Email/Webserver With Hestia

make sure reverse dns is configured for your server (the hostname step below has a bit more info)
- smtp servers do not like when this is not configured
(optional?) make a new dns entry pointed to the same A record (or CNAME) of the FQDN and append mail as a subdomain to the front

Start with a fresh install of a supported linux variant (see the download link for a list)
Configure your hostname
Download the hestia installer to the server
Run the installer (as root - not sudo)
- If you want to customize the install, you can find the options here, but the defaults are very sane and cover the needs of a personal web/email server (webserver/email server/spam filter/ftp/firewall/etc).
After checking some things, it will likely ask you if you want to remove ufw to be reinstalled (especially on Ubuntu since that comes preinstalled), choose yes
At the prompt, confirm you want to install
- enter the email address of the admin (not to be created, but to be contacted by)
- confirm the FQDN is correct
A username and password will be generated for you. Take note of these as you will need them to log in to the web console.
Reboot when prompted
Perform basic security modifications (change password, don't operate as admin, etc)

At some point, ideally before this, you'll want to set your DNS glue records on whatever domain your servers will be on.
On a second server, the one destined to be a DNS slave, again start with a few install of a supported linux variant
Download and install with the following options:
- bash hst-install.sh -v no -j no -m no -x no -t no
- This will not install ftp/email/mysql/etc as they are uneccessary for DNS
Follow prompts just like the first section
Reboot when prompted
Perform basic security modifications (change password, don't operate as admin, etc)
Create a new user on the slave server called dns-cluster
- details beyond the name username do not matter, but it's probably wise to leave ssh access to nologin
- Make sure the password is secure though
On your master server, from an admin command prompt, run
- v-add-remote-dns-host [slaveFQDNNoBrackets] [slaveControlPanelPort] admin [slaveAdminPasswordNoBrackets]
You can now confirm through the slave web control panel that dns zones are syncing over. (log into the dns-cluster user to view)

this document last modified: January 30 2020 02:36