Hosting Your Own Website in 6 Easy Steps

We all are familiar with WordPress. It is a free and open source online content management feature, this allows us to host our websites with ease. WordPress is used by 63.5% of all the websites whose content management system we know. This is 43.2% of all websites. It combines simplicity for users and publishers with under-the-hood complexity for developers.

Only a handful of things are required to get started

1. BrainyPi or Raspberry pi
2. Wifi/ ethernet
3. Micro SD card loaded with debian
4. keyboard
5. mouse
6. monitor
7. A domain name

1.1 Before installing docker and its dependencies we need to do a few steps

sudo apt-get install \
   ca-certificates \
   curl \
   gnupg \
   lsb-release

1.2 Add docker's official GPG keys

sudo mkdir -p /etc/apt/keyrings
curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu/gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg

1.3 Use the following command to set up the repository

echo \
  "deb [arch=$(dpkg --print-architecture) signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg] https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu \
  $(lsb_release -cs) stable" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/docker.list > /dev/null

1.4 Finally, install Docker Engine

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io docker-compose-plugin

1.5 Lastly, run this to test the installation

sudo docker run hello-world

2.1 Start by creating a directory

mkdir ~/wordpress

2.2 Create nginx.conf file

nano ~/wordpress/nginx-conf/nginx.conf

2.3 Now paste the following in the file and make sure to change "your_domain" and "www.your_domain" to your domain name.

server {
        listen 80;
        listen [::]:80;

        server_name your_domain www.your_domain;

        index index.php index.html index.htm;

        root /var/www/html;

        location ~ /.well-known/acme-challenge {
                allow all;
                root /var/www/html;
        }

        location / {
                try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php$is_args$args;
        }

        location ~ \.php$ {
                try_files $uri =404;
                fastcgi_split_path_info ^(.+\.php)(/.+)$;
                fastcgi_pass wordpress:9000;
                fastcgi_index index.php;
                include fastcgi_params;
                fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
                fastcgi_param PATH_INFO $fastcgi_path_info;
        }

        location ~ /\.ht {
                deny all;
        }
        
        location = /favicon.ico { 
                log_not_found off; access_log off; 
        }
        location = /robots.txt { 
                log_not_found off; access_log off; allow all; 
        }
        location ~* \.(css|gif|ico|jpeg|jpg|js|png)$ {
                expires max;
                log_not_found off;
        }
}

2.4 Creating docker-compose

nano docker-compose.yml

2.5 creating env file

nano .env

2.6 paste the following in .env file and remember to change the values

MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD=your_root_password
MYSQL_USER=your_wordpress_database_user
MYSQL_PASSWORD=your_wordpress_database_password

2.7 creating docker-compose( remember to change "your-emailaddress@gmail.com" to your email address)

version: '3'

services:
  db:
    image: mysql:8.0
    container_name: db
    restart: unless-stopped
    env_file: .env
    environment:
      - MYSQL_DATABASE=wordpress
    volumes:
      - dbdata:/var/lib/mysql
    command: '--default-authentication-plugin=mysql_native_password'
    networks:
      - app-network

  wordpress:
    depends_on:
      - db
    image: wordpress:5.1.1-fpm-alpine
    container_name: wordpress
    restart: unless-stopped
    env_file: .env
    environment:
      - WORDPRESS_DB_HOST=db:3306
      - WORDPRESS_DB_USER=$MYSQL_USER
      - WORDPRESS_DB_PASSWORD=$MYSQL_PASSWORD
      - WORDPRESS_DB_NAME=wordpress
    volumes:
      - wordpress:/var/www/html
    networks:
      - app-network

  webserver:
    depends_on:
      - wordpress
    image: nginx:1.15.12-alpine
    container_name: webserver
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - "80:80"
      - "443:443"
    volumes:
      - wordpress:/var/www/html
      - ./nginx-conf:/etc/nginx/conf.d
      - certbot-etc:/etc/letsencrypt
    networks:
      - app-network

  certbot:
    depends_on:
      - webserver
    image: certbot/certbot
    container_name: certbot
    volumes:
      - certbot-etc:/etc/letsencrypt
      - wordpress:/var/www/html
    command: certonly --webroot --webroot-path=/var/www/html --email your-emailaddress@gmail.com --agree-tos --no-eff-email --force-renewal -d your_domain -d www.your_domain

volumes:
  certbot-etc:
  wordpress:
  dbdata:

networks:
  app-network:
    driver: bridge

2.8 Finally run

sudo docker-compose up -d

3.1 open a browser and type

https://your_domain_name.example

3.2 Follow the on screen instructions to finish the installation.

4.1 Click on continue

5.1 Enter the required details

6.1 This is your admin panel, here you can configure your WordPress site.