Fresh Install

An opinionated bootstrap script for a fresh Ubuntu or Linux Mint web development workstation.

Requirements

• A recent Ubuntu or Linux Mint release (amd64)
• A regular user with sudo access
• An internet connection

Do not run the script directly as root.

Usage

chmod +x install.sh
./install.sh

To reboot automatically after installation:

REBOOT_AFTER_INSTALL=1 ./install.sh

To also start PHP 7 and MySQL 5.7 for legacy projects:

INSTALL_LEGACY_STACK=1 ./install.sh

Both options can be combined in the same execution.

Included Software

• Full system update
• Git, GitHub CLI, build tools, Composer, PHP CLI, and common PHP extensions
• MySQL/PostgreSQL clients and modern terminal utilities
• Node.js 24 LTS through NodeSource
• Docker Engine, Buildx, and Docker Compose from Docker's official repository
• Visual Studio Code, Brave, Syncthing, and MongoDB Compass
• Flatpak, Slack, DBeaver, Postman, Flatseal, and Obsidian
• Zsh and Oh My Zsh with Git, Docker, Compose, and history plugins
• An Ed25519 SSH key, while preserving an existing key
• A ~/www project directory

Local Services

The script starts MongoDB 7 through Docker Compose. PHP 7 and MySQL 5.7 belong to the optional legacy profile and start only with INSTALL_LEGACY_STACK=1. All ports are bound to 127.0.0.1:

• PHP: http://localhost:8080
• MySQL: localhost:3606
• MongoDB: localhost:27017

Configuration and randomly generated credentials are stored under ~/.config/fresh-install/ with user-only permissions. To manage the services:

docker compose --env-file ~/.config/fresh-install/services.env \
  -f ~/.config/fresh-install/compose.yaml ps

Log out and back in after installation to apply Docker group membership and the default shell.

Terminal Tools

The bootstrap installs the commands below. They do not replace traditional Unix tools; they provide convenient alternatives for recurring development tasks.

rg — text search

Ripgrep searches recursively and respects .gitignore. It is a fast alternative to common find and grep combinations:

rg "MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD"
rg "TODO" src tests
rg --files

jq — JSON processing

Use jq to read, filter, and format JSON from configuration files or API responses:

jq . package.json
curl -s https://api.example.com/items | jq '.[0]'

Keep filter expressions inside single quotes so the shell does not interpret their special characters.

shellcheck — shell analysis

ShellCheck detects unquoted variables, portability problems, and fragile shell constructs:

bash -n install.sh
shellcheck install.sh

bash -n validates syntax, while ShellCheck adds static analysis.

gh — GitHub CLI

Use GitHub CLI to authenticate, inspect issues, and work with pull requests without opening a browser:

gh auth login
gh repo view --web
gh pr create
gh pr checks

Run gh auth login once after installation. The package comes from the official GitHub CLI repository.

Other utilities

• tree: displays directory structures, for example tree -L 2.
• zip and unzip: create and extract ZIP archives.
• composer: manages PHP dependencies; run composer install inside a project.
• PHP extensions: cURL, Intl, Mbstring, MySQL, SQLite, XML, and ZIP.

Do not run Composer or npm with sudo. Project dependencies should belong to the regular user and be declared by the project.