File permission problem on Ubuntu Lamp server

Question

Please don't mark it as duplicated. I've tried a lot but can't make it working.

I've installed LAMP using tasksel. Everything is fine but having file permission error (While installing WordPress I get this error "Sorry, but I can’t write the wp-config.php file." )

I can create the file manually but I don't want to do this. I wasn't to make it working correctly.

What I did to set up permission after installing lamp

cd /var/wwww/ sudo chown -R username:www-data /var/www/html/ sudo chmod 775 /var/www/html/ sudo chmod g+s /var/www/html/

Later I tried some solutions like sudo chown -R [USER NAME]:[USER NAME] /var/www which I found on askubuntu.

I don't know much about permission issue trying solution blindly.

Can you please help me on this to make it working? :)

Output of ls -l /var/www
Output of total 4 drwxrwsr-x 3 h3mdsa h3mdsa 4096 Jun 12 16:40 html
(Thanks @Jos for comment)

Thanks in advanced,
Md Al Amin

Solution

You were close: the directory /var/www/ should be owned by www-data (as a user) and www-data as a group. So the proper command, if things get messed up, is:

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www

Comments

[Jos]

At this point, what is the output of ls -l /var/www? Please add this to your question.

[Jos]

Try: sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www. That should work. You were close.

[alaminio]

Hey it works like a magic. Can you please tell me why sudo chown -R username:www-data /var/www/html/ didn't work? I used it on other machine 2 month ago. It worked but didn't work this time. Anyway thanks for help.

[Jos]

Hard to tell why that did work on the other machine - it shouldn't have worked. Apache2 runs with user name www-data and executes PHP statements as that user. Allow me to rewrite my comment as an answer.

[Rinzwind]

If Jos his answer is correct why is this NOT a duplicate? Hmm? @alamin72103 for instance: your method works but does need a change to groups: askubuntu.com/questions/353847/apache-permissions or askubuntu.com/questions/378351/… and many more ;)

[alaminio]

Hi @Rinzwind Thanks for your comment. I told on my question that I don't know much about permission issue. The first link you gave was not helpful for me because he told "I have added the www-data user to my user's group" I didn't know anything like that so I was like an alien word to me and I tried second liked accepted answer which I mentioned on my question. But your comment helped me. I was unable to create folder and file with mouse right click. After adding www-data user to my user's group everything is fine.Thank you for your comment.