Setup NOW Learning Management System in EL9

Update: 2025-01-14 Host: Rocky Linux 9.3

Comprehensive Server Administration Guide

For complete server administration best practices including security hardening, monitoring, backup strategies, and enterprise compliance, see the RHEL/Alma/Rocky/Fedora Server Administration Guide.

This document provides a quick setup guide for NOW-LMS on EL9 systems. For production environments, we strongly recommend following the comprehensive server administration practices.

Update your server

Keep your server up to date:

dnf update -y

Enable the web console

With Cockpit you can administer the server with out a SSH daemon.

sudo dnf install cockpit firewalld -y
sudo systemctl enable --now cockpit.socket
sudo systemctl enable firewalld --now
sudo firewall-cmd --add-service=cockpit
sudo firewall-cmd --add-service=cockpit --permanent

Create a sudo user

Do not use the root user:

adduser serveradmin # User a custom user to make it more secure and hard to guest
passwd serveradmin
usermod -aG wheel serveradmin

Now you can admin your server from the web console and there is no need of the SSH daemon, be sure you can loggin with the sudo user at: your_ip:9090

Secure the server

Block access to the root user:

sudo cp /etc/ssh/sshd_config /etc/ssh/sshd_config_backup
# No root access
sudo vi /etc/ssh/sshd_config # Set: PermitRootLogin no
systemctl restart sshd

Or disable the SSHD service and use the web console to admin the server [recomended]

systemctl disable --now sshd

Only disable the SSHD server after you have logedin in the web console and verified you can perform administrative tasks.

Install the Caddy Server:

Nginx is another good option:

sudo dnf install -y epel-release
sudo dnf install -y caddy
sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --zone=public --add-service=http
sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --zone=public --add-service=https

Configure the Caddy Server:

mkdir /etc/caddy/
touch /etc/caddy/Caddyfile
vi /etc/caddy/Caddyfile

Set the Caddy Server to act as a reverse proxy:

:443 {
    reverse_proxy localhost:8080
}

Start the Caddy Server

systemctl enable --now caddy

Install NOW - Learning Management System

Install NOW - LMS

Install system requirements

dnf install -y npm pango python3.12 python3.12-pip python3.12-cryptography git

Create a virtual enviroment and install now-lms

Do not create the virtual enviroment using root or sudo:

python3.12 -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate
git clone https://github.com/bmosoluciones/now-lms.git
cd now-lms/now_lms/static/
npm install
cd ..
dc ..
pip install -e .


# Postgresql
pip install pg8000

# MySQL
pip install mysqlclient

Create a start script

Create a run script file to start your system_

cd
touch run.py
vi run.py

Use this template

#! /home/serveradmin/venv/bin/python
from now_lms import create_app

app = create_app()
app.config["SECRET_KEY"] = "a_very_secret_key"
app.config["SQLALCHEMY_DATABASE_URI"] = "database_uri"

if __name__ == "__main__":
    # This script is designed to be used with a WSGI server like Waitress or Gunicorn
    # Run with Waitress (default, cross-platform): python run.py
    # Or with Gunicorn (Linux only): gunicorn --bind 0.0.0.0:8080 --workers 4 run:app
    pass

Test your run script and setup your system

You can test the application factory works:

python /home/serveradmin/run.py

If there are no errors, you can now use a WSGI server to serve the application.

Setup WSGI Server

NOW-LMS supports both Waitress (default, cross-platform) and Gunicorn (Linux only) as WSGI servers.

Option 1: Using Waitress (Recommended - Default)

Waitress is the default WSGI server and works on both Linux and Windows:

source /home/serveradmin/venv/bin/activate
pip install waitress

Run with Waitress:

python /home/serveradmin/run.py

Or using the CLI:

/home/serveradmin/venv/bin/lmsctl serve
# or specify explicitly: lmsctl serve --wsgi-server waitress

Option 2: Using Gunicorn (Linux Only)

Install Gunicorn in your virtual environment:

source /home/serveradmin/venv/bin/activate
pip install gunicorn

Run with Gunicorn

Start the WSGI server with Gunicorn:

/home/serveradmin/venv/bin/gunicorn --bind 0.0.0.0:8080 --workers 4 --chdir /home/serveradmin run:app

Or using the CLI:

/home/serveradmin/venv/bin/lmsctl serve --wsgi-server gunicorn

Create the database and admin user

Before starting the server for the first time, initialize the database:

export SECRET_KEY="a_very_secret_key"
export SQLALCHEMY_DATABASE_URI="database_uri"
ADMIN_USER=adminuser ADMIN_PSWD=passSECURE123+ /home/serveradmin/venv/bin/lmsctl database init

This command will:

Setup a new database for the system
Create the administrator user

You can check your system now at https://your_ip and see your new site.

For production, consider using a systemd service to manage the Gunicorn process.