Vtiger is free and open source customer relationship management application. It is written in PHP and uses MySQL to store its data. Vtiger is very popular and is one of the most downloaded CRM applications used by thousands of businesses around the world. Vtiger CRM provides numerous features like contacts management, opportunity management, sales forecasting, email marketing, help desk and case management, customer portal and collaborative features. Vtiger CRM also provides mobile applications for various platforms like Android and iOS. The application also provides knowledge base features.
In this tutorial, we will learn how to install Vtiger CRM on CentOS server. We will also install all the required dependencies like Apache, PHP, and MySQL/MariaDB.
Requirements
Vtiger CRM’s requirements increase as the users of application increases. For optimal performance, you can use a server with 2GB RAM. To follow this tutorial, you will need a server with minimal CentOS 7 installed. All the required dependencies will be installed throughout the tutorial. You will also need root access or sudo access on your server. If you are logged in as non root user, run sudo -i to switch to root user.
Installing Vtiger CRM
Before installing any package it is recommended that you update the packages and repository using the following command.
yum -y update
To install Vtiger CRM, you will need to install a web server, PHP and a database server. In this tutorial, we will be installing Apache web server with PHP 5.6 and MariaDB as the database server.
To install Apache web server run the following command.
yum -y install httpd
To start Apache web server and enable it to start at boot time, run the following command.
systemctl start httpdsystemctl enable httpd
Although Vtiger CRM can be installed on earlier versions of PHP but we will be installing it on a supported version of PHP as support for PHP versions <= 5.5 has been ended. The default YUM repository contains PHP version 5.4 only, hence we will need to use the Webtatic repository to install a version of PHP greater than 5.4. Run the following commands for installing EPEL repository as EPEL repository is required to install Webtatic repository.
yum -y install epel-releaseyum -y updateyum clean all
Now install Webtatic repository using the following commands.
rpm -Uvh https://mirror.webtatic.com/yum/el7/webtatic-release.rpmyum -y update
To install PHP 5.6 and all the required PHP modules, run the following command.
yum -y install php56w php56w-mysql php56w-imap php56w-curl php56w-xml php56w-zlib php56w-gd
To verify PHP version, run the following command.
php -v
You should get following output.
[root@liptan-pc ~]# php -v
PHP 5.6.29 (cli) (built: Dec 10 2016 12:42:43)
Copyright (c) 1997-2016 The PHP Group
Zend Engine v2.6.0, Copyright (c) 1998-2016 Zend Technologies
Once PHP is installed, you will need to configure few thing in php.ini configuration. Open /etc/php.ini using your favorite editor.
nano /etc/php.ini
If you do not have nano installed, you can install it using yum -y install nano. Scroll down to find the following lines.
; Maximum amount of memory a script may consume (128MB)
; http://php.net/memory-limit
memory_limit = 128M
Increase the memory_limit to 256MB, you may increase it to a higher value for faster processing of the application. Next find the following lines.
; Maximum execution time of each script, in seconds
; http://php.net/max-execution-time
; Note: This directive is hardcoded to 0 for the CLI SAPI
max_execution_time = 30
Increase the max_execution_time to 0. Now find:
; http://php.net/display-errors
display_errors = Off
Change the display_errors = Off to display_errors = On. Now find:
; http://php.net/log-errors
log_errors = On
Change the log_errors = On to log_errors = Off. Now find:;
; http://php.net/short-open-tag
short_open_tag = Off
Change the short_open_tag = Off to short_open_tag = On. Now find:
; http://php.net/error-reporting
error_reporting = E_ALL & ~E_DEPRECATED & ~E_STRICT
Change the above line to as follows.
error_reporting = E_WARNING & ~E_NOTICE & ~E_DEPRECATED
Once done, save the changes and restart Apache web server using the following command.
systemctl restart httpd
Now install MariaDB database server using the following command.
yum -y install mariadb mariadb-server
Start MariaDB and enable it to start at boot time using the following commands.
systemctl start mariadbsystemctl enable mariadb
Now run the following command to secure your MariaDB installation.
mysql_secure_installation
It will run a small script which asks you to provide the root password for MariaDB. As we have just installed MariaDB, the root password is not set, just press enter to proceed further. It will ask you if you want to set a root password for your MariaDB installation, choose y and set a strong password for the installation. It will further ask you for removing test databases and anonymous users. Most of the questions are self-explanatory and you should answer yes to all the questions.
Now you will need to create a database with a database user to store Vtiger CRM data. To create a database we will need to login to MySQL command line first. Run the following command for same.
mysql -u root -p
This will prompt you for the root password, provide the root password of MySQL which you have set earlier. Now run the following query to create a new database for your Vtiger CRM installation.
CREATE DATABASE vtiger_data;
The above query will create a database named vtiger_data. For the database, you can use any name you prefer in the place of vtiger_data. Make sure that you use semicolon at the end of each query as the query always ends with a semicolon. Once the database is created you can create a new user and grant all the permissions to the user for the database. Using root user is not recommended for the databases. To create a new database user, run the following query.
CREATE USER 'vtiger_user'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'StrongPassword';
The above query will create a user with username vtiger_user. You can use any preferred username instead of vtiger_user. Replace StrongPassword with a strong password. Now provide the appropriate privileges to your database user over the database you have created. Run the following command:;
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON vtiger_data.* TO 'vtiger_user'@'localhost';
Now run the following command to immediately apply the changes on the database privileges.
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
Exit MySQL prompt by executing exit command.
Once done, you can download the Vtiger CRM using the following command.
cd /var/www/htmlwget wget http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/vtigercrm/vtiger%20CRM%206.5.0/Core%20Product/vtigercrm6.5.0.tar.gz -O vtigercrm.tar.gz
At the time of writing the tutorial, the latest version of Vtiger CRM is 6.5.0. You can always check for the latest version on Vtiger CRM download page.
Extract the files using the following command.
tar xzf vtigercrm.tar.gz
The above command will extract the files in vtigercrm directory. Move all the files to the web root directory of Apache web server using the following command.
mv vtigercrm/* /var/www/html
Now you will need to disable your SELinux. To completely disable the SELinux you will need to edit /etc/selinux/config file.
nano /etc/selinux/config
If you don’t have nano installed, you can install it using yum -y install nano Find the following line:
SELINUX=enforcing
Change it to:
SELINUX=disabled
Now you will need to reboot your server so that the new configuration can take effect. Once the server is rebooted, you will need to provide the ownership of the application to web server user using the following command.
chown -R apache:apache /var/www/html
Now you can go to your favorite browser and browse the following link.
http://serverIPaddress
Or
http://yourdomain.com
You will see following welcome interface.
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Click the Install ** button to proceed further. Now you will be shown the license agreement. To proceed further you will need to accept the license agreement. Click **I Agree to go further. The installer will now check for the system requirements. If you have followed this tutorial, you should see that all the requirements are met.
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Click Next to proceed further. In next interface, you will be required to provide the database credentials and Admin user credentials.
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Provide the database name which we have created earlier, provide the hostname localhost and the username and password of the database user.
In System Information, choose the currency. In administration user, choose an admin password and provide your name, email, date format, and timezone. The administrator username will be set to admin with your chosen password.
In the next interface, the installer will show you the configuration settings that will be used for installation. If you need to re-configure the setting provided, click on the Back button.
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Click Next to proceed further. The installer will now write the database and will install Vtiger CRM. Once done it will ask you to select the industry of your firm. In Next interface you will be asked to choose the modules to enable. Choose the modules according to your need, you can configure the modules later also.
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Once the installation finishes, you will be automatically logged into the dashboard. You will see following interface.
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The Vtiger CRM installation is now finished.
Conclusion
In this tutorial, we have learned how to install Vtiger CRM application on CentOS 7 server. You can now deploy the application to increase the productivity and improve customer relations of your organization.
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