Install Apache OpenMeetings on Ubuntu 16.04 | 18.04 with MariaDB

OpenMeetings is a cross-platform, free open source, Apache project that provides video conferencing, instant messaging, white board and document collaborations for individuals and businesses. This app is a Java based app and similar to WebEx and other remote conference tools, it can be used for online training and many more.

This brief tutorial is going to show students and new users how to install OpenMeetings on Ubuntu 16.04 | 18.04 with MariaDB support.

There are four primary audio/video options available when using OpenMeetins. These are: audio + video, audio only, video only, and picture only.

You can also record sessions with advanced file explorer with drag n’ drop interface, multi-whiteboard and chat, user management and more.

For more about OpenMeetings, please visit its homepage.

Step 1: Install Oracle JAVA 8

To support OpenMeetings, make sure to have Java installed. To do that, run the commands below. The easiest way to install Oracle Java JDK 8 on Ubuntu is via a third party PPA… To add that PPA, run the commands below.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:webupd8team/java

After running the commands above, you should see a prompt to accept the PPA key onto Ubuntu… accept and continue

Now that the PPA repository has been added to Ubuntu, run the commands below to download Oracle Java 8 installer…. the installer should install the latest Java JDK 8 on your Ubuntu machines.

sudo apt update
sudo apt install oracle-java8-installer

When you run the commands above you’ll be prompted to access the license terms of the software… accept and continue.

Set Oracle JDK8 as default, to do that, install the oracle-java8-set-default package. This will automatically set the JAVA env variable.

sudo apt install oracle-java8-set-default

Now that JAVA is installed, run the commands below to set its home directory.

sudo nano /etc/environment

Then copy and paste the hightlighted line below and save the file.

PATH="/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/games:/usr/local/games"
JAVA_HOME=/usr/lib/jvm/java-8-oracle
export JAVA_HOME

After that run the commands below.

source /etc/environment

When you run echo $JAVA_HOME you should now see Java home directory.

Step 2: Install Required Dependencies for OpenMeetings

After instaling Java, run the commands below to install dependencies for OpenMeetingts.

sudo apt install imagemagick ghostscript jodconverter dnsutils build-essential zlib1g-dev libxt6 libxrender1 ffmpeg sox

Step 3: Install MariaDB Database Server

MariaDB database server is a great place to start when looking at open source database servers to use with OpenMeetings. To install MariaDB run the commands below.

sudo apt-get install mariadb-server mariadb-client

After installing MariaDB, the commands below can be used to stop, start and enable MariaDB service to always start up when the server boots.

Run these on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS

sudo systemctl stop mysql.service
sudo systemctl start mysql.service
sudo systemctl enable mysql.service

Run these on Ubuntu 17.10 and 18.04 LTS

sudo systemctl stop mariadb.service
sudo systemctl start mariadb.service
sudo systemctl enable mariadb.service

After that, run the commands below to secure MariaDB server by creating a root password and disallowing remote root access.

sudo mysql_secure_installation

When prompted, answer the questions below by following the guide.

Enter current password for root (enter for none): Just press the Enter
Set root password? [Y/n]: Y
New password: Enter password
Re-enter new password: Repeat password
Remove anonymous users? [Y/n]: Y
Disallow root login remotely? [Y/n]: Y
Remove test database and access to it? [Y/n]: Y
Reload privilege tables now? [Y/n]: Y

Restart MariaDB server

After installing MariaDB, run the commands below to create a database for OpenMeetings.

To logon to MariaDB database server, run the commands below.

sudo mysql -u root -p

Then create a database called openmeetings

CREATE DATABASE openmeetings;

Create a database user called openmeetingsuser with new password

CREATE USER 'openmeetingsuser'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'new_password_here';

Then grant the user full access to the database.

GRANT ALL ON openmeetings.* TO 'openmeetingsuser'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'user_password_here' WITH GRANT OPTION;

Finally, save your changes and exit.

FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
EXIT;

Step 4: Downlaod and Install OpenMeetings

Now that Java and MariaDB are installed and configured, run the commands below to downlaod OpenMeetings package.

cd /tmp && wget

Once the download is completed extract the downloaded file with the following command:

sudo mkdir -p /opt/openmeetings
sudo tar xvf apache-openmeetings-4.0.4.tar.gz -C /opt/openmeetings

Next, install Java MySQL connector by running the commands below.

sudo apt-get install libmysql-java
sudo cp /usr/share/java/mysql-connector-java.jar /opt/openmeetings/webapps/openmeetings/WEB-INF/lib/

Finally, run the commands below to start OpenMeetings process.

cd /opt/openmeetings
sudo sh red5.sh openmeetings

OpenMeetings should now be started and listening on port 5080.

Open your browser and browse to the server hostname or IP address followed by port 5080/openmeetings

Select MySQL database connection. By default OpenMeetings uses its internal integrated Apache Derby database. in a production environment, you may want to use MySQL or MariaDB. Select it and type in the database info you created above and continue.