Introduction

Discourse is a free and open-source Internet forum software. Features include support for threading, categorization and tagging of discussions, configurable access control, live updates, expanding link previews, infinite scrolling, and real-time notifications. It allows for high customizability via its plugin architecture and theming system.

In this article, we will show you how to Install Discourse on Ubuntu 20.04.

Prerequisites

The server must be running on Ubuntu 20.04 with 2 GB of RAM or more.

Securing the server

Updating the security updates.

$ sudo dpkg-reconfigure -plow unattended-upgrades

Setup a firewall withufw.

$ sudo apt-get install ufw
$ sudo ufw default allow outgoing
$ sudo ufw default deny incoming
$ sudo ufw allow 22
$ sudo ufw allow http
$ sudo ufw allow https
$ sudo ufw enable

Installingfail2banto secure your server.
```
$ sudo apt install fail2ban
```

Configure`fail2ban`to use`ufw`

Copy the main configuration to/etc/fail2ban/jail.localfile.
```
$ sudo cp /etc/fail2ban/jail.conf /etc/fail2ban/jail.local
```
Edit the configuration/etc/fail2ban/jail.localfile.
```
$ sudo nano /etc/fail2ban/jail.local
```
Search thebanaction,banaction_allportsconfigurations and change toufwin the /etc/fail2ban/jail.localfile.
```
banaction = ufw
banaction_allports = ufw
```

Installing Docker

Uninstall old versions such asdocker,docker.io, ordocker-engineif present in your system.
```
$ sudo apt-get remove docker docker-engine docker.io containerd runc
```
Update the package index.
```
$ sudo apt-get update
```

Install the ca-certificate.

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

Setting up the repository.

$ sudo curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu/gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /usr/share/keyrings/docker-archive-keyring.gpg

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

Make sure the package is updated after the installation of the docker repository.
```
$ sudo apt update
```

Installing the latest version of docker engine.

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

Install Discourse

Create a 'discourse' folder in the/vardirectory withmkdir command.
```
$ sudo mkdir /var/discourse
```

Clone the official discourse git repository in/var/discourse.

$ sudo git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse_docker.git /var/discourse

Change to the discourse directory.
```
cd /var/discourse
```
Launch the setup tool.
```
./discourse-setup
```

The following questions are prompted when setting up the discourse.

a. Hostname for your Discourse?: The hostname of your Discourse platform should be entered here. [Example: test.discourse.com]
b. Email address for the admin account(s)?: Enter your Discourse administrator's email address of your choice.
c. SMTP server address?: Enter your SMTP server address.[Example: smtp.sendgrid.net]
d. SMTP port?: Enter your SMTP port. [Example:25]
e. SMTP user name?: Enter your SMTP username.
f. SMTP password?: enter your SMTP user password.
g. Notification email address? [noreply@test.discourse.com]:[Example: test@example.com]
h. Optional email address for Let's Encrypt warnings? (ENTER to skip) [me@example.com]: Press 'ENTER' key
i. Optional Maxmind License key (ENTER to continue without MAXMIND GeoLite2 geolocation database) [1234567890123456]: Press 'ENTER' key

Note: Please wait until the installation gets complete after entering all the details and if you want to edit the values again. Run the ./discourse-setupagain.

Output

Verify Discourse installation

To access your Discourse instance, you can just open a web browser and enter the domain name used when setting up the discourse.
You will see the welcome page with the 'Register' button and fill in the necessary steps to access the discourse dashboard page.