Install Webmin on Debian 11

Follow through this tutorial to learn how to install Webmin on Debian 11. Webmin is a web based control panel that allows system administrators to manage system administration tasks such as user account management, package management, e.t.c from the browser.

Installing Webmin on Debian 11

There are two ways in which you can install Webmin;

• Install Webmin from Webmin APT repository
• Install Webmin using Webmin DEB binary

Install Webmin from Webmin APT repository

Installing Webmin from its APT repos ensures that you can always fetch and install updates seamlessly as well deal with any required dependency automatically.

Create Webmin APT repository

Run the command below to install Webmin APT repo on Debian 11;

echo "deb https://download.webmin.com/download/newkey/repository stable contrib" | tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/webmin.list

Install Webmin Repo Signing Key

Once the Webmin APT repo is installed, run the command below to install the repository GPG signing key;

apt install sudo gnupg2 -y

wget -qO - https://download.webmin.com/developers-key.asc | gpg --dearmor > /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/webmin.gpg

Update System Package Cache

Next, update your system package cache;

apt update

Install Webmin from Webmin APT Repo

You can now install Webmin by running the command below;

apt install webmin -y

Install Webmin using Webmin DEB binary

You can also choose to download and install Webmin manually. With this method, you will have to deal with updates manually.

Update system package cache;

apt update

Download Webmin DEB Binary Installer

Navigate to Webmin download’s page download the Webmin DEB binary installer.

You can simply grab the download link and pull it using wget command. The version number varies. Be sure to check the downloads page.

curl -Ls -o webmin.deb https://www.webmin.com/download/deb/webmin-current.deb

Install Webmin using DEB Binary

To automatically deal with package dependencies when installing via the DEB binary, use the APT package manager;

apt install ./webmin.deb

Running Webmin

Once the installation is done, you can start Webmin by running the command below;

/etc/webmin/start

To confirm it is running, check to ensure port 10000/tcp is opened.

ss -altnp | grep 100

LISTEN 0      4096         0.0.0.0:10000      0.0.0.0:*    users:(("miniserv.pl",pid=3453,fd=5))

You can restart, reload and stop using the commands below, respectively.

/etc/webmin/restart

/etc/webmin/reload

/etc/webmin/stop

Accessing Webmin Web Interface

Webmin is now installed and ready for your system administration tasks. During the installation, you will see a message like;

...
Setting up webmin (1.981) ...
Webmin install complete. You can now login to https://debian11:10000/
as root with your root password, or as any user who can use sudo
to run commands as root.
...

The above highlighted line shows how you can access Webmin from browser.

Webmin listens on port 10000/tcp by default.

To allow external access, simply open this port on firewall if is running;

ufw allow 10000/tcp

You can then access Webmin from your browser, https://server-IP:10000.

Accept the self signed SSL warning and proceed to Webmin login interface. As stated above;

you can login as root with your root password, or as any user who can use sudo to run commands as root

The default Webmin dashboard showing system information.

On the left panel of the Webmin interface, you can access several other system administration settings.

Webmin is an awesome tool. Explore it further.

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Configure BIND DNS Server using Webmin on CentOS 8