Nextcloud is an open-source client and server software application that helps you create a personal online file storage service on your own.
The Nextcloud server is written in PHP and uses the local disk on the server for underlying storage. You can modify the Nextcloud configuration to use COS as the underlying storage, so as to enjoy a higher reliability, more powerful disaster recovery capabilities, and unlimited storage space at lower storage costs.
This document describes the environment on which the Nextcloud server depends, compares and analyzes the differences between local storage and COS, and explains how to build a personal online file storage service.
Note:
Switching an existing Nextcloud server instance from local storage to COS may render existing files invisible. To change the storage method of an existing instance, we recommend you build a new Nextcloud server, configure COS as the storage, and migrate the data from the old instance to the new one.
Nextcloud Server Environment Overview
The Nextcloud server is written in PHP and can use SQLite, MySQL, MariaDB, or PostgreSQL as the database. Due to the limits in performance, we generally recommend you not use SQLite in your actual business. Although PHP, MySQL, and relevant server software applications support Windows, according to the Nextcloud community, running the Nextcloud server on Windows may cause problems such as garbled text. Therefore, the Nextcloud team has declared that the Nextcloud server cannot be deployed on Windows.
Server configuration
Cloud Virtual Machine (CVM) currently provides multiple instance families, with multiple sub-families each. Different instance families have different strengths, such as large memory or high I/O. As Nextcloud is targeted at individual, family, and SME users, it has low requirements for hardware resources, and you can select a Standard model with balanced resources. As for the CVM instance sub-families, the latest ones generally have a higher cost performance, so just select the latest sub-family.
After determining the instance family and sub-family, you need to choose specific vCPU and memory specifications (the private network bandwidth and PPS vary by specification). You can use OPcache for PHP to improve the performance, and the Nextcloud server can use APCu memory cache to further improve the performance, so we recommend you select a large memory.
As you can adjust the CVM instance configuration after purchase, you can first purchase an instance with low specifications such as 1-core and 4 GB MEM and determine whether to upgrade the specifications to improve the performance based on the numbers of users and files as well as CVM monitoring data after your online file storage service is built and launched to the production environment. If you need to use the service in a multi-user scenario such as family or SME, we recommend you purchase a 2-core 8 GB MEM or 4-core 16 GB MEM instance to offer a sufficient performance.
Server operating system
All mainstream Linux distributions can well sustain the Nextcloud server. Their configurations are basically the same except for the command (i.e., package management tool) used for software package installation.
Note:
This document takes a CVM instance on CentOS 7.7 as an example.
Databases
As mentioned above, MySQL is generally used together with PHP in the actual business. As MariaDB is a fork from MySQL and highly compatible with MySQL, the Nextcloud server can run well with MySQL 5.7+ or MariaDB 10.2+.
Tencent Cloud offers TencentDB for MySQL and TencentDB for MariaDB. Both services adopt a source-replica high-availability architecture and have a higher reliability compared with self-built databases in CVM. In addition, they support easy-to-use Ops features like automatic backup. Therefore, we strongly recommend you use TencentDB in your actual business.
Note:
This document takes a TencentDB for MySQL 5.7 instance as an example.
Web server and PHP runtime
Some Nextcloud server configurations are specified in .htaccess files, so you can directly use Nextcloud's built-in configuration items when using the Apache server software application. Nginx is a web server software application developing rapidly in recent years and features ease of installation and configuration, less resource usage, and higher load capacity compared with Apache. You can transcript .htaccess configurations on the Nextcloud server to Nginx configurations to better sustain the Nextcloud server. This document uses the Nginx server software application and provides a complete Nginx configuration example for reference.
The PHP runtime has been upgraded to PHP 7, and the main maintained versions include 7.2, 7.3, and 7.4, all of which support the Nextcloud server. Here, use the latest version 7.4. Moreover, Nextcloud depends on certain PHP modules. The requirements for specific modules are as detailed below.
Tencent Cloud network environment
Currently, Tencent Cloud offers the classic network and VPC environments. The classic network is a public network resource pool shared by all Tencent Cloud users, where the private IPs of all CVM instances are assigned by Tencent Cloud and you cannot customize IP ranges or IP addresses. A VPC is a logically isolated network space in Tencent Cloud. In a VPC, you can customize IP ranges, IP addresses, and routing policies. Currently, as the classic network resources are insufficient and cannot be expanded, the classic network is no longer supported for new accounts and in some new AZs. Therefore, this document takes a VPC as an example.
Cloud Block Storage (CBS) disks are mounted to the operating system as local disks on CVM instances. As Nextcloud uses the file system to store the online file storage data by default, you can directly store Nextcloud data to CBS disks on the operating system. Compared with CBS, COS offers the following benefits:
Use cases
CBS
CBS is a type of block storage and can be directly mounted to the CVM operating system as disks. Generally, a CBS disk is used exclusively by the operating system and can be mounted to only one CVM instance. However, it has a high read/write performance and is suitable for scenarios where a high I/O and a low latency are required and it is used by only one CVM instance exclusively.
COS
COS opens up its read/write APIs over the HTTP protocol, so you need to access the objects (files) stored in COS through programming. It uses object keys (like file paths) as indexes and have an unlimited storage capacity. As its data is transferred over the network, COS has a lower speed and higher latency. However, as operations are performed on objects, after an application manipulates an object, another application can immediately manipulate the same object. In conclusion, COS is suitable for scenarios where a high performance is not required but a large cost-effective storage capacity or shared access is needed. It is more suitable to use the online file storage application together with COS for the following reasons: the online file storage application transfers data over the network and doesn't require a low latency; the speed and latency on the linkage from the online file storage client to server and then to COS are mainly subject to the client network; COS doesn't limit its own speed.
Maintenance
CBS
CBS has a fixed capacity, which can be expanded in the console or via TencentCloud API. After expansion, you need to add partitions on the operating system, and partition exceptions may occur, which incur certain maintenance costs.
COS
COS is used on demand and doesn't limit the total capacity or the number of objects (files), so it requires no maintenance at all.
Data security
Both CBS and COS use methods such as multi-copy to guarantee the data reliability.
Building the Nextcloud Server Runtime Environment
Preparing Tencent Cloud products on which the Nextcloud server depends
1. Log in to the COS console (you need to activate COS first if you use it for the first time), go to the Bucket List page, click Create Bucket, and configure as follows:
Configuration Item
Value
Name
Enter a custom bucket name such as `nextcloud`. Note that the name cannot be changed once confirmed.
Region
Select the region of the CVM instance.
Other
Keep the default settings.
2. After setting the above configuration items, click OK.
Installing and configuring the web server and PHP runtime
Installing Nginx
1. Use an SSH tool to log in to the newly purchased server.
2. Run the following command to install Nginx:
yum install nginx
If the following information is displayed, press Y and Enter to confirm the installation (repeat the same operation for similar information).
Is this ok [y/d/N]:
3. If the following information is displayed, the installation is completed:
Complete!
[root@VM-0-10-centos ~]#
4. Run the following command to check whether the Nginx version can be viewed normally:
nginx -v
If the following information is displayed, the installation is completed:
nginx version: nginx/1.16.1
Installing PHP
1. Use an SSH tool to log in to the newly purchased server.
2. Run the following command to install PHP 7.4:
yum install epel-release yum-utils
3. Run the following commands in sequence:
Command 1:
If command execution is too slow or stuck for a long time, you can press Ctrl + C to cancel the execution and run the command again (same for the following commands).
Command 2:
yum-config-manager --enable remi-php74
Command 3:
yum install php php-fpm
4. After the installation, run the following command to check whether the PHP version can be viewed normally:
php -v
If the following information is displayed, the installation is completed:
In addition to the basic part of PHP, Nextcloud also depends on other PHP modules to implement some features. For more information on the modules on which Nextcloud depends, see Prerequisites for manual installation.
In this example, the PHP modules required by Nextcloud are installed. If you want to use other optional features of Nextcloud, find and install the PHP modules depended on by yourself.
1. Use an SSH tool to log in to the newly purchased server.
2. Run the following command to install the PHP modules:
3. After the installation, run the following command to view the installed PHP modules:
php -m
4. To install another module, simply run yum install <php-module-name> again.
Uploading and decompressing the Nextcloud server code
1. Download the latest installation package of the Nextcloud server from the Nextcloud website and upload it to the /var/www/ directory on the server as follows:
1. Run the wget command to directly download the installation package from the server. For example, after entering the /var/www/ directory, run the following command: wget https://download.nextcloud.com/server/releases/nextcloud-19.0.1.zip.
2. Download the installation package to the local PC and upload it to the /var/www/ directory through SFTP or SCP.
3. Download the installation package to the local PC and upload it through lrzsz as follows:
3.1 Use an SSH tool to log in to the newly purchased server.
3.2 Run yum install lrzsz to install lrzsz.
3.3 Run cd /var/www/ to enter the target directory.
3.4 Run rz -bye and select the Nextcloud server installation package downloaded to the local PC in the SSH tool (the operation varies by tool).
4. Use an SSH tool to log in to the newly purchased server.
5. Run unzip nextcloud-<version>.zip to decompress the installation package such as unzip nextcloud-19.0.1.zip.
Configuring PHP
1. Use an SSH tool to log in to the newly purchased server.
2. Run vim /etc/php-fpm.d/www.conf to open the PHP-FPM configuration file and modify the following configuration items (for detailed directions on how to use Vim, see its documentation; you can also modify the configuration file in other ways):
1. Change user = apache to user = nginx.
2. Change group = apache to group = nginx.
3. After the modification, enter :wq to save the file and exit Vim (for detailed directions on how to use Vim, see its documentation).
4. Run the following command to change the directory owner to make PHP compatible with Nginx:
chown -R nginx:nginx /var/lib/php
5. Run the following commands in sequence and start the PHP-FPM service:
Command 1:
systemctl enable php-fpm # Command 1
Command 2:
systemctl start php-fpm # Command 2
Configuring Nginx
1. Use an SSH tool to log in to the newly purchased server.
2. Run the following command to change the website directory owner:
chown -R nginx:nginx /var/www
3. Back up the current Nginx configuration file /etc/nginx/nginx.conf as follows:
1. Run cp /etc/nginx/nginx.conf ~/nginx.conf.bak to back up the current configuration file to the HOME directory.
2. Use SFTP or SCP to download the current configuration file to the local PC.
3. Change /etc/nginx/nginx.conf to the following content:
# For more information on configuration, see:
# * Official English Documentation: http://nginx.org/en/docs/
user nginx;
worker_processes auto;
error_log /var/log/nginx/error.log;
pid /run/nginx.pid;
# Load dynamic modules. See /usr/share/doc/nginx/README.dynamic.
include /usr/share/nginx/modules/*.conf;
events {
worker_connections 1024;
}
http {
log_format main '$remote_addr - $remote_user [$time_local] "$request" '
'$status $body_bytes_sent "$http_referer"'
'"$http_user_agent" "$http_x_forwarded_for"';
access_log /var/log/nginx/access.log main;
sendfile on;
tcp_nopush on;
tcp_nodelay on;
keepalive_timeout 65;
types_hash_max_size 2048;
include /etc/nginx/mime.types;
default_type application/octet-stream;
# Load modular configuration files from the /etc/nginx/conf.d directory.
# See http://nginx.org/en/docs/ngx_core_module.html#include
3. On the left sidebar, select Overview and record the information in Bucket Name and Region in Basic Information.
Getting the API key
We recommend you use a sub-account key and follow the principle of least privilege to reduce risks. For information about how to obtain a sub-account key, see Access Key.
Modifying the Nextcloud server configuration file
1. Use a text editor to create the config.php file, enter the following content, and modify relevant values according to the comments:
<?php
$CONFIG=array(
'objectstore'=>array(
'class'=>'\\\\OC\\\\Files\\\\ObjectStore\\\\S3',
'arguments'=>array(
'bucket'=>'nextcloud-1250000000',// Bucket name
'autocreate'=>false,
'key'=>'AKIDxxxxxxxx',// Replace it with your `SecretId`
'secret'=>'xxxxxxxxxxxx',// Replace it with your `SecretKey`
'hostname'=>'cos.<Region>.myqcloud.com',// Change `<Region>` to the bucket region such as `ap-shanghai`
'use_ssl'=>true,
),
),
);
As shown below:
2. Save the file and upload it to the /var/www/nextcloud/config/ directory (keep the filename config.php) through SFTP or SCP or by running the rz -bye command.
3. Run the following command to change the owner of the configuration file:
If you want to use your own domain name but not an IP address to access your Nextcloud server, you can register a domain name, resolve it to your CVM IP address, and get the ICP filing for it as instructed in the documentation of your domain registrar.
As the Nextcloud server will record the domain name or IP address used during installation, we recommend you register, resolve, and get the ICP filing for a domain name before installation and use the domain name to go to the security page of the Nextcloud server.
If you need to change the domain name or IP address after installing the Nextcloud server, you can modify trusted_domains in the /var/www/nextcloud/config/config.php configuration file on your own as instructed in Trusted domains.
Installing the Nextcloud Server
1. Access the Nextcloud server in the browser. Create an admin account and record the admin username and password.
2. Expand Storage & database and configure as follows:
Configuration Item
Value
Data folder
/var/www/nextcloud/data (keep the default value)
Configure the database
MySQL/MariaDB
Database user
root
Database password
Password of the `root` user entered during TencentDB for MySQL initialization.
Database name
nextcloud (or another unused name)
Database host (`localhost` is displayed by default)
Private network address of the TencentDB for MySQL instance
3. Click Finish setup and wait for the Nextcloud server to be installed.
4. If an error such as 504 Gateway Timeout is displayed during installation, you can directly refresh the page and try again.
5. After the installation, log in to the Nextcloud server with the admin account to use Nextcloud on web.
Nextcloud Server Debugging
Background job
The Nextcloud server sometimes needs to execute some background jobs like database cleanup when there are no user interactions. As the PHP operation characteristics prevent PHP-based programs from maintaining an independent worker process or thread internally, you need to proactively call the corresponding PHP program externally to execute such background jobs.
The Nextcloud server offers three background job call methods. By default, the browser will initiate an Ajax request to start a server background job to execute it if you log in on the web client. However, this method depends greatly on your login status. If there are no users logged in, such background jobs cannot be executed, so this method is the least reliable.
To solve the problem of low reliability of Ajax-based background job execution, we recommend you use cron on Linux to configure background jobs. cron can accurately control the time when a job is started such as every five minutes (the number of minutes must be an integral multiple of five) or the 10th minute at each o'clock. The customizable time granularities include minute, hour, day of month, month, and day of week and even second and year on certain operating systems. Therefore, this method is highly flexible. For more information on and configuration of cron, see cron documentation.
The following steps describe how to configure cron to support Nextcloud server background jobs:
1. Use an SSH tool to log in to the newly purchased server.
2. Run the following command to install the PHP modules:
yum install php-posix
3. Run the following command to open or create a cron configuration for the nginx account:
crontab -u nginx -e
4. The editor used here is Vi/Vim. Press i to enter the editing mode and insert the following line:
*/5 * * * * php -f /var/www/nextcloud/cron.php
Press ESC to exit the editing mode and enter :wq to save the file and exit the editor (for detailed directions on how to use Vi/Vim, see its documentation).
In the above configurations, the officially recommended execution frequency of once every five minutes is set. After the background jobs are executed in five minutes, you can open the browser, log in to the Nextcloud server, click the first letter of your username in the top-right corner to enter the Settings page, select Administration > Basic Settings on the left sidebar, and you can see that Cron is selected by default in Background jobs.
Memory cache
PHP can use OPcache to improve the performance, and the Nextcloud server also can use the APCu memory cache to further improve the performance. You can configure as follows:
1. Use an SSH tool to log in to the newly purchased server.
2. Run the following command to install the PHP modules:
yum install php-pecl-apcu
3. Run the following commands in sequence to restart Nginx and PHP-FPM:
Command 1:
systemctl restart nginx
Command 2:
systemctl restart php-fpm
4. Run vim /var/www/nextcloud/config/config.php to open the configuration file of the Nextcloud server, add the line 'memcache.local' => '\\OC\\Memcache\\APCu', in $CONFIG = array (, save the file, and exit the editor.
5. If cron is configured to optimize the background jobs, you need to modify the apc configuration in PHP as follows: Run vim /etc/php.d/40-apcu.ini to open the PHP APCu configuration file, change ;apc.enable_cli=0 to apc.enable_cli=1 (note that the semicolon at the beginning needs to be removed), save the file, and exit the editor. If the /etc/php.d/40-apcu.ini path doesn't exist, search for and edit the .ini configuration file whose name contains apc or apcu in the /etc/php.d/ directory.
Configuring Client Access
Nextcloud provides official desktop sync clients and mobile clients, which can be downloaded from the Nextcloud official website or the app stores of different platforms. When configuring Nextcloud, you need to enter its server address (domain name or IP) and your username and password to log in to and use the client.
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