GitLab CE (Community Edition) is a Git repository management system which is open source software and available for free under the MIT Expat license. Gitlab allows you to manage your Git repositories, review your codes, track issues, manage wikis etc. Moreover, it can be easily integrated with useful tools like Slack, JIRA, Hipchat, Jenkins etc. It can be installed and used on a Linux VPS. Today we will show you how to install GitLab on a virtual server running Linux as an operating system.

First of all, lets take a look at the GitLab’s system requirements. GitLab supports the following Linux distributions:
– Ubuntu
– Debian
– CentOS
– Scientific Linux
We offer all of these Linux distributions for our Linux Virtual Server hosting plans. Also, GitLab requires Ruby 2.1.x. Currently, GitLab does not work with Ruby version 2.2 or Ruby 2.3.

When it comes to hardware requirements, it is recommended to run GitLab on a system with 2GB of RAM and 2 CPU cores, which makes our SSD 2 VPS hosting plan very suitable.

If your server meets the GitLab’s system requirements, you can continue with the steps below.

Connect to your Linux server via SSH and update all your system software to the latest version available. If you run Ubuntu/Debian as an operating system you can execute the following command to do that:

apt-get update && apt-get -y upgrade

On CentOS, you should execute the following command:

sudo yum update

Your system will be up to date within few minutes.

Install GitLab on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS

To install GitLab on an Ubuntu Virtual Server running Ubuntu 14.04 as an operating system, you need to install and configure all the necessary dependencies.

sudo apt-get install postfix openssh-server curl ca-certificates

Next, go ahead and add the GitLab repository to your list of repositories:

curl -sS https://packages.gitlab.com/install/repositories/gitlab/gitlab-ce/script.deb.sh | sudo bash

To install the GitLab package, execute the following command:

sudo apt-get install gitlab-ce

Once the installation is completed, you can configure and start the GitLab service using the command below:

sudo gitlab-ctl reconfigure

Install GitLab on CentOS 7

To install GitLab on an CentOS Virtual Server running CentOS 7 as an operating system, you need to install and configure all the necessary dependencies.

Execute the commands below one by one:

sudo yum install postfix
sudo systemctl enable postfix
sudo systemctl start postfix
sudo yum install openssh-server openssh-clients policycoreutils curl
sudo systemctl enable sshd
sudo systemctl start sshd

Open HTTP access in the system firewall:

sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-service=http
sudo systemctl reload firewalld

Next, add the GitLab repository:

curl -sS https://packages.gitlab.com/install/repositories/gitlab/gitlab-ce/script.rpm.sh | sudo bash

Install the GitLab package using the following command:

sudo yum install gitlab-ce

Once the installation is completed, you can configure and start the GitLab service using the commands below:

sudo gitlab-ctl reconfigure

Access GitLab

To access GitLab you need to open your favorite web browser and enter the hostname of your server or your server IP address into the search bar. After your first login, you can change the username and the default password.

PS. If you liked this post please share it with your friends on the social networks using the buttons on the left or simply leave a reply below. Thanks.