How to install Snipe-IT on Ubuntu on AWS Free Tier

Today I show you how to install Snipe-IT on Ubuntu using Amazon Web Services Free Tier EC2 instance.

After struggling through at least 5 or 6 incomplete “tutorials” on how to install Snipe-IT on Ubuntu, I gave up and scrapped the official documentation for you, bringing together the most complete Snipe-IT tutorial out there.

Alright, without further ado, let’s get to work.

Step 1 - Install LAMP

First, we need to install LAMP, that is, Linux, Apache2, MySQL, and PHP.

Go ahead and install LAMP following my guide.

Make sure to write down your MySQL root credentials while running through the MySQL installation.

Step 2 - Updating Ubuntu and installing prerequisites

We start with assuming you have a freshly installed Ubuntu Server in front of you or you followed the video above and created a fresh Ubuntu instance on AWS EC2.

Updates first:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade -y

Then we are going to log in with root by typing:

sudo -i

Next, we are going to download the composer:

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

Then we are going to move the composer to another folder:

mv composer.phar /usr/local/bin/composer
cd /var/www/

Alright, time to download snipe-it:

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

Finally, we replace .env.example with .env:

cp .env.example .env

More on that later.

Step 3 - Configuring the MySQL Database

Time to create our MySQL Database:

mysql -u root -p

Now you need to run a couple of commands, make sure to use the EXACT commands like in the box below, replace “your username” and “yourpw” with your own username and password:

    mysql> create database snipeit;
    mysql> CREATE USER 'yourusername'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'yourpw';
    mysql> GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON snipeit.* TO 'yourusername'@'localhost';
    mysql> flush privileges;
    mysql> exit

Of course, remember your credentials.

Step 4 - Editing the .env file

Now we are going to edit the .env config file.

nano .env

You need to adjust the values according to your server and the database we created earlier. Remember to enter your username and password that you set in step 3.

Don’t worry about the APP_KEY either, we are going to generate that later.

Hit CTRL+O to write and CTRL+X to exit.

Step 5 - Adjusting permissions

Now we got to adjust a couple of permissions:

chown -R www-data:www-data storage public/uploads
chmod -R 775 storage
chmod -R 755 public/uploads

Step 6 - Installing PHP dependencies

Installing PHP dependencies:

apt-get install -y git unzip php php-mcrypt php-curl php-mysql php-gd php-ldap php-zip php-mbstring php-xml
apt-get install php7.0-bcmath

Step 7 - Installing Composer & generating our App Key

Installing Composer, go get yourself a nice cup of coffee as this will take a while.

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

And generating our APP Key:

php artisan key:generate

Type yes when you get asked if you really want to run that command. Copy the Key and save it somewhere. The Key will automatically get pasted into your .env file.

Step 8 - Editing configuration files and wrapping up

Almost done guys, hold tight.

Now we are going to enable our Virtual Host:

sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/snipeit.example.com.conf

And paste the text into the box below:

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

Make sure to replace YOURSERVERIP with, well, your server IP.

Press CTRL+O to save and CTRL+X to exit.

Now we are going to run a couple apache commands:

sudo a2ensite snipeit.example.com.conf
sudo a2enmod rewrite
sudo systemctl restart apache2

And we are going to disable the default.conf

sudo a2dissite 000-default.conf
sudo service apache2 restart

Change directory

cd /etc/apache2/sites-available

And we are going to rename the default.conf to keep it as a backup:

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

And finally, remove it:

sudo rm 000-default.conf

Already and finally wrapping it up with:

sudo phpenmod mcrypt
sudo phpenmod mbstring
sudo a2enmod rewrite
sudo service apache2 restart

Step 9 - Setup with the Web Browser

Now you are as good as done. Open a Web Browser and enter your server IP. You should end up here:

Ignore the File Owner warning, this seems to be a bug and will probably be fixed in an update. Click on Next: Create Database Tables.

You will likely get an error:

Don’t panic; just refresh the page by hitting F5.

Click on Next: Create User

Finalize everything to your liking, click F5 if you get the error again.

And congratulations, you are now running a powerful, completely free cloud-based instance of the Snipe IT Asset Management Software on your free tier Amazon EC2 instance.

whoami

Stefan

Stefan founded Ceos3c in 2016 and has spent a decade teaching cybersecurity, Linux, and web development through hands-on tutorials. He builds and ships real products while sharing his journey: ProofSwap.me, XPMetric.com, and EasyEarningsTracker.com. Find him on YouTube (youtube.com/stefanrows) and X (@StefanRows).

• ProofSwap Testimonial swaps for indie makers
• xpmetric Cookieless web analytics
• EasyEarningsTracker Income tracking for creators