Open Source

In this blog post, we will look at SNIPE-IT installation on Ubuntu Server with NGINX web server.

Last updated on 9th of March 2021

Check-out step-by-step video demonstration of SNIPE-IT installation.

Requirements for this guide to follow

1. Ubuntu server up and running
2. Static IP assigned to the server
3. Internet connectivity
4. Logged in with user account created during Ubuntu server installation or Root user (logging in as root not recommended)

1. Connect to Ubuntu server

Highly recommend to use a SSH client for connectivity and it will make easy to copy/paste commands as compare to directly interacting with your Ubuntu server console.
I will be using Putty as SSH client. Here is the direct link to download Putty or you could use your preferred SSH client.

OpenSSH server status/installation

• OpenSSH is already installed. You can check SSH server status

sudo service ssh status

• If Open SSH server is not installed, you can install it by using the following commands:

sudo apt install OpenSSH-Server

• Verify Open SSH server status

sudo service ssh status

• Open SSH server’s configuration file is located here, file name is sshd_config. Open SSH should work out of the box, however, you can edit it if needed with your preferred choice of editor

cd /etc/ssh

2. Update/Upgrade installed packages

Update and upgrade installed packages on Ubuntu server. You will need to run this command as sudo and enter ‘y’ when prompted to confirm.

sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade

3. Install NGINX, MySQL, PHP and PHP FPM

1. Install NGINX

   sudo apt install nginx

2. Install MySQL

   sudo apt install mysql-server

3. Install PHP and PHP-FPM

   sudo add-apt-repository universe

   sudo apt install php-fpm php-mysql

Check versions

• MySQL server version

  sudo mysql -V

• NGINX version

  sudo nginx -V

• PHP Version

  sudo php --version

 Test Installation

• NGINX: Browse to IP address of your server and you should see NGINX generic web page
  

• MySQL: Run the following command to see the status of MySQL Server

  sudo service mysql status

4. Create a new site and test PHP

In this step, we will create a new site for Snipe-IT, disable default site and test php. Also, we will restart the relevant services. We will come back to this later and update the root folder once SNIPE-IT is downloaded.

• Create new site with name ams.teknex.com.au, you can update this name if you like to something else

  sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/ams.teknex.com.au

• Add site content as follows, update Directory if you download Snipe-IT in a different folder and Server Name to your Ubuntu Server’s IP address

  server {
      listen 80;
      listen [::]:80;
  
      server_name  172.24.200.95;
      root   /var/www/html;
      index  index.php index.html index.htm;
      
      access_log /var/log/nginx/ams.teknex.com.au.access.log;
      error_log /var/log/nginx/ams.teknex.com.au.error.log;
  
  
      location / {
      try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php$is_args$args;
        }
  
      location ~ \.php$ {
           include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
           fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php7.4-fpm.sock;
           include fastcgi_params;
           fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
           fastcgi_intercept_errors on;
      }
  }

Easiest way to check PHP-FPM version is by typing the following in the terminal and hit tab. This should populate the value as shown below. For instance if your PHP-FPM version is 7.4 then enter the value as php7.4-fpm.

php-fpm

• Enable new site

  sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/ams.teknex.com.au /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/

• Disable default site

  sudo unlink /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default

• Restart Nginx

  sudo service nginx restart

• PHP: Create a simple PHP page and browse to IP_Address/phpinfo.php

  sudo bash -c "echo -e '<?php\nphpinfo();\n?>' > /var/www/html/phpinfo.php"

  

Do not proceed further if PHP is not working

5. Download Snipe-IT

Clone recent version of Snipe-IT from GIT into a local folder snipeit.

• Working directory is /var/www

  cd /var/www/

• Clone Snipe-IT to local folder snipeit

  sudo git clone https://github.com/snipe/snipe-it snipeit

• Make a copy of .env environmental file

  cd /var/www/snipeit

  sudo cp .env.example .env

• If you like, you can have a quick look inside the .env file with nano editor. We will come back to this file later on. Don’t make any changes to the file and use Ctrl + X to exit

  sudo nano .env

6. Configure MySQL Server

Run MySQL secure installation command line wizard and secure the installation.

sudo mysql_secure_installation

• yes or no, if you would like to install Validate Password Plugin (I selected no for this in my lab environment)
• The next part offers you to change the password for the root of MySQL and enter password twice
• The next option to remove anonymous users, I will choose Yes 
• The next option to stop root login remotely, I would go for no 
• Reload privileges table: Yes 
• You will see, “All done”, once it is all done 

7. Create an initial database and a user

In this step, we will create database, user and grant specific privileges to new user.

• Login to MySQL server, provide password for MySQL root user when it prompts

  sudo mysql -u root -p

• Create new database snipeit_db

  CREATE DATABASE snipeit_db;

• Create new user snipeit_user
  

  CREATE USER 'snipeit_user'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'password'; 

• Grant permissions to sipeit_user on database snipeit_db
  

  GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON snipeit_db.* TO 'snipeit_user'@'localhost';

• Verify permissions

  Show GRANTS FOR 'snipeit_user'@'localhost'; 

  

• Flush privileges

  flush privileges;

• Quit

  quit;

• Restart MySQL service

  sudo service mysql restart

• Check MySQL service status

  sudo service mysql status

8. Update .env file

Let’s update .env file with the required information. 

cd /var/www/snipeit

sudo nano .env

Update the following:

• App_URL
• DB_DATABASE
• DB_USERNAME
• DB_PASSWORD

9. Update folder permissions

Update folder permissions in the Snipe-IT root directory

• Working directory is /var/www/snipeit

  cd /var/www/snipeit

• Update permissions

  sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/snipeit/

  sudo chmod -R 755 storage

  sudo chmod -R 755 public/uploads

10. Download Composer

Working directory is logged in user’s home directory. In my case it is /home/snipeit

sudo curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php

sudo mv composer.phar /usr/local/bin/composer

11. Install PHP dependencies

There are a number of PHP dependencies, ensure these all are successfully installed. 
Working directory: Home directory of logged in user 

sudo add-apt-repository universe

sudo apt-get install -y git unzip php php-curl php-mysql php-gd php-ldap php-zip php-mbstring php-xml php-bcmath php-tokenizer

12. Install Composer

Working directory: /var/www/snipeit

cd /var/www/snipeit

sudo composer install --no-dev --prefer-source

13. Generate App Key for .env file

Run the following command and enter yes when prompted

sudo php artisan key:generate

Verify the key generation

Open .env file and check APP_KEY value

sudo nano .env

14. Update Snipe-IT site

We created a site earlier and in this step we will update the root folder.

sudo nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/ams.teknex.com.au

Update the root to the following:

/var/www/snipeit/public

Restart the web server

sudo service nginx restart

15. Snipe-IT pre-flight setup

Browse to IP address of your Ubuntu server and you should see the pre-flight page. Follow the prompts and you are done!!

Your feedback is important for us and other users. Leave it in the comments how did you go with your setup 🙂

This post is refined version of original LinkedIn post Snipe-IT Configuration On Ubuntu in which we installed step by step Snipe-IT on Ubuntu Server. You would be able to copy all the commands much easier through this post.

Last updated on 14th August 2021

Working Config:
PHP 7.4.3
MySQL 8.0.26
Apache 2.4.41
Snipe-IT 5.1.8 build 6227

Requirements for this guide to follow

1. Ubuntu server up and running
2. Static IP assigned to the server
3. Internet connectivity
4. Logged in with user account created during Ubuntu server installation or Root user (logging in as root not recommended)

1. Connect to Ubuntu server

Highly recommend to use a SSH client for connectivity and it will make easy to copy/paste commands as compare to directly interacting with your Ubuntu server console.
I will be using Putty as SSH client. Here is the direct link to download Putty or you could use your preferred SSH client.

OpenSSH server status/installation

• OpenSSH is already installed. You can check SSH server status

sudo service ssh status

• If Open SSH server is not installed, you can install it by using the following commands:

sudo apt install OpenSSH-Server

• Verify Open SSH server status

sudo service ssh status

• Open SSH server’s configuration file is located here, file name is sshd_config. Open SSH should work out of the box, however, you can edit it if needed with your preferred choice of editor

cd /etc/ssh

2. Update/Upgrade installed packages

Update and upgrade installed packages on Ubuntu server. You will need to run this command as sudo and enter ‘y’ when prompted to confirm.

sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade

3. Install Apache, MySQL and PHP

You can use a repository like tasksel to install LAMP server components. Otherwise, you can install individual components.
Install Apache, MySQL and PHP using tasksel

sudo apt install tasksel

sudo tasksel install lamp-server

Check versions

• MySQL server version

  sudo mysql -V

• Apache version

  sudo apache2 -V

• PHP Version

  sudo php --version

 Test Installation

• Apache: Browse to IP address of your server and you should see Apache generic web page

  

• MySQL: Run the following command to see the status of MySQL Server

  sudo service mysql status

• PHP: Create a simple PHP page and browse to IP_Address/phpinfo.php

  sudo bash -c "echo -e '<?php\nphpinfo();\n?>' > /var/www/html/phpinfo.php" 

  

4. Download Snipe-IT

Clone recent version of Snipe-IT from GIT into a local folder snipeit.

• Working directory is /var/www

  cd /var/www/

• Clone Snipe-IT to local folder snipeit

  sudo git clone https://github.com/snipe/snipe-it snipeit

• Make a copy of .env environmental file

  cd /var/www/snipeit

  sudo cp .env.example .env

• If you like, you can have a quick look inside the .env file with nano editor. We will come back to this file later on. Don’t make any changes to the file and use Ctrl + X to exit

  sudo nano .env

5. Configure MySQL Server

Run MySQL secure installation command line wizard and secure the installation.

sudo mysql_secure_installation

• yes or no, if you would like to install Validate Password Plugin (I selected no for this in my lab environment)
• The next part offers you to change the password for the root of MySQL and enter password twice
• The next option to remove anonymous users, I will choose Yes 
• The next option to stop root login remotely, I would go for no 
• Reload privileges table: Yes 
• You will see, “All done”, once it is all done 

6. Create an initial database and a user

In this step, we will create database, user and grant specific privileges to new user.

• Login to MySQL server, provide password for MySQL root user when it prompts

  sudo mysql -u root -p

• Create new database snipeit

  CREATE DATABASE snipeit;

• Create new user mysqlclient
  

  CREATE USER 'mysqlsnipeit'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'snipeit'; 

• Grant permissions to mysqlsnipeit on database snipeit
  

  GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON snipeit.* TO 'mysqlsnipeit'@'localhost';

• Verify permissions

  Show GRANTS FOR 'mysqlsnipeit'@'localhost'; 

  

• Flush privileges

  flush privileges;

• Quit

  quit;

• Restart MySQL service

  sudo service mysql restart

• Check MySQL service status

  sudo service mysql status

7. Update .env file

Let’s update .env file with the required information. 

cd /var/www/snipeit

sudo nano .env

Update the following:

• App_URL
• DB_Database
• DB_USername
• DB_Password

8. Update folder permissions

Update folder permissions in the Snipe-IT root directory

• Working directory is /var/www/snipeit

  cd /var/www/snipeit

• Update permissions

  sudo chown -R www-data:www-data storage public/uploads 

  sudo chmod -R 755 storage

  sudo chmod -R 755 public/uploads

9. Download Composer

Working directory is logged in user’s home directory. In my case it is /home/snipeit

sudo curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php

sudo mv composer.phar /usr/local/bin/composer

10. Install PHP dependencies

There are a number of PHP dependencies, ensure these all are successfully installed. 
Working directory: Home directory of logged in user 

sudo add-apt-repository universe

sudo apt-get install -y git unzip php php-curl php-mysql php-gd php-ldap php-zip php-mbstring php-xml php-bcmath php-tokenizer

11. Install Composer

Working directory: /var/www/snipeit

cd /var/www/snipeit

sudo composer install --no-dev --prefer-source

I noticed the following warning when I installed Composer today on 14th August 2021. Even though, this has no impact on the installation whatsoever. I was still able to generate the app key in the next step.

12. Generate App Key for .env file

Run the following command and enter yes when prompted

sudo php artisan key:generate

Verify the key generation

View contents of .env file and check APP_KEY value

sudo cat .env

13. Create a new site for Snipe-IT

In this step, we will create a new site for Snipe-IT, copy default site and remove it as well. Also, we will restart the relevant services.

• Create new site with name ams.test.com.conf, you can update this name if you like to something else

  sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/ams.teknex.com.conf

• Add site content as follows, update Directory if you download Snipe-IT in a different folder and Server Name to your Ubuntu Server’s IP address

  <VirtualHost *:80>
  ServerAdmin webmaster@localhost
  <Directory /var/www/snipeit/public>
         Require all granted
         AllowOverride All
    </Directory>
     DocumentRoot /var/www/snipeit/public
     ServerName 172.24.39.97
    #Redirect permanent / https://snipeit.your-server-fqdn.com/
         ErrorLog /var/log/apache2/snipeIT.error.log
         CustomLog /var/log/apache2/access.log combined
  </VirtualHost>

• Enable new site

  sudo a2ensite ams.teknex.com.conf

  sudo a2enmod rewrite

• Restart Apache

  sudo service apache2 restart

• Disable default site

  sudo a2dissite 000-default.conf

• Reload Apache service

  sudo service apache2 reload

• Copy default site and remove it

  cd /etc/apache2/sites-available

  sudo cp 000-default.conf 000-default.confTEMP

  sudo rm 000-default.conf

• Reset associations

  sudo phpenmod mbstring

  sudo a2enmod rewrite

  service apache2 restart

14. Snipe-IT pre-flight setup

Browse to IP address of your Ubuntu server and you should see the pre-flight page. Follow the prompts and you are done!!

Your feedback is important for us and other users. Leave it in the comments how did you go with your setup 🙂

In this detailed tutorial, we will go through all the required steps needed to be performed in order to successfully install Snipe-IT on Windows Server 2019.

This blog is updated on 19th Dec 2021. Make sure you install Visual C++ 2015-2019 Redistributable if you are planning to use PHP Version 7.3 or higher

Software Requirements:

• Server 2019 (Server 2016 or 2012 can be used as well): Evaluate Windows Server 2019
• Notepad ++
• PHP >= 7.4 (7.4 < 8 recommended) Non Thread Safe
• C++ 2015-2019
• URL Rewrite 2.1
• PHP Manager
• MariaDB Version 10.0.14
• Composer
• SNIPE-IT
• Check requirements on the official Snipe-IT documents

1. Server 2019 Setup

It can be a virtual machine or a physical server. Make sure you have a static IP address assigned and a working Internet connection.

In our example:

• Server Name: AMS-04
• IP Address: 10.0.0.2

2. IIS Server and CGI Roles

 Let’s add required roles to our server.

• Open Server Manager and add IIS Server Role and CGI feature in Applications Development

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

3. Install Visual C++ 2015-2019

• Run downloaded exe file and follow the prompts

4. Install URL Rewrite

Download URL Rewrite 2.1

Run the downloaded exe file. Depends on the download you might need working Internet connection.

5. Install PHP Manager

Download PHP Manager and install it from downloaded msi file.

Test PHP Manager Installation

6. PHP Installation

• Download PHP , In this tutorial I have used 7.3.7 Non Thread Safe  x64
• Check what version is required from SNIPE-IT PHP requirements
• Create a new folder “PHP” in the System Drive. In the most cases it is C: Drive.

• Copy all data from original downloaded folder PHP.7.*.* to C:PHP

• Open IIS Server Manager
• Click on your Server Name and you will see the following Window.
• Double click on PHP Manager and register new PHP-CGI.EXE. You will find PHP-CGI.EXE file in C:\PHPPHP-CGI.EXE. Follow the steps below to accomplish this task.

  

  
  

  

Test PHP Installation

There are two ways in which PHP could be tested.

• First Method (this test will be enough)

It can be tested within IIS Manager.

• Second method

A separate text file you could create within c:\inetpub\wwwroot > name it phpinfo.php > Edit with notepad and add this content without quotation marks

“<?php phpinfo(); ?>“

You might need to restart your IIS Server through IIS Server Manager is some cases before you open http://localhost/phpinfo.php

Enable/Disable PHP Extensions

• Open IIS Manager
• Click on your Server Name > Open PHP Manager
• Disable following extensions leave other enabled extensions as enabled

php_gettext.dll

php_soap.dll

php_xmlrpc.all

• Enable following extensions in addition to already enabled extensions

php_exif.dll

fileinfo.dll

php_pdo_mysql.dll

php_ldap.dll

After enabling and disabling, you will end up with the following extensions.

7. MariaDB installation

• SNIPE-IT Requirements – SNIPE-IT recommends 10.0.14.
• MariaDB Download
• Download msi file

• Run downloaded msi file and follow the prompts

  

  

  

  

1. Database Setup

• Double click on HeidiSQL shortcut or search it in the Start Menu > Applications
• Start a new session and use root credentials to login

• Create a new database, name it snipeit

  

  

2. Create New User

• Create a new user, name it snipeit

• Change user permissions and provide full access to database snipeit

8. Configure Snipe-IT Root Folder

• Download the latest version of Snipe-it

• Extract the files from the zip folder

• Create a new folder c:\inetpub\wwwroot\snipeit

• Copy all files and folders from downloaded snipeit to c:\inetpub\wwwroot\snipeit

9. Update environmental file

Find DB Dump Path (It will be needed in the .env file)

Follow the below steps to find the DB_DUMP_PATH

• Find where MariaDB is located, in my case, it is C:\Program FilesMariaDB\10.0\bin.
• To find MariaDB bin folder location, open Command Prompt as administrator and run the following command without quotations:

“cmd /c for %A in (“C:\Program Files\MariaDB 10.0\bin”) do @echo %~sA”

cmd /c for %A in ("C:\Program Files\MariaDB 10.0\bin") do @echo %~sA

The output would be the DB_DUMP_PATH, copy that path. In my case, it was the following

C:PROGRA~1MARIAD~1.0bin

Save this output in a text file as below

'C:\\PROGRA~1\\MARIAD~1.0\\bin'

Open .env.example with Notepad++, .env file is located in the Snipe-IT root folder

• Update required fields as shown in the screenshot
  – APP_URL
  – DB_DATABASE
  – DB_USERNAME
  – DB_PASSWORD
  – DB_DUMP_PATH

  

• Save that file as .env

10. Install Composer

• Download Composer exe file

• Copy that file to Snipeit root directory, c:\intepub\wwwroot\snipeit

• Run Composer exe file > Leave Developer Mode unchecked > Browse to PHP root directory as discussed in step number 5 > Select PHP.exe file > Follow the prompts and finish

  

• Open Command Prompt (this might not work in PowerShell) as an administrator in the Snipe-IT root directory and run the following command (this step requires Internet connectivity, make sure you test it before hand)

             composer install

11. Generate App Key

• Open command prompt as an administrator in the Snipe-IT root directory and run the following command

php artisan key:generate

• Open .env file with Notepad++ and you would see App Key populated in the .env file automatically as shown in the above screenshot

12. Create a new website

• Open IIS Manager
• Update Bindings of Default Web Site

Create new website

• Open IIS Server Manager and enter the details as shown in the screenshot below and click OK to start the website immediately.

Update Handler Mappings

• In IIS Manager, click on Sites and double click on newly created site SNIPE IT
• Double Click on Handler Mappings
• Update the settings as shown in the screenshot

  

  

  

13. Fix Folder Permissions

Add permissions for the IIS user for the uploads folder:

• Go to C:\inetpub\wwwroot\snipe-it\public
• Right Click uploads > Properties
• Go to the Security Tab > Edit
• Click Add and change location to local machine
• Type IUSR in object name box
• Click OK
• Give IUSR full control
• Click OK twice

Add permissions for the IIS user for the cache folder:

• Go to C:\inetpub\wwwroot\snipe-it\bootstrap
• Right Click cache > Properties
• Go to the Security Tab > Edit
• Click Add and change location to local machine
• Type IUSR in object name box
• Click OK
• Give IUSR full control
• Click OK twice

Add permissions for the IIS user for the storage folder:

Go to C:\inetpub\wwwroot\snipe-it

• Right Click storage > Properties
• Go to Security Tab > Edit
• Click Add and change location to local machine
• Type IUSR in object name box
• Click OK
• Give IUSR modify permissions
• Click OK twice

Add permissions for the IIS user for the Windows Temp folder:

• Go to C:\Windows
• Right Click temp > Properties
• Go to the Security Tab > Edit
• Click Add and change location to local machine
• Type IUSR in object name box
• Click OK
• Give IUSR modify permissions
• Click OK twice

Add permissions for the IIS_IUSRS for the Windows Temp folder:

• Go to C:\Windows
• Right Click Temp > Properties
• Go to the Security Tab > Edit
• Click Add and change location to local machine
• Type IIS_IUSRS in object name box
• Click OK
• Give IIS_IUSRS modify permissions
• Click OK twice

Add permissions for the IIS_IUSRS for the Storage folder:

• Go to c:\inetpub\wwwroot\snipe-it
• Right Click Storage > Properties
• Go to the Security Tab > Edit
• Click Add and change location to local machine
• Type IIS_IUSRS in object name box
• Click OK
• Give IIS_IUSRS modify permissions
• Click OK twice

14. Browse to Snipe-IT Pre Flight Setup

• Change security settings for IE in the Server Manager > Local Server > Enhanced Mode > Turn Off For Administrators

• Open IE and browse to your IIS Server’s IP address > In this case it is 10.0.0.2

• Snipe-IT Page will load
• Click Next Create Database Tables

• It might show Something Went Wrong > Refresh the page

• Next: Create User > Fill all the required information > You should see the below page

  

  

Congratulations – all done!

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