Complete Server-Side Cheat-Sheet for WordPress on Ubuntu 24.04 (Apache, MariaDB, SSL & Speed Tweaks)

0. Prerequisites & Stack We’re Using

SSH in as root (or a sudo user) before running anything:

ssh root@YOUR_SERVER_IP

1. Essential Commands (do these first)

1.1 System update & common tools

apt update && apt upgrade -y
apt install unzip curl git htop -y

1.2 LAMP stack & PHP extras

apt install apache2 mariadb-server php php-{fpm,cli,common,mbstring,zip,gd,curl,xml,imagick,redis,mysql} -y
systemctl enable --now apache2 mariadb php8.3-fpm

1.3 Add Domain example.com.bd

Create a Virtual Host:

sudo mkdir -p /var/www/xemum.com.bd
sudo chown -R $USER:$USER /var/www/xemum.com.bd

Create the config:

<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerName xemum.com.bd
    ServerAlias www.xemum.com.bd
    DocumentRoot /var/www/xemum.com.bd

    <Directory /var/www/xemum.com.bd>
        Options Indexes FollowSymLinks
        AllowOverride All
        Require all granted
    </Directory>

    ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/xemum_error.log
    CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/xemum_access.log combined
</VirtualHost>

Enable it:

sudo a2ensite xemum.com.bd
sudo a2enmod rewrite
sudo systemctl reload apache2

1.4 SSL (already Sectigo)

# Copy your Sectigo CRT & CA bundle to /etc/ssl/certs/
nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/xemum.com.bd-le-ssl.conf   # or create one
# -> set SSLCertificateFile /etc/ssl/certs/xemum.com.bd.crt
# -> set SSLCertificateChainFile /etc/ssl/certs/SectigoBundle.crt
systemctl reload apache2

Verify:

openssl s_client -connect xemum.com.bd:443 -servername xemum.com.bd \
  </dev/null | openssl x509 -noout -issuer -dates

1.5 Secure MariaDB & make WordPress DB

mysql_secure_installation        # set root-sql password, remove test DB

mysql -u root -p <<'SQL'
CREATE DATABASE xemumbd DEFAULT CHARACTER SET utf8mb4 COLLATE utf8mb4_unicode_ci;
CREATE USER 'xemumbd'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'Pass@12345';
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON xemumbd.* TO 'xemumbd'@'localhost';
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
SQL

1.6 PHPMyAdmin (optional GUI)

apt install phpmyadmin -y   # choose Apache, then “dbconfig-common”, set phpmyadmin pwd

Access: https://xemum.com.bd/phpmyadmin/

1.7 Redis object cache

apt install redis-server php-redis -y
systemctl enable --now redis-server
redis-cli ping          # returns PONG

1.8 Correct WordPress file ownership & FS method

cd /var/www/xemum.com.bd
chown -R www-data:www-data .
find . -type d -exec chmod 755 {} \;
find . -type f -exec chmod 644 {} \;

# ensure direct writes (no FTP prompt)
sed -i "/stop editing/i\define( 'FS_METHOD', 'direct' );" wp-config.php

2. Optional / Nice-to-Have Commands

3. Troubleshooting / Fix Commands

4. Quick Reboot & Update Workflow

# install kernel patches
apt update && apt full-upgrade -y
reboot            # disconnects PuTTY; reconnect after ~30 s

# after login
uptime            # check fresh boot

🎉 You’re Production-Ready!