Install SonarQube to Ubuntu Server (20.4)

1. Prepare your Ubuntu server.

• SSH to your Ubuntu server as a non-root user with sudo access.
• Update your server.

$ sudo apt update

$ sudo apt upgrade -y

2. Install OpenJDK 11

• Install OpenJDK 11.

$ sudo apt install -y openjdk-11-jdk

3. Install and Configure PostgreSQL

• Add PostgreSQL repository.

$ sudo sh -c 'echo "deb <http://apt.postgresql.org/pub/repos/apt/> lsb_release -cs-pgdg main" >> /etc/apt/sources.list.d/pgdg.list'

• Add PostgreSQL signing key.

$ wget -q <https://www.postgresql.org/media/keys/ACCC4CF8.asc> -O - | sudo apt-key add -

• Install PostgreSQL.

$ sudo apt install -y postgresql postgresql-contrib

• Enable DB server to start automatically on reboot.

$ sudo systemctl enable postgresql

• Start DB server.

$ sudo systemctl start postgresql

• Change the default PostgreSQL password.

$ sudo passwd postgres

• Switch to the postgres user.

$ su - postgres

• Create a user named sonar.

$ createuser sonar

• Log into PostgreSQL.

$ psql

• Set a password for the sonar user. Use a strong password in place of my_strong_password.

$ ALTER USER sonar WITH ENCRYPTED password 'my_strong_password';

• Create SonarQube database and set its owner to sonar.

$ CREATE DATABASE sonarqube OWNER sonar;

• Grant all privileges on SonarQube database to the user sonar.

$ GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON DATABASE sonarqube to sonar;

• Exit PostgreSQL.

$ \\q

• Return to your non-root sudo user account.

$ exit

4. Download and Install SonarQube

• Install the zip utility, which is needed to unzip the SonarQube files.

$ sudo apt install -y zip

• Locate the latest download URL from SonarQube official download page. At the time of writing this document, the download URL was as follows:

https://binaries.sonarsource.com/Distribution/sonarqube/sonarqube-9.0.1.46107.zip

• Download the SonarQube distribution files.

$ sudo wget <https://binaries.sonarsource.com/Distribution/sonarqube/sonarqube-9.0.1.46107.zip>

• Unzip the downloaded file.

$ sudo unzip sonarqube-9.0.1.46107.zip

• Move the unzipped files to /opt/sonarqube directory

$ sudo mv sonarqube-9.0.1.46107 /opt/sonarqube

5. Add SonarQube Group and User

• Create a sonar group.

$ sudo groupadd sonar

• Create a sonar user and set /opt/sonarqube as the home directory.

$ sudo useradd -d /opt/sonarqube -g sonar sonar

• Grant the sonar user access to the /opt/sonarqube directory.

$ sudo chown sonar:sonar /opt/sonarqube -R

6. Configure SonarQube

• Edit the SonarQube configuration file.

sudo nano /opt/sonarqube/conf/sonar.properties

Step 1: Find the following lines.

#sonar.jdbc.username= #sonar.jdbc.password=

Step 2: Uncomment the lines, and add the database user sonar and password my_strong_password you created in Section 3.

sonar.jdbc.username=sonar sonar.jdbc.password=my_strong_password

Step 3: Below those two lines, add sonar.jdbc.url.

sonar.jdbc.url=jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/sonarqube

Step 4: Save and exit the file.

• Edit the sonar script file.

$ sudo nano /opt/sonarqube/bin/linux-x86-64/sonar.sh

Step 1: About 50 lines down, locate this line.

#RUN_AS_USER=

Step 2: Uncomment the line and change it to.

RUN_AS_USER=sonar

Step 3: Save and exit the file.

7. Setup Systemd Service

• Create a systemd service file to start SonarQube at system boot.

$ sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/sonar.service

Step 1: Paste the following lines to the file.

[Unit] Description=SonarQube service After=syslog.target network.target

[Service] Type=forking

ExecStart=/opt/sonarqube/bin/linux-x86–64/sonar.sh start

ExecStop=/opt/sonarqube/bin/linux-x86–64/sonar.sh stop

User=sonar Group=sonar Restart=always

LimitNOFILE=65536 LimitNPROC=4096

[Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target

Step 2: Save and exit the file.

• Enable the SonarQube service to run at system startup.

$ sudo systemctl enable sonar

• Start the SonarQube service.

$ sudo systemctl start sonar

• Check the service status.

$ sudo systemctl status sonar

8. Modify Kernel System Limits

SonarQube uses Elasticsearch to store its indices in an MMap FS directory. It requires some changes to the system defaults.

• Edit the sysctl configuration file.

$ sudo nano /etc/sysctl.conf

Step 1: Add the following lines.

vm.max_map_count=262144 fs.file-max=65536 ulimit -n 65536 ulimit -u 4096

Step 2: Save and exit the file.

• Reboot the system to apply the changes.

$ sudo reboot

9. Access SonarQube Web Interface

• Access SonarQube in a web browser at your server’s IP address on port 9000. For example:

http://localhost:9000