’s. Page loads were about 3-5 seconds (10-second improvement).

Mixed bag from Vultr (more optimisation and performance improvements were needed).

This screenshot is showing poor www.gtmetrix.com scores , pool google page speed index scores and upgrading from 1GB to 2GB memory on my server.

Google Chrome Developer Console Audit Results on Vultr hosted website were not very good (I stopped checking as nothing helped).

This is a screenshot showing poor site performance (screenshot taken in Google Dev tools audit feature)

The problem was the Vultr server (400km away in Sydney) was offline (my issue) and everything above (adding more memory, adding 2x CDN’s (EWWW and Cloudflare), adding PHP Child workers etc) did not seem to help???

Enter UpCloud…

Recently, a friend sent a link to a blog article about a host called “UpCloud” who promised “Faster than SSD” performance.  This can’t be right: “Faster than SSD”? I was intrigued. I wanted to check it out as I thought nothing was faster than SSD (well, maybe RAM).

I signed up for a trial and ran a disk IO test (read the review here) and I was shocked. It’s fast. Very fast.

Summary: UpCloud was twice as fast (Disk IO and CPU) as Vultr (+ an optional $4/m firewall and $3/m for 1x backup).

This is a screenshot showing Vultr.com servers getting half the read and write disk io performance compared to upcloud.com.

fyi: Labels above are K Bytes per second. iozone loops through all file sizes from 4 KB to 16,348 KB and measures through the reads per second. To be honest, the meaning of the numbers doesn’t interest me, I just want to compare apples to apples.

This is am image showing iozone results breakdown chart (kbytes per sec on vertical axis, file size in horizontal axis and transfer size on third access)

(image snip from http://www.iozone.org/ which explains the numbers)

I might have to copy my website on UpCloud and see how fast it is.

Where to Deploy and Pricing

UpCloud Pricing: https://www.upcloud.com/pricing/

UpCloud Pricing

 

UpCloud does not have a data centre in Australia yet so why choose UpCloud?

Most of my site’s visitors are based in the US and UpCloud have disk IO twice as fast as Vultr (win-win?).  I could deploy to Chicago?

This image sows most of my visitors are in the US

My site’s traffic is growing and I need to ensure the site is fast enough in the future.

This image shows that most of my sites visitors are hitting my site on week days.

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Creating an UpCloud VM

I used a friend’s referral code and signed up to create my first VM.

FYI: use my Referral code and get $25 free credit.  Sign up only takes 2 minutes.

https://www.upcloud.com/register/?promo=D84793

When you click the link above you will receive 25$ to try out serves for 3 days. You can exit his trail and deposit $10 into UpCloud.

Trial Limitations

The trial mode restrictions are as following:

* Cloud servers can only be accessed using SSH, RDP, HTTP or HTTPS protocols
* Cloud servers are not allowed to send outgoing e-mails or to create outbound SSH/RDP connections
* The internet connection is restricted to 100 Mbps (compared to 500 Mbps for non-trial accounts)
* After your 72 hours free trial, your services will be deleted unless you make a one-time deposit of $10

UpCloud Links

The UpCloud support page is located here: https://www.upcloud.com/support/

  • Quick start: Introduction to UpCloud
  • How to deploy a Cloud Server
  • Deploy a cloud server with UpCloud’s API

More UpCloud links to read:

  • Two-Factor Authentication on UpCloud
  • Floating IPs on UpCloud
  • How to manage your firewall
  • Finalizing deployment

Signing up to UpCloud

Navigate to https://upcloud.com/signup and add your username, password and email address and click signup.

New UpCloud Signup Page

Add your address and payment details and click proceed (you don’t need to pay anything ($1 may be charged and instantly refunded to verify the card)

Add address and payment details

That’s it, check yout email.

Signup Done

Look for the UpCloud email and click https://my.upcloud.com/

Check Email

Now login

Login to UpCloud

Now I can see a dashboard 🙂

UpCloud Dashboard

 

I was happy to see 24/7 support is available.

This image shows the www.upcloud.com live chat

I opted in for the new dashboard

UpCloud new new dashboard

Deploy My First UpCloud Server

This is how I deployed a server.

Note: If you are going to deploy a server consider using my referral code and get $25 credit for free.

Under the “deploy a server” widget I named the server and chose a location (I think I was supposed to use an FQDN name -e.g., “fearby.com”). The deployment worked though. I clicked continue, then more options were made available:

  1. Enter a short server description.
  2. Choose a location (Frankfurt, Helsinki, Amsterdam, Singapore, London and Chicago)
  3. Choose the number of CPU’s and amount of memory
  4. Specify disk number/names and type (MaxIOPS or HDD).
  5. Choose an Operating System
  6. Select a Timezone
  7. Define SSH Keys for access
  8. Allowed login methods
  9. Choose hardware adapter types
  10. Where the send the login password

Deploy Server

FYI: How to generate a new SSH Key (on OSX or Ubuntu)

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ssh-keygen -t rsa

Output

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Generating public/private rsa key pair.
Enter file in which to save the key (/root/.ssh/id_rsa): /temp/example_rsa
Enter passphrase (empty for no passphrase): *********************************
Enter same passphrase again:*********************************
Your identification has been saved in /temp/example_rsa.
Your public key has been saved in /temp/example_rsa.pub.
The key fingerprint is:
SHA256:########################### user@sever
Outputted public and private key

Did the key export? (yes)

> /temp# ls /temp/ -al
> drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Jun 9 15:33 .
> drwxr-xr-x 27 root root 4096 Jun 8 14:25 ..
> -rw——- 1 user user 1766 Jun 9 15:33 example_rsa
> -rw-r–r– 1 user user 396 Jun 9 15:33 example_rsa.pub

“example_rsa” is the private key and “example_rsa.pub “is the public key.

  • The public key needs to be added to the server to allow access.
  • The private key needs to be added to any local ssh program used for remote access.

Initialisation script (after deployment)

I was pleased to see an initialization script section that calls actions after the server is deployed. I configured the initialisation script to pull down a few GB of backups from my Vultr website in Sydney (files now removed).

This was my Initialisation script:

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#!/bin/bash
echo "Downloading the Vultr websites backups"
mkdir /backup
cd /backup
wget -o www-mysql-backup.sql https://fearby.com/.../www-mysql-backup.sql
wget -o www-blog-backup.zip https://fearby.com/.../www-blog-backup.zip

Confirm and Deploy

I clicked “Confirm and deploy” but I had an alert that said trial mode can only deploy servers up to 1024MB of memory.

This image shows I cant deploy servers with 2/GB in trial modeExiting UpCloud Trial Mode

I opened the dashboard and clicked My Account then Billing, I could see the $25 referral credit but I guess I can’t use that in Trial.

I exited trial mode by depositing $10 (USD).

View Billing Details

 

Make a manual 1-time deposit of $10 to exit trial mode.

Deposit $10 to exit the trial

FYI: Server prices are listed below (or view prices here).

 

UpCloud Pricing

Now I can go back and deploy the server with the same settings above (1x CPU, 2GB Memory, Ubuntu 18.04, MaxIOPS Storage etc)

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Deployment takes a few minutes and depending on how you specified a password may be emailed to you.

UpCloud Server Deployed

The server is now deployed; now I can connect to it with my SSH program (vSSH).  Simply add the server’s IP, username, password and the SSH private key (generated above) to your ssh program of choice.

fyi: The public key contents start with “ssh-rsa”.

This image shows me connecting to my sever via ssh

I noticed that the initialisation script downloaded my 2+GB of files already. Nice.

UpCloud Billing Breakdown

I can now see on the UpCloud billing page in my dashboard that credit is deducted daily (68c); at this rate, I have 49 days credit left?

Billing Breakdown

I can manually deposit funds or set up automatic payments at any time 🙂

UpCloud Backup Options

You do not need to setup backups but in case you want to roll back (if things stuff up), it is a good idea. Backups are an additional charge.

I have set up automatic daily backups with an auto deletion after 2 days

To view backup scheduled click on your deployed server then click backup

List of UpCloud Backups

Note: Backups are charged at $0.056 for every GB stored – so $5.60 for every 100GB per month (half that for 50GB etc)

You can take manual backups at any time (and only be charged for the hour)

UpCloud Firewall Options

I set up a firewall at UpCloud to only allow the minimum number of ports (UpCloud DNS, HTTP, HTTPS and My IP to port 22).  The firewall feature is charged at $0.0056 an hour ($4.03 a month)

I love the ability to set firewall rules on incoming, destination and outgoing ports.

To view your firewall click on your deployed server then click firewall

UpCloud firewall

Update: I modified my firewall to allow inbound ICMP (IPv4/IPv6) and UDP (IPv4/IPv6) packets.

(Note: Old firewall screenshot)

Firewall Rules Allow port 80, 443 and DNS

Because my internet provider has a dynamic IP, I set up a VPN with a static IP and whitelisted it for backdoor access.

Local Ubuntu ufw Firewall

I duplicated the rules in my local ufw (2nd level) firewall (and blocked mail)

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sudo ufw status numbered
Status: active
 
     To                         Action      From
     --                         ------      ----
[ 1] 80                         ALLOW IN    Anywhere
[ 2] 443                        ALLOW IN    Anywhere
[ 3] 25                         DENY OUT    Anywhere                   (out)
[ 4] 53                         ALLOW IN    93.237.127.9
[ 5] 53                         ALLOW IN    93.237.40.9
[ 6] 22                         ALLOW IN    REMOVED (MY WHITELISTED IP))
[ 7] 80 (v6)                    ALLOW IN    Anywhere (v6)
[ 8] 443 (v6)                   ALLOW IN    Anywhere (v6)
[ 9] 25 (v6)                    DENY OUT    Anywhere (v6)              (out)
[10] 53                         ALLOW IN    2a04:3540:53::1
[11] 53                         ALLOW IN    2a04:3544:53::1

UpCloud Download Speeds

I pulled down a 1.8GB Ubuntu 18.08 Desktop ISO 3 times from gigenet.com and the file downloaded in 32 seconds (57MB/sec). Nice.

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$/temp# wget http://mirrors.gigenet.com/ubuntu/18.04/ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso
--2018-06-08 18:02:04-- http://mirrors.gigenet.com/ubuntu/18.04/ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso
Resolving mirrors.gigenet.com (mirrors.gigenet.com)... 69.65.15.34
Connecting to mirrors.gigenet.com (mirrors.gigenet.com)|69.65.15.34|:80... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 1921843200 (1.8G) [application/x-iso9660-image]
Saving to: 'ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso'
 
ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso 100%[==================================================================>] 1.79G 57.0MB/s in 32s
 
2018-06-08 18:02:37 (56.6 MB/s) - 'ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso' saved [1921843200/1921843200]
 
$/temp# wget http://mirrors.gigenet.com/ubuntu/18.04/ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso
--2018-06-08 18:02:46-- http://mirrors.gigenet.com/ubuntu/18.04/ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso
Resolving mirrors.gigenet.com (mirrors.gigenet.com)... 69.65.15.34
Connecting to mirrors.gigenet.com (mirrors.gigenet.com)|69.65.15.34|:80... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 1921843200 (1.8G) [application/x-iso9660-image]
Saving to: 'ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso.1'
 
ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso.1 100%[==================================================================>] 1.79G 57.0MB/s in 32s
 
2018-06-08 18:03:19 (56.6 MB/s) - 'ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso.1' saved [1921843200/1921843200]
 
$/temp# wget http://mirrors.gigenet.com/ubuntu/18.04/ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso
--2018-06-08 18:03:23-- http://mirrors.gigenet.com/ubuntu/18.04/ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso
Resolving mirrors.gigenet.com (mirrors.gigenet.com)... 69.65.15.34
Connecting to mirrors.gigenet.com (mirrors.gigenet.com)|69.65.15.34|:80... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 1921843200 (1.8G) [application/x-iso9660-image]
Saving to: 'ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso.2'
 
ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso.2 100%[==================================================================>] 1.79G 57.0MB/s in 32s
 
2018-06-08 18:03:56 (56.8 MB/s) - 'ubuntu-18.04-desktop-amd64.iso.2' saved [1921843200/1921843200]

Install Common Ubuntu Packages

I installed common Ubuntu packages.

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apt-get install zip htop ifstat iftop bmon tcptrack ethstatus speedometer iozone3 bonnie++ sysbench siege tree tree unzip jq jq ncdu pydf ntp rcconf ufw iperf nmap iozone3

Timezone

I checked the server’s time (I thought this was auto set before I deployed)?

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$hwclock --show
2018-06-06 23:52:53.639378+0000

I reset the time to Australia/Sydney.

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dpkg-reconfigure tzdata
Current default time zone: 'Australia/Sydney'
Local time is now: Thu Jun 7 06:53:20 AEST 2018.
Universal Time is now: Wed Jun 6 20:53:20 UTC 2018.

Now the timezone is set 🙂

Shell History

I increased the shell history.

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HISTSIZEH =10000
HISTCONTROL=ignoredups

SSH Login

I created a ~/.ssh/authorized_keys file and added my SSH public key to allow password-less logins.

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mkdir ~/.ssh
sudo nano ~/.ssh/authorized_keys

I added my pubic ssh key, then exited the ssh session and logged back in. I can now log in without a password.

Install NGINX

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apt-get install nginx

nginx/1.14.0 is now installed.

A quick GT Metrix test.

This image shows awesome static nginx performance ratings of of 99%

Install MySQL

Run these commands to install and secure MySQL.

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apt install mysql-server
mysql_secure_installation

Securing the MySQL server deployment.
> Would you like to setup VALIDATE PASSWORD plugin?: n
> New password: **********************************************
> Re-enter new password: **********************************************
> Remove anonymous users? (Press y|Y for Yes, any other key for No) : y
> Disallow root login remotely? (Press y|Y for Yes, any other key for No) : y
> Remove test database and access to it? (Press y|Y for Yes, any other key for No) : y
> Reload privilege tables now? (Press y|Y for Yes, any other key for No) : y
> Success.

I disabled the validate password plugin because I hate it.

MySQL Ver 14.14 Distrib 5.7.22 is now installed.

Set MySQL root login password type

Set MySQL root user to authenticate via “mysql_native_password”. Run the “mysql” command.

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mysql
SELECT user,authentication_string,plugin,host FROM mysql.user;
+------------------+-------------------------------------------+-----------------------+-----------+
| user | authentication_string | plugin | host |
+------------------+-------------------------------------------+-----------------------+-----------+
| root | | auth_socket | localhost |
| mysql.session | hiddden | mysql_native_password | localhost |
| mysql.sys | hiddden | mysql_native_password | localhost |
| debian-sys-maint | hiddden | mysql_native_password | localhost |
+------------------+-------------------------------------------+-----------------------+----------

Now let’s set the root password authentication method to “mysql_native_password”

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ALTER USER 'root'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED WITH mysql_native_password BY '*****************************************';
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)

Check authentication method.

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mysql> SELECT user,authentication_string,plugin,host FROM mysql.user;
+------------------+-------------------------------------------+-----------------------+-----------+
| user | authentication_string | plugin | host |
+------------------+-------------------------------------------+-----------------------+-----------+
| root | ######################################### | mysql_native_password | localhost |
| mysql.session | hiddden | mysql_native_password | localhost |
| mysql.sys | hiddden | mysql_native_password | localhost |
| debian-sys-maint | hiddden | mysql_native_password | localhost |
+------------------+-------------------------------------------+-----------------------+-----------+

Now we need to flush permissions.

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mysql> FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)

Done.

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Install PHP

Install PHP 7.2

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apt-get install software-properties-common
add-apt-repository ppa:ondrej/php
apt-get update
apt-get install -y php7.2
php -v

PHP 7.2.5, Zend Engine v3.2.0 with Zend OPcache v7.2.5-1 is now installed. Do update PHP frequently.

I made the following changes in /etc/php/7.2/fpm/php.ini

> cgi.fix_pathinfo=0
> max_input_vars = 1000
> memory_limit = 1024M
> max_file_uploads = 20M
> post_max_size = 20M

Install PHP Modules

sudo apt-get install php-pear php7.2-curl php7.2-dev php7.2-mbstring php7.2-zip php7.2-mysql php7.2-xml

Install PHP FPM

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apt-get install php7.2-fpm

Configure PHP FPM config.

Edit /etc/php/7.2/fpm/php.ini

> cgi.fix_pathinfo=0
> max_input_vars = 1000
> memory_limit = 1024M
> max_file_uploads = 20M
> post_max_size = 20M

Reload php sudo service.

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php7.2-fpm restart service php7.2-fpm status

Install PHP Modules

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sudo apt-get install php-pear php7.2-curl php7.2-dev php7.2-mbstring php7.2-zip php7.2-mysql php7.2-xml

Configuring NGINX

If you are not comfortable editing NGINX config files read here, here and here.

I made a new “www root” folder, set permissions and created a default html file.

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mkdir /www-root
chown -R www-data:www-data /www-root
echo "Hello World" >> /www-root/index.html

I edited the “root” key in “/etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default” file and set the root a new location (e.g., “/www-root”)

I added these performance tweaks to /etc/nginx/nginx.conf

> worker_cpu_affinity auto;
> worker_rlimit_nofile 100000

I add the following lines to “http {” section in /etc/nginx/nginx.conf

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client_max_body_size 10M;
 
gzip on;
gzip_disable "msie6";
gzip_comp_level 5;
gzip_min_length 256;
gzip_vary on;
gzip_types
application/atom+xml
application/ld+json
application/manifest+json
application/rss+xml
application/vnd.geo+json
application/vnd.ms-fontobject
application/x-font-ttf
application/x-web-app-manifest+json
application/xhtml+xml
font/opentype
image/bmp
image/x-icon
text/cache-manifest
text/vcard
text/vnd.rim.location.xloc
text/vtt
text/x-component
text/x-cross-domain-policy;
#text/html is always compressed by gzip module
 
gzip_proxied any;
gzip_buffers 16 8k;
gzip_http_version 1.1;
gzip_types text/plain text/css application/json application/javascript text/xml application/xml application/xml+rss te$

Check NGINX Status

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service nginx status
* nginx.service - A high performance web server and a reverse proxy server
Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/nginx.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
Active: active (running) since Thu 2018-06-07 21:16:28 AEST; 30min ago
Docs: man:nginx(8)
Main PID: # (nginx)
Tasks: 2 (limit: 2322)
CGroup: /system.slice/nginx.service
|- # nginx: master process /usr/sbin/nginx -g daemon on; master_process on;
`- # nginx: worker process

Install Open SSL that supports TLS 1.3

This is a work in progress. The steps work just fine for me on Ubuntu 16.04. but not Ubuntu 18.04.?

Installing Adminer MySQL GUI

I will use the PHP based Adminer MySQL GUI to export and import my blog from one server to another. All I needed to do is install it on both servers (simple 1 file download)

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cd /utils
wget -o adminer.php https://github.com/vrana/adminer/releases/download/v4.6.2/adminer-4.6.2-mysql-en.php

Use Adminer to Export My Blog (on Vultr)

On the original server open Adminer (http) and..

  1. Login with the MySQL root account
  2. Open your database
  3. Choose “Save” as the output
  4. Click on Export

This image shows the export of the wordpress adminer page

Save the “.sql” file.

I used Adminer on the UpCloud server to Import My Blog

FYI: Depending on the size of your database backup you may need to temporarily increase your upload and post sizes limits in PHP and NGINX before you can import your database.

Edit /etc/php/7.2/fpm/php.ini
> max_file_uploads = 100M
> post_max_size =100M

And Edit: /etc/nginx/nginx.conf
> client_max_body_size 100M;

Don’t forget to reload NGINX config and restart NGINX and PHP. Take note of the maximum allowed file size in the screenshot below. I temporarily increased my upload limits to 100MB in order to restore my 87MB blog.

Now I could open Adminer on my UpCloud server.

  1. Create a new database
  2. Click on the database and click Import
  3. Choose the SQL file
  4. Click Execute to import it

Import MuSQL backup with Adminer

Don’t forget to create a user and assign permissions (as required – check your wp-config.php file).

Import MySQL Database

Tip: Don’t forget to lower the maximum upload file size and max post size after you import your database,

Cloudflare DNS

I use Cloudflare to manage DNS, so I need to tell it about my new server.

You can get your server’s IP details from the UpCloud dashboard.

Find IP

At Cloudflare update your DNS details to point to the server’s new IPv4 (“A Record”) and IPv6 (“AAAA Record”).

Cloudflare DNS

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Domain Error

I waited an hour and my website was suddenly unavailable.  At first, I thought this was Cloudflare forcing the redirection of my domain to HTTP (that was not yet set up).

DNS Not Replicated Yet

I chatted with UpCloud chat on their webpage and they kindly assisted me to diagnose all the common issues like DNS values, DNS replication, Cloudflare settings and the error was pinpointed to my NGINX installation.  All NGINX config settings were ok from what we could see?  I uninstalled NGINX and reinstalled it (and that fixed it). Thanks UpCloud Support 🙂

Reinstalled NGINX

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sudo apt-get purge nginx nginx-common

I reinstalled NGINX and reconfigured /etc/nginx/nginx.conf (I downloaded my SSL cert from my old server just in case).

Here is my /etc/nginx/nginx.conf file.

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user www-data;
worker_processes auto;
worker_cpu_affinity auto;
pid /run/nginx.pid;
include /etc/nginx/modules-enabled/*.conf;
error_log /var/log/nginx/www-nginxcriterror.log crit;
 
events {
        worker_connections 768;
        multi_accept on;
}
 
http {
 
        client_max_body_size 10M;
        sendfile on;
        tcp_nopush on;
        tcp_nodelay on;
        keepalive_timeout 65;
        types_hash_max_size 2048;
        server_tokens off;
 
        server_names_hash_bucket_size 64;
        server_name_in_redirect off;
 
        include /etc/nginx/mime.types;
        default_type application/octet-stream;
 
        ssl_protocols TLSv1.1 TLSv1.2;
        ssl_prefer_server_ciphers on;
 
        access_log /var/log/nginx/www-access.log;
        error_log /var/log/nginx/www-error.log;
 
        gzip on;
 
        gzip_vary on;
        gzip_disable "msie6";
        gzip_min_length 256;
        gzip_proxied any;
        gzip_comp_level 6;
        gzip_buffers 16 8k;
        gzip_http_version 1.1;
        gzip_types text/plain text/css application/json application/javascript text/xml application/xml application/xml+rss text/javascript;
 
        include /etc/nginx/conf.d/*.conf;
        include /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/*;
}

Here is my /etc/nginx/sites-available/default file (fyi, I have not fully re-setup TLS 1.3 yet so I commented out the settings)

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proxy_cache_path /tmp/nginx-cache keys_zone=one:10m;#
server {
        root /www-root;
 
        # Listen Ports
        listen 80 default_server http2;
        listen [::]:80 default_server http2;
        listen 443 ssl default_server http2;
        listen [::]:443 ssl default_server http2;
 
        # Default File
        index index.html index.php index.htm;
 
        # Server Name
        server_name www.fearby.com fearby.com localhost;
 
        # HTTPS Cert
        ssl_certificate /etc/nginx/ssl-cert-path/fearby.crt;
        ssl_certificate_key /etc/nginx/ssl-cert-path/fearby.key;
        ssl_dhparam /etc/nginx/ssl-cert-path/dhparams4096.pem;
 
        # HTTPS Ciphers
        
        # TLS 1.2
        ssl_protocols TLSv1.2;
        ssl_prefer_server_ciphers on;
        ssl_ciphers "EECDH+AESGCM:EDH+AESGCM:AES256+EECDH:AES256+EDH";
 
        # TLS 1.3 #todo
        # ssl_ciphers
        # ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA512:DHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA512:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:DHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:DES-CBC3-SHA;
        # ssl_ecdh_curve secp384r1;
 
        # Force HTTPS
        if ($scheme != "https") {
                return 301 https://$host$request_uri;
        }
 
        # HTTPS Settings
        server_tokens off;
        ssl_session_cache shared:SSL:10m;
        ssl_session_timeout 30m;
        ssl_session_tickets off;
        add_header Strict-Transport-Security "max-age=63072000; includeSubdomains; preload";
        add_header X-Frame-Options DENY;
        add_header X-Content-Type-Options nosniff;
        add_header X-XSS-Protection "1; mode=block";
#ssl_stapling on; # Requires nginx >= 1.3.7
 
        # Cloudflare DNS
        resolver 1.1.1.1 1.0.0.1 valid=60s;
        resolver_timeout 1m;
 
        # PHP Memory
        fastcgi_param PHP_VALUE "memory_limit = 1024M";
 
# pass the PHP scripts to FastCGI server listening on 127.0.0.1:9000
        location ~ .php$ {
            try_files $uri =404;
            # include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
 
            fastcgi_split_path_info ^(.+.php)(/.+)$;
            fastcgi_index index.php;
            fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
            include fastcgi_params;
            fastcgi_pass unix:/run/php/php7.2-fpm.sock;
 
            # NOTE: You should have "cgi.fix_pathinfo = 0;" in php.ini
            # fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000;
    }
 
        location / {
            # try_files $uri $uri/ =404;
            try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?q=$uri&$args;
            index index.php index.html index.htm;
            proxy_set_header Proxy "";
        }
 
        # Deny Rules
        location ~ /.ht {
                deny all;
        }
        location ~ ^/.user.ini {
            deny all;
        }
        location ~ (.ini) {
            return 403;
        }
 
        # Headers
        location ~* .(?:ico|css|js|gif|jpe?g|png|js)$ {
            expires 30d;
            add_header Pragma public;
            add_header Cache-Control "public";
        }
 
}

SSL Labs SSL Certificate Check

All good thanks to the config above.

SSL Labs

Install WP-CLI

I don’t like setting up FTP to auto-update WordPress plugins. I use the WP-CLI tool to manage WordPress installations by the command line. Read my blog here on using WP-CLI.

Download WP-CLI

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mkdir /utils
cd /utils
curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/wp-cli/builds/gh-pages/phar/wp-cli.phar

Move WP-CLI to the bin folder as “wp”

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chmod +x wp-cli.phar
sudo mv wp-cli.phar /usr/local/bin/wp

Test wp

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wp --info
OS: Linux 4.15.0-22-generic #24-Ubuntu SMP Wed May 16 12:15:17 UTC 2018 x86_64
Shell: /bin/bash
PHP binary: /usr/bin/php7.2
PHP version: 7.2.5-1+ubuntu18.04.1+deb.sury.org+1
php.ini used: /etc/php/7.2/cli/php.ini
WP-CLI root dir: phar://wp-cli.phar
WP-CLI vendor dir: phar://wp-cli.phar/vendor
WP_CLI phar path: /www-root
WP-CLI packages dir:
WP-CLI global config:
WP-CLI project config:
WP-CLI version: 1.5.1

Update WordPress Plugins

Now I can run “wp plugin update” to update all WordPress plugins

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wp plugin update
Enabling Maintenance mode...
Downloading update from https://downloads.wordpress.org/plugin/wordfence.7.1.7.zip...
Unpacking the update...
Installing the latest version...
Removing the old version of the plugin...
Plugin updated successfully.
Downloading update from https://downloads.wordpress.org/plugin/wp-meta-seo.3.7.1.zip...
Unpacking the update...
Installing the latest version...
Removing the old version of the plugin...
Plugin updated successfully.
Downloading update from https://downloads.wordpress.org/plugin/wordpress-seo.7.6.1.zip...
Unpacking the update...
Installing the latest version...
Removing the old version of the plugin...
Plugin updated successfully.
Disabling Maintenance mode...
Success: Updated 3 of 3 plugins.
+---------------+-------------+-------------+---------+
| name | old_version | new_version | status |
+---------------+-------------+-------------+---------+
| wordfence | 7.1.6 | 7.1.7 | Updated |
| wp-meta-seo | 3.7.0 | 3.7.1 | Updated |
| wordpress-seo | 7.5.3 | 7.6.1 | Updated |
+---------------+-------------+-------------+---------+

Update WordPress Core

WordPress core file can be updated with “wp core update”

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wp core update
Success: WordPress is up to date.

Troubleshooting: Use the flag “–allow-root “if wp needs higher access (unsafe action though).

Install PHP Child Workers

I edited the following file to setup PHP child workers /etc/php/7.2/fpm/pool.d/www.conf

Changes

> pm = dynamic
> pm.max_children = 40
> pm.start_servers = 15
> pm.min_spare_servers = 5
> pm.max_spare_servers = 15
> pm.process_idle_timeout = 30s;
> pm.max_requests = 500;
> php_admin_value[error_log] = /var/log/www-fpm-php.www.log
> php_admin_value[memory_limit] = 512M

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Restart PHP

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sudo service php7.2-fpm restart

Test NGINX config, reload NGINX config and restart NGINX

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nginx -t
nginx -s reload
/etc/init.d/nginx restart

Output (14 workers are ready)

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Check PHP Child Worker Status
 
sudo service php7.2-fpm status
* php7.2-fpm.service - The PHP 7.2 FastCGI Process Manager
Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/php7.2-fpm.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
Active: active (running) since Thu 2018-06-07 19:32:47 AEST; 20s ago
Docs: man:php-fpm7.2(8)
Main PID: # (php-fpm7.2)
Status: "Processes active: 0, idle: 15, Requests: 2, slow: 0, Traffic: 0.1req/sec"
Tasks: 16 (limit: 2322)
CGroup: /system.slice/php7.2-fpm.service
|- # php-fpm: master process (/etc/php/7.2/fpm/php-fpm.conf)
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
|- # php-fpm: pool www
- # php-fpm: pool www

Memory Tweak (set at your own risk)

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sudo nano /etc/sysctl.conf

vm.swappiness = 1

Setting swappiness to a value of 1 all but disables the swap file and tells the Operating System to aggressively use ram, a value of 10 is safer. Only set this if you have enough memory available (and free).

Possible swappiness settings:

> vm.swappiness = 0 Swap is disabled. In earlier versions, this meant that the kernel would swap only to avoid an out of memory condition when free memory will be below vm.min_free_kbytes limit, but in later versions, this is achieved by setting to 1.[2]> vm.swappiness = 1 Kernel version 3.5 and over, as well as Red Hat kernel version 2.6.32-303 and over: Minimum amount of swapping without disabling it entirely.
> vm.swappiness = 10 This value is sometimes recommended to improve performance when sufficient memory exists in a system.[3]
> vm.swappiness = 60 The default value.
> vm.swappiness = 100 The kernel will swap aggressively.

The “htop” tool is a handy memory monitoring tool to “top”

Also you can use good old “watch” command to show near-live memory usage (auto-refreshes every 2 seconds)

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watch -n 2 free -m

Script to auto-clear the memory/cache

As a habit, I am setting up a cronjob to check when free memory falls below 100MB, then cache is automatically cleared (freeing memory).

Script Contents: clearcache.sh

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#!/bin/bash
 
# Script help inspired by https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/119126/command-to-display-memory-usage-disk-usage-and-cpu-load
ram_use=$(free -m)
IFS=$'n' read -rd '' -a ram_use_arr <<< "$ram_use"
ram_use="${ram_use_arr[1]}"
ram_use=$(echo "$ram_use" | tr -s " ")
IFS=' ' read -ra ram_use_arr <<< "$ram_use"
 
ram_total="${ram_use_arr[1]}"
ram_used="${ram_use_arr[2]}"
ram_free="${ram_use_arr[3]}"
 
d=`date '+%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S'`
 
if ! [[ "$ram_free" =~ ^[0-9]+$ ]]; then
        echo "Sorry ram_free is not an integer"
else
 
        if [ "$ram_free" -lt "100" ]; then
                echo "$d RAM LOW (Total: $ram_total MB, Used: $ram_used MB, Free: $ram_free MB) - Clearing Cache..."
                sync; echo 1 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches
                sync; echo 2 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches
                #sync; echo 3 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches    #Not advised in production
                # Read for more info https://www.tecmint.com/clear-ram-memory-cache-buffer-and-swap-space-on-linux/
                exit 1
        else
                if [ "$ram_free" -lt "256" ]; then
                        echo "$d RAM ALMOST LOW (Total: $ram_total MB, Used: $ram_used MB, Free: $ram_free MB)"
                        exit 1
                else
                        if [ "$ram_free" -lt "512" ]; then
                                echo "$d RAM OK (Total: $ram_total MB, Used: $ram_used MB, Free: $ram_free MB)"
                                exit 1
                        else
                                echo "$d RAM LOW (Total: $ram_total MB, Used: $ram_used MB, Free: $ram_free MB)"
                                exit 1
                        fi
                fi
        fi
fi

I set the cronjob to run every 15 mins, I added this to my cronjob.

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SHELL=/bin/bash
*/15  *  *  *  *  root /bin/bash /scripts/clearcache.sh >> /scripts/clearcache.log

Sample log output

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2018-06-10 01:13:22 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 981 MB, Free: 387 MB)
2018-06-10 01:15:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 974 MB, Free: 394 MB)
2018-06-10 01:20:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 955 MB, Free: 412 MB)
2018-06-10 01:25:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 1002 MB, Free: 363 MB)
2018-06-10 01:30:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 970 MB, Free: 394 MB)
2018-06-10 01:35:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 963 MB, Free: 400 MB)
2018-06-10 01:40:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 976 MB, Free: 387 MB)
2018-06-10 01:45:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 985 MB, Free: 377 MB)
2018-06-10 01:50:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 983 MB, Free: 379 MB)
2018-06-10 01:55:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 979 MB, Free: 382 MB)
2018-06-10 02:00:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 980 MB, Free: 380 MB)
2018-06-10 02:05:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 971 MB, Free: 389 MB)
2018-06-10 02:10:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 983 MB, Free: 376 MB)
2018-06-10 02:15:01 RAM OK (Total: 1993 MB, Used: 967 MB, Free: 392 MB)

I will check the log (/scripts/clearcache.log) in a few days and view the memory trends.

After 1/2 a day Ubuntu 18.04 is handling memory just fine, no externally triggered cache clears have happened 🙂

Free memory over time

I used https://crontab.guru/every-hour to set the right schedule in crontab.

I rebooted the VM.

Update: I now use Nixstats monitoring

Swap File

FYI: Here is a handy guide on viewing swap file usage here. I’m not using swap files so it is only an aside.

After the system rebooted I checked if the swappiness setting was active.

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sudo cat /proc/sys/vm/swappiness
1

Yes, swappiness is set.

File System Tweaks – Write Back Cache (set at your own risk)

First, check your disk name and file system

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sudo lsblk -o NAME,FSTYPE,SIZE,MOUNTPOINT,LABEL

Take note of your disk name (e.g vda1)

I used TuneFS to enable writing data to the disk before writing to the journal. tunefs is a great tool for setting file system parameters.

Warning (snip from here): “I set the mode to journal_data_writeback. This basically means that data may be written to the disk before the journal. The data consistency guarantees are the same as the ext3 file system. The downside is that if your system crashes before the journal gets written then you may loose new data — the old data may magically reappear.”

Warning this can corrupt your data. More information here.

I ran this command.

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tune2fs -o journal_data_writeback /dev/vda1

I edited my fstab to append the “writeback,noatime,nodiratime” flags for my volume after a reboot.

Edit FS Tab:

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sudo nano /etc/fstab

I added “writeback,noatime,nodiratime” flags to my disk options.

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# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'blkid' to print the universally unique identifier for a
# device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name devices
# that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
# <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options> <dump>  <pass>
# / was on /dev/vda1 during installation
#                <device>                 <dir>           <fs>    <options>                                             <dump>  <fsck>
UUID=xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx /               ext4    errors=remount-ro,data=writeback,noatime,nodiratime   0       1

Updating Ubuntu Packages

Show updatable packages.

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apt-get -s dist-upgrade | grep "^Inst"

Update Packages.

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sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade

Unattended Security Updates

Read more on Ubuntu 18.04 Unattended upgrades here, here and here.

Install Unattended Upgrades

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sudo apt-get install unattended-upgrades

Enable Unattended Upgrades.

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sudo dpkg-reconfigure --priority=low unattended-upgrades

Now I configure what packages not to auto update.

Edit /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/50unattended-upgrades

Find “Unattended-Upgrade::Package-Blacklist” and add packages that you don’t want automatically updated, you may want to manually update these (and monitor updates).

I prefer not to auto-update critical system apps (I will do this myself).

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Unattended-Upgrade::Package-Blacklist {
"nginx";
"nginx-common";
"nginx-core";
"php7.2";
"php7.2-fpm";
"mysql-server";
"mysql-server-5.7";
"mysql-server-core-5.7";
"libssl1.0.0";
"libssl1.1";
};

FYI: You can find installed packages by running this command:

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apt list --installed

Enable automatic updates by editing /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/20auto-upgrades

Edit the number at the end (the number is how many days to wait before updating) of each line.

> APT::Periodic::Update-Package-Lists “1”;
> APT::Periodic::Download-Upgradeable-Packages “1”;
> APT::Periodic::AutocleanInterval “7”;
> APT::Periodic::Unattended-Upgrade “1”;

Set to “0” to disable automatic updates.

The results of unattended-upgrades will be logged to /var/log/unattended-upgrades

Update packages now.

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unattended-upgrade -d

Almost done.

I Rebooted

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GT Metrix Score

I almost fell off my chair. It’s an amazing feeling hitting refresh in GT Metrix and getting sub-2-second score consistently (and that is with 17 assets loading and 361KB of HTML content)

0.9sec load times

WebPageTest.org Test Score

Nice. I am not sure why the effective use of CDN has an X rating as I have the EWWW CDN and Cloudflare. First Byte time is now a respectable “B”, This was always bad.

Update: I found out the longer you set cache delays in Cloudflare the higher the score.

Web Page Test

GT Metrix has a nice historical breakdown of load times (night and day).

Upcloud Site Speed in GTMetrix

Google Page Speed Insight Desktop Score

I benchmarked with https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/

This will help with future SEO rankings. It is well known that Google is pushing fast servers.

 

100% Desktop page speed score

Google Chrome 70 Dev Console Audit (Desktop)

100% Chrome Audit Score

This is amazing, I never expected to get this high score.  I know Google like (and are pushing) sub-1-second scores.

 

My site is loading so well it is time I restored some old features that were too slow on other servers

  • I disabled Lazy loading of images (this was not working on some Android devices)
  • I re-added the News Widget and news images.

 

GTMetrix and WebpageTest sores are still good (even after adding bloat)

Benchmarks are still good

My WordPress site is not really that small either

Large website

FYI: WordPress Plugins I use.

These are the plugins I use.

  • Autoptimize – Optimises your website, concatenating the CSS and JavaScript code, and compressing it.
  • BJ Lazy Load (Now Disabled) – Lazy image loading makes your site load faster and saves bandwidth.
  • Cloudflare – Cloudflare speeds up and protects your WordPress site.
  • Contact Form 7 – Just another contact form plugin. Simple but flexible.
  • Contact Form 7 Honeypot – Add honeypot anti-spam functionality to the popular Contact Form 7 plugin.
  • Crayon Syntax Highlighter – Supports multiple languages, themes, highlighting from a URL, local file or post text.
  • Democracy Poll – Allows to create democratic polls. Visitors can vote for more than one answer & add their own answers.
  • Display Posts Shortcode – Display a listing of posts using the
    • Updating NGINX to the development branch to get more frequent updates and features over the stable branch
    • Replacing Google Analytics with Piwik/Matomo for a locally hosted privacy focused open source analytics solution
    • How to install PHP 7.2.latest on Ubuntu 16.04
    • Check the compatibility of your WordPress theme and plugin code with PHP Compatibility Checker
    • Add two factor auth login protection to WordPress with YubiCo hardware YubiKeys and or 2FA Authenticator App
    • I moved my domain to UpCloud (on the other side of the world) from Vultr (Sydney) and could not be happier with the performance.
    • Setup two factor authenticator protection at login on Ubuntu or Debian
    • Using the Yubico YubiKey NEO hardware-based two-factor authentication device to improve authentication and logins to OSX and software
    • Monitor server performance with NixStats and receive alerts by SMS, Push, Email, Telegram etc
    • Telstra promised Fibre to the house (FTTP) when I had FTTN and this is what happened [Part 5]..
    shortcode
  • EWWW Image Optimizer – Reduce file sizes for images within WordPress including NextGEN Gallery and GRAND FlAGallery. Uses jpegtran, optipng/pngout, and gifsicle.
  • GDPR Cookie Consent – A simple way to show that your website complies with the EU Cookie Law / GDPR.
  • GTmetrix for WordPress – GTmetrix can help you develop a faster, more efficient, and all-around improved website experience for your users. Your users will love you for it.
  • TinyMCE Advanced – Enables advanced features and plugins in TinyMCE, the visual editor in WordPress.
  • Wordfence Security – Anti-virus, Firewall and Malware Scan
  • WP Meta SEO – WP Meta SEO is a plugin for WordPress to fill meta for content, images and main SEO info in a single view.
  • WP Performance Score Booster – Speed-up page load times and improve website scores in services like PageSpeed, YSlow, Pingdom and GTmetrix.
  • WP SEO HTML Sitemap – A responsive HTML sitemap that uses all of the settings for your XML sitemap in the WordPress SEO by Yoast Plugin.
  • WP-Optimize – WP-Optimize is WordPress’s #1 most installed optimisation plugin. With it, you can clean up your database easily and safely, without manual queries.
  • WP News and Scrolling Widgets Pro – WP News Pro plugin with six different types of shortcode and seven different types of widgets. Display News posts with various designs.
  • Yoast SEO – The first true all-in-one SEO solution for WordPress, including on-page content analysis, XML sitemaps and much more.
  • YouTube – YouTube Embed and YouTube Gallery WordPress Plugin. Embed a responsive video, YouTube channel, playlist gallery, or live stream

How I use these plugins to speed up my site.

  • I use EWWW Image Optimizer plugin to auto-compress my images and to provide a CDN for media asset deliver (pre-Cloudflare). Learn more about ExactDN and EWWW.io here.
  • I use Autoptimize plugin to optimise HTML/CSS/JS and ensure select assets are on my EWWW CDN. This plugin also removes WordPress Emojis, removed the use of Google Fonts, allows you to define pre-configured domains, Async Javascript-files etc.
  • I use BJ Lazy Load to prevent all images in a post from loading on load (and only as the user scrolls down the page).
  • GTmetrix for WordPress and Cloudflare plugins are for information only?
  • I use WP-Optimize to ensure my database is healthy and to disable comments/trackbacks and pingbacks.

Let’s Test UpCloud’s Disk IO in Chicago

Looks good to me, Read IO is a little bit lower than UpCloud’s Singapore data centre but still, it’s faster than Vultr.  I can’t wait for more data centres to become available around the world.

Why is UpCloud Disk IO so good?

I asked UpCloud on Twitter why the Disk IO was so good.

  • “MaxIOPS is UpCloud’s proprietary block-storage technology. MaxIOPS is physically redundant storage technology where all customer’s data is located in two separate physical devices at all times. UpCloud uses InfiniBand (!) network to connect storage backends to compute nodes, where customers’ cloud servers are running. All disks are enterprise-grade SSD’s. And using separate storage backends, it allows us to live migrate our customers’ cloud servers freely inside our infrastructure between compute nodes – whether it be due to hardware malfunction (compute node) or backend software updates (example CPU vulnerability and immediate patching).“

My Answers to Questions to support

Q1) What’s the difference between backups and snapshots (a Twitter user said Snapshots were a thing)

A1) Backups and snapshots are the same things with our infrastructure.

Q2) What are charges for backup of a 50GB drive?

A2) We charge $0.06 / GB of the disk being captured. But capture the whole disk, not just what was used. So for a 50GB drive, we charge $0.06 * 50 = $3/month. Even if 1GB were only used.

  • Support confirmed that each backup is charged (so 5 times manual backups are charged 5 times). Setting up a daily auto backup schedule for 2 weeks would create 14 billable backup charges.
  • I guess a 25GB server will be $1.50 a month

Q3) What are data charges if I go over my 2TB quota?

A3) Outgoing data charges are $0.056/GB after the pre-configured allowance.

Q4) What happens if my balance hits $0?

A4) You will get notification of low account balance 2 weeks in advance based on your current daily spend. When your balance reaches zero, your servers will be shut down. But they will still be charged for. You can automatically top-up if you want to assign a payment type from your Control Panel. You deposit into your balance when you want. We use a prepay model of payment, so you need to top up before using, not billing you after usage. We give you lots of chances to top-up.

Support Tips

  • One thing to note, when deleting servers (CPU, RAM) instances, you get the option to delete the storages separately via a pop-up window. Choose to delete permanently to delete the disk, to save credit. Any disk storage lying around even unattached to servers will be billed.
  • Charges are in USD.

I think it’s time to delete my domain from Vultr in Sydney.

Deleted my Vultr domain

I deleted my Vultr domain.

Delete Vultr Server

Done.

More Reading on UpCloud

https://www.upcloud.com/documentation/faq/

UpCloud Server Status

http://status.upcloud.com

Check out my new guide on Nixstats for awesome monitoring

 

What I would like

  1. Ability to name individual manual backups (tag with why I backed up).
  2. Ability to push user defined data from my VM to the dashboard
  3. Cheaper scheduled backups
  4. Sydney data centres (one day)

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Update: Post UpCloud Launch Tweaks (Awesome)

I had a look at https://www.webpagetest.org/ results to see where else I can optimise webpage delivery.

Optimisation Options

Disable dasjhicons.min.css (for unauthenticated WordPress users).

Find functions.php in the www root

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sudo find . -print |grep  functions.php

Edit functions.php

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sudo nano ./wp-includes/functions.php

Add the following

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// Remove dashicons in frontend for unauthenticated users
add_action( 'wp_enqueue_scripts', 'bs_dequeue_dashicons' );
function bs_dequeue_dashicons() {
    if ( ! is_user_logged_in() ) {
        wp_deregister_style( 'dashicons' );
    }
}

HTTP2 Push

  • Introducing HTTP/2 Server Push with NGINX 1.13.9 | NGINX
  • How To Set Up Nginx with HTTP/2 Support on Ubuntu 16.04 | DigitalOcean

I added http2 to my listening servers

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server {
        root /www;
 
        ...
        listen 80 default_server http2;
        listen [::]:80 default_server http2;
        listen 443 ssl default_server http2;
        listen [::]:443 ssl default_server http2;
        ...

I tested a http2 push page by defining this in /etc/nginx/sites-available/default 

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location = /http2/push_demo.html {
        http2_push /http2/pushed.css;
        http2_push /http2/pushedimage1.jpg;
        http2_push /http2/pushedimage2.jpg;
        http2_push /http2/pushedimage3.jpg;
}

Once I tested that push (demo here) was working I then defined two files to push that were being sent from my server

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location / {
        ...
        http2_push /https://fearby.com/wp-includes/js/jquery/jquery.js;
        http2_push /wp-content/themes/news-pro/images/favicon.ico;
        ...
}

I used the WordPress Plugin Autoptimize to remove Google font usage (this removed a number of files being loaded when my page loads).

I used the WordPress Plugin WP-Optimize plugin into to remove comments and disable pingbacks and trackbacks.

WordPress wp-config.php tweaks

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# Memory
define('WP_MEMORY_LIMIT','1024M');
define('WP_MAX_MEMORY_LIMIT','1024M');
set_time_limit (60);
 
# Security
define( 'FORCE_SSL_ADMIN', true);
 
# Disable Updates
define( 'WP_AUTO_UPDATE_CORE', false );
define( 'AUTOMATIC_UPDATER_DISABLED', true );
 
# ewww.io
define( 'WP_AUTO_UPDATE_CORE', false );

Add 2FA Authentication to server logins.

I recently checked out YubiCo YubiKeys and I have secured my Linux servers with 2FA prompts at login. Read the guide here. I secured my WordPress too.

Tweaks Todo

  • Compress placeholder BJ Lazy Load Image (plugin is broken)
  • Solve 2x Google Analytics tracker redirects (done, switched to Matomo)

Conclusion

I love UpCloud’s fast servers, give them a go (use my link and get $25 free credit).

I love Cloudflare for providing a fast CDN.

I love ewww.io’s automatic Image Compression and Resizing plugin that automatically handles image optimisations and pre Cloudflare/first hit CDN caching.

Read my post about server monitoring with Nixstats here.

Let the results speak for themselves (sub <1 second load times).

Results

I hope this guide helps someone.

Please consider using my referral code and get $25 credit for free.

https://www.upcloud.com/register/?promo=D84793

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Revision History

v2.1 Newer GTMetrix scores

v2.0 New UpCloud UI Update and links to new guides.

v1.9 Spelling and grammar

v1.8 Trial mode gotcha (deposit money ASAP)

v1.7 Added RSA Private key info

v1.7 – Added new firewall rules info.

v1.6 – Added more bloat to the site, still good.

v1.5 Improving Accessibility

v1.4 Added Firewall Price

v1.3 Added wp-config and plugin usage descriptions.

v1.2 Added GTMetrix historical chart.

v1.1 Fixed free typos and added final conclusion images.

v1.0 Added final results

v0.9 added more tweaks (http2 push, removing unwanted files etc)

v0.81 Draft  – Added memory usage chart and added MaxIOPS info from UpCloud.

v0.8 Draft post.

Filed Under: CDN, Cloud, Cloudflare, Cost, CPanel, Digital Ocean, DNS, Domain, ExactDN, Firewall, Hosting, HTTPS, MySQL, MySQLGUI, NGINX, Performance, PHP, php72, Scalability, TLS, Ubuntu, UpCloud, Vultr, Wordpress Tagged With: draft, GTetrix, host, IOPS, Load Time, maxIOPS, MySQL, nginx, Page Speed Insights, Performance, php, SSD, ubuntu, UpCloud, vm

Upgrading an Ubuntu server on UpCloud to add more CPU, Memory and Disk Space

June 25, 2018 by Simon

Upgrading an Ubuntu server on UpCloud to add more CPU, Memory and Disk Space

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If you have not read my previous posts I have now moved my blog from Vultr to the awesome UpCloud host (signup using this link to get $25 free credit).

Recently I compared Digital Ocean, Vultr and UpCloud Disk IO here and UpCloud came out on top by a long way (read the blog post here). Here is my blog post on moving from Vultr to UpCloud.

Spoiler: UpCloud performance is great.

Upcloud Site Speed in GTMetrix

Why Upgrade

I have 1 CPU, 1 GB memory and 50GB storage and it is running well?  I have PHP child workers set up and have set up the preferred use of memory over swap file usage.

View of htop querying processes on Ubuntu

Before UpCloud, when I had 512MB ram on Vultr I had multiple NGINX crashed a day so I used a bash script and scheduled a cron job to clear memory cache when memory fell below 100MB (view the script here).  To further increase the speed of the WordPress I have configured the OS to use memory over the disk.  About once a day free memory falls below 100MB (this is not a problem as my script clears cached items automatically).

Graph of memory falling below 100MB every day

I’d like to add more memory as I am working on some things (watch this space) and I will use the extra memory. I’d prefer the server is set up now for the expected workload.

How to Upgrade

This is how I upgraded from 1xCPU/2GB Memory/50GB Storage/2TB Transferred Data to a 2 CPU/4GB Mmeory/80GB Storage/4TB Transferred Data server.

UpCloud Pricing: https://www.upcloud.com/pricing/

Pricing table form https://www.upcloud.com/pricing/

Upgrade an UpCloud VM

I shut down my existing VM. Read this guide to setup a VM.

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shutdown -P

Login to the UpCloud dashboard, select your server (confirm the server has shut down) and click General Settings, choose the upgrade and click Update.

Upgrade the Server, shut it down the server and choose upgrade

I confirmed the upgrade options (2x CPU, 4096 MB Memory).

Confirm Upgrade Options

Click Update

Upgrade Applied

After 10 seconds you can start your server from the UpCloud server.

I confirmed the CPU upgrade was visible in the VM

Shell
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cat /proc/cpuinfo
processor       : 0
vendor_id       : GenuineIntel
cpu family      : 6
model           : 63
model name      : Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2687W v3 @ 3.10GHz
stepping        : 2
microcode       : 0x1
cpu MHz         : 3099.978
cache size      : 16384 KB
physical id     : 0
siblings        : 2
core id         : 0
cpu cores       : 2
apicid          : 0
initial apicid  : 0
fpu             : yes
fpu_exception   : yes
cpuid level     : 13
wp              : yes
flags           : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht syscall nx pdpe1gb rdtscp lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon rep_good nopl xtopology cpuid pni pclmulqdq ssse3 fma cx16 pcid sse4_1 sse4_2 x2apic movbe popcnt tsc_deadline_timer aes xsave avx f16c rdrand hypervisor lahf_lm abm invpcid_single pti fsgsbase tsc_adjust bmi1 avx2 smep bmi2 erms invpcid xsaveopt arat
bugs            : cpu_meltdown spectre_v1 spectre_v2 spec_store_bypass
bogomips        : 6199.95
clflush size    : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes   : 40 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:
 
processor       : 1
vendor_id       : GenuineIntel
cpu family      : 6
model           : 63
model name      : Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2687W v3 @ 3.10GHz
stepping        : 2
microcode       : 0x1
cpu MHz         : 3099.978
cache size      : 16384 KB
physical id     : 0
siblings        : 2
core id         : 1
cpu cores       : 2
apicid          : 1
initial apicid  : 1
fpu             : yes
fpu_exception   : yes
cpuid level     : 13
wp              : yes
flags           : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht syscall nx pdpe1gb rdtscp lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon rep_good nopl xtopology cpuid pni pclmulqdq ssse3 fma cx16 pcid sse4_1 sse4_2 x2apic movbe popcnt tsc_deadline_timer aes xsave avx f16c rdrand hypervisor lahf_lm abm invpcid_single pti fsgsbase tsc_adjust bmi1 avx2 smep bmi2 erms invpcid xsaveopt arat
bugs            : cpu_meltdown spectre_v1 spectre_v2 spec_store_bypass
bogomips        : 6199.95
clflush size    : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes   : 40 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:

Software Tweaks Post Upgrade.

I added these settings to the top of /etc/nginx/nginx.conf to ensure the extra CPU was used.

Shell
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worker_processes auto;
worker_cpu_affinity auto;

I increased PHP FPM ( /etc/php/7.2/fpm/php.ini ) to increase the memory usage and child workers. I doubled child workers and max memeory limit.

Shell
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memory_limit = 3072M
pm.max_children = 80
pm.start_servers = 30
pm.min_spare_servers = 10
pm.max_spare_servers = 30

I restarted NGINX and PHP

Shell
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nginx -t
nginx -s reload
/etc/init.d/nginx restart
service php7.2-fpm restart

I tweaked WordPress max memory limits

Shell
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define( 'WP_MEMORY_LIMIT','3072M');
define( 'WP_MAX_MEMORY_LIMIT','3072M');

MySQL Tweaks: I logged into MySQL

Shell
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mysql -u root -p

I ran “SHOW GLOBAL STATUS” to view stats

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mysql> SHOW GLOBAL STATUS;
+-----------------------------------------------+--------------------------------------------------+
| Variable_name                                 | Value                                            |
+-----------------------------------------------+--------------------------------------------------+
| Aborted_clients                               | 0                                                |
| Aborted_connects                              | 0                                                |
| Binlog_cache_disk_use                         | 0                                                |
| Binlog_cache_use                              | 0                                                |
| Binlog_stmt_cache_disk_use                    | 0                                                |
| Binlog_stmt_cache_use                         | 0                                                |
| Bytes_received                                | 3179986                                          |
| Bytes_sent                                    | 223872114                                        |
| Com_admin_commands                            | 0                                                |
| Com_assign_to_keycache                        | 0                                                |
| Com_alter_db                                  | 0                                                |
| Com_alter_db_upgrade                          | 0                                                |
| Com_alter_event                               | 0                                                |
| Com_alter_function                            | 0                                                |
| Com_alter_instance                            | 0                                                |
| Com_alter_procedure                           | 0                                                |
| Com_alter_server                              | 0                                                |
| Com_alter_table                               | 0                                                |
| Com_alter_tablespace                          | 0                                                |
| Com_alter_user                                | 0                                                |
| Com_analyze                                   | 0                                                |
| Com_begin                                     | 0                                                |
| Com_binlog                                    | 0                                                |
| Com_call_procedure                            | 0                                                |
| Com_change_db                                 | 284                                              |
| Com_change_master                             | 0                                                |
| Com_change_repl_filter                        | 0                                                |
| Com_check                                     | 0                                                |
| Com_checksum                                  | 0                                                |
| Com_commit                                    | 0                                                |
| Com_create_db                                 | 0                                                |
| Com_create_event                              | 0                                                |
| Com_create_function                           | 0                                                |
| Com_create_index                              | 0                                                |
| Com_create_procedure                          | 0                                                |
| Com_create_server                             | 0                                                |
| Com_create_table                              | 0                                                |
| Com_create_trigger                            | 0                                                |
| Com_create_udf                                | 0                                                |
| Com_create_user                               | 0                                                |
| Com_create_view                               | 0                                                |
| Com_dealloc_sql                               | 0                                                |
| Com_delete                                    | 18                                               |
| Com_delete_multi                              | 0                                                |
| Com_do                                        | 0                                                |
| Com_drop_db                                   | 0                                                |
| Com_drop_event                                | 0                                                |
| Com_drop_function                             | 0                                                |
| Com_drop_index                                | 0                                                |
| Com_drop_procedure                            | 0                                                |
| Com_drop_server                               | 0                                                |
| Com_drop_table                                | 0                                                |
| Com_drop_trigger                              | 0                                                |
| Com_drop_user                                 | 0                                                |
| Com_drop_view                                 | 0                                                |
| Com_empty_query                               | 0                                                |
| Com_execute_sql                               | 0                                                |
| Com_explain_other                             | 0                                                |
| Com_flush                                     | 0                                                |
| Com_get_diagnostics                           | 0                                                |
| Com_grant                                     | 0                                                |
| Com_ha_close                                  | 0                                                |
| Com_ha_open                                   | 0                                                |
| Com_ha_read                                   | 0                                                |
| Com_help                                      | 0                                                |
| Com_insert                                    | 342                                              |
| Com_insert_select                             | 0                                                |
| Com_install_plugin                            | 0                                                |
| Com_kill                                      | 0                                                |
| Com_load                                      | 0                                                |
| Com_lock_tables                               | 0                                                |
| Com_optimize                                  | 0                                                |
| Com_preload_keys                              | 0                                                |
| Com_prepare_sql                               | 0                                                |
| Com_purge                                     | 0                                                |
| Com_purge_before_date                         | 0                                                |
| Com_release_savepoint                         | 0                                                |
| Com_rename_table                              | 0                                                |
| Com_rename_user                               | 0                                                |
| Com_repair                                    | 0                                                |
| Com_replace                                   | 0                                                |
| Com_replace_select                            | 0                                                |
| Com_reset                                     | 0                                                |
| Com_resignal                                  | 0                                                |
| Com_revoke                                    | 0                                                |
| Com_revoke_all                                | 0                                                |
| Com_rollback                                  | 0                                                |
| Com_rollback_to_savepoint                     | 0                                                |
| Com_savepoint                                 | 0                                                |
| Com_select                                    | 16358                                            |
| Com_set_option                                | 849                                              |
| Com_signal                                    | 0                                                |
| Com_show_binlog_events                        | 0                                                |
| Com_show_binlogs                              | 0                                                |
| Com_show_charsets                             | 0                                                |
| Com_show_collations                           | 0                                                |
| Com_show_create_db                            | 0                                                |
| Com_show_create_event                         | 0                                                |
| Com_show_create_func                          | 0                                                |
| Com_show_create_proc                          | 0                                                |
| Com_show_create_table                         | 0                                                |
| Com_show_create_trigger                       | 0                                                |
| Com_show_databases                            | 3                                                |
| Com_show_engine_logs                          | 0                                                |
| Com_show_engine_mutex                         | 0                                                |
| Com_show_engine_status                        | 0                                                |
| Com_show_events                               | 0                                                |
| Com_show_errors                               | 0                                                |
| Com_show_fields                               | 921                                              |
| Com_show_function_code                        | 0                                                |
| Com_show_function_status                      | 0                                                |
| Com_show_grants                               | 0                                                |
| Com_show_keys                                 | 1                                                |
| Com_show_master_status                        | 0                                                |
| Com_show_open_tables                          | 0                                                |
| Com_show_plugins                              | 0                                                |
| Com_show_privileges                           | 0                                                |
| Com_show_procedure_code                       | 0                                                |
| Com_show_procedure_status                     | 0                                                |
| Com_show_processlist                          | 0                                                |
| Com_show_profile                              | 0                                                |
| Com_show_profiles                             | 0                                                |
| Com_show_relaylog_events                      | 0                                                |
| Com_show_slave_hosts                          | 0                                                |
| Com_show_slave_status                         | 0                                                |
| Com_show_status                               | 6                                                |
| Com_show_storage_engines                      | 0                                                |
| Com_show_table_status                         | 0                                                |
| Com_show_tables                               | 2                                                |
| Com_show_triggers                             | 0                                                |
| Com_show_variables                            | 6                                                |
| Com_show_warnings                             | 1                                                |
| Com_show_create_user                          | 0                                                |
| Com_shutdown                                  | 0                                                |
| Com_slave_start                               | 0                                                |
| Com_slave_stop                                | 0                                                |
| Com_group_replication_start                   | 0                                                |
| Com_group_replication_stop                    | 0                                                |
| Com_stmt_execute                              | 4                                                |
| Com_stmt_close                                | 4                                                |
| Com_stmt_fetch                                | 0                                                |
| Com_stmt_prepare                              | 4                                                |
| Com_stmt_reset                                | 0                                                |
| Com_stmt_send_long_data                       | 4                                                |
| Com_truncate                                  | 2                                                |
| Com_uninstall_plugin                          | 0                                                |
| Com_unlock_tables                             | 0                                                |
| Com_update                                    | 70                                               |
| Com_update_multi                              | 0                                                |
| Com_xa_commit                                 | 0                                                |
| Com_xa_end                                    | 0                                                |
| Com_xa_prepare                                | 0                                                |
| Com_xa_recover                                | 0                                                |
| Com_xa_rollback                               | 0                                                |
| Com_xa_start                                  | 0                                                |
| Com_stmt_reprepare                            | 0                                                |
| Connection_errors_accept                      | 0                                                |
| Connection_errors_internal                    | 0                                                |
| Connection_errors_max_connections             | 0                                                |
| Connection_errors_peer_address                | 0                                                |
| Connection_errors_select                      | 0                                                |
| Connection_errors_tcpwrap                     | 0                                                |
| Connections                                   | 292                                              |
| Created_tmp_disk_tables                       | 1124                                             |
| Created_tmp_files                             | 30                                               |
| Created_tmp_tables                            | 1369                                             |
| Delayed_errors                                | 0                                                |
| Delayed_insert_threads                        | 0                                                |
| Delayed_writes                                | 0                                                |
| Flush_commands                                | 1                                                |
| Handler_commit                                | 6094                                             |
| Handler_delete                                | 33                                               |
| Handler_discover                              | 0                                                |
| Handler_external_lock                         | 38571                                            |
| Handler_mrr_init                              | 0                                                |
| Handler_prepare                               | 0                                                |
| Handler_read_first                            | 2299                                             |
| Handler_read_key                              | 134761                                           |
| Handler_read_last                             | 237                                              |
| Handler_read_next                             | 310119                                           |
| Handler_read_prev                             | 2733                                             |
| Handler_read_rnd                              | 222350                                           |
| Handler_read_rnd_next                         | 472820                                           |
| Handler_rollback                              | 0                                                |
| Handler_savepoint                             | 0                                                |
| Handler_savepoint_rollback                    | 0                                                |
| Handler_update                                | 15605                                            |
| Handler_write                                 | 17310                                            |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_dump_status                | Dumping of buffer pool not started               |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_load_status                | Buffer pool(s) load completed at 180624 23:38:01 |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_resize_status              |                                                  |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_data                 | 1035                                             |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_bytes_data                 | 16957440                                         |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_dirty                | 0                                                |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_bytes_dirty                | 0                                                |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_flushed              | 1936                                             |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_free                 | 7144                                             |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_misc                 | 13                                               |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_total                | 8192                                             |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_read_ahead_rnd             | 0                                                |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_read_ahead                 | 0                                                |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_read_ahead_evicted         | 0                                                |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_read_requests              | 306665                                           |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_reads                      | 950                                              |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_wait_free                  | 0                                                |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_write_requests             | 26509                                            |
| Innodb_data_fsyncs                            | 1229                                             |
| Innodb_data_pending_fsyncs                    | 0                                                |
| Innodb_data_pending_reads                     | 0                                                |
| Innodb_data_pending_writes                    | 0                                                |
| Innodb_data_read                              | 16273920                                         |
| Innodb_data_reads                             | 1078                                             |
| Innodb_data_writes                            | 2857                                             |
| Innodb_data_written                           | 53379584                                         |
| Innodb_dblwr_pages_written                    | 1275                                             |
| Innodb_dblwr_writes                           | 109                                              |
| Innodb_log_waits                              | 0                                                |
| Innodb_log_write_requests                     | 450                                              |
| Innodb_log_writes                             | 585                                              |
| Innodb_os_log_fsyncs                          | 793                                              |
| Innodb_os_log_pending_fsyncs                  | 0                                                |
| Innodb_os_log_pending_writes                  | 0                                                |
| Innodb_os_log_written                         | 664064                                           |
| Innodb_page_size                              | 16384                                            |
| Innodb_pages_created                          | 56                                               |
| Innodb_pages_read                             | 988                                              |
| Innodb_pages_written                          | 1936                                             |
| Innodb_row_lock_current_waits                 | 0                                                |
| Innodb_row_lock_time                          | 0                                                |
| Innodb_row_lock_time_avg                      | 0                                                |
| Innodb_row_lock_time_max                      | 0                                                |
| Innodb_row_lock_waits                         | 0                                                |
| Innodb_rows_deleted                           | 2                                                |
| Innodb_rows_inserted                          | 19219                                            |
| Innodb_rows_read                              | 249102                                           |
| Innodb_rows_updated                           | 77                                               |
| Innodb_num_open_files                         | 81                                               |
| Innodb_truncated_status_writes                | 0                                                |
| Innodb_available_undo_logs                    | 128                                              |
| Key_blocks_not_flushed                        | 0                                                |
| Key_blocks_unused                             | 12751                                            |
| Key_blocks_used                               | 645                                              |
| Key_read_requests                             | 321877                                           |
| Key_reads                                     | 648                                              |
| Key_write_requests                            | 196                                              |
| Key_writes                                    | 150                                              |
| Locked_connects                               | 0                                                |
| Max_execution_time_exceeded                   | 0                                                |
| Max_execution_time_set                        | 0                                                |
| Max_execution_time_set_failed                 | 0                                                |
| Max_used_connections                          | 3                                                |
| Max_used_connections_time                     | 2018-06-24 23:43:48                              |
| Not_flushed_delayed_rows                      | 0                                                |
| Ongoing_anonymous_transaction_count           | 0                                                |
| Open_files                                    | 229                                              |
| Open_streams                                  | 0                                                |
| Open