The virtual machine images are specially designed to work with a minimum of configuration.

If you are using an image in production or want to try out advanced features, it can be useful to know these technical details. Note that these details are the same for both VMWare and VirtualBox images.

Using the VM command line

You will occasionally need to access the command line in the VM (for example, to perform software updates).

You can log in to the server command line by selecting the Login to server option from the menu. The username is root and the password is whatever you specified when you were first setting up the VM.

Note that you are logging in with the Linux root account, which is completely separate from your Deskpro admin account.

VM configuration details

The image uses Ubuntu Linux 14.04, php 7.0 and the nginx webserver.

Elasticsearch (required for full-text search) is installed and running.

Deskpro uses a MySQL database. The MySQL password is randomised when you first run the image; you can find out what it is by looking at config.database.php in the install folder.

The folder where Deskpro is installed is:

/usr/share/nginx/html/deskpro
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The path to PHP is:

usr/bin/php
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On Linux, Deskpro uses a cron job to run scheduled tasks (like checking for new emails). The file used to configure the cron job is:

/etc/cron.d/deskpro
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You should not need to edit this file.

The default cron job is

* * * * * deskpro /usr/bin/php /usr/share/nginx/html/deskpro/cron.php
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which simply runs the cron.php file in the Deskpro install directory once per minute.

VM networking options

The Advanced menu option enables you to access the Networking menu to change networking settings for the VM. By default, the VM will try to connect to your network using DHCP.

If you want to assign a static IP address (recommended for production use), select the Static IP option. Remember to go to Admin > Setup > Settings and change the Helpdesk URL to include the new IP.

Note that with VirtualBox, you must always run the VM with the Bridged Adapter network setting (in Settings > Network in the VirtualBox interface).