The goal of this setup is to run the brep Apache2 modules from the development build while still being as close to the real deployment as possible. To this end, we use default, system-wide installations of both Apache2 and Postgres. In the below instructions replace with your login and www-data with the user under which Apache2 is running (See the "User" directive in the Apache2 .conf file). 0. Check Permissions Check that the files in the brep/ directory are readable by "others". If they are not, then run the following two commands to grant Apache2 read access: setfacl -Rdm g:www-data:rx brep setfacl -n -Rm g:www-data:rx brep And also for all the directories leading up to brep/, for example, if you have ~/projects/brep/, then: setfacl -m g:www-data:rx ~/ ~/projects [Note that strictly speaking www-data in the above two commands is the Apache2 group, not user. However, most installations use the same name for both.] 1. Create PostgreSQL User and Database $ sudo sudo -u postgres psql # Note: double sudo is not a mistake. CREATE DATABASE brep TEMPLATE template0 ENCODING 'UTF8' \ LC_COLLATE 'en_US.UTF8' LC_CTYPE 'en_US.UTF8'; CREATE USER ; GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON DATABASE brep TO ; CREATE USER "www-data" INHERIT IN ROLE ; Exit psql (^D), then make sure the logins work: $ psql -d brep $ sudo sudo -u www-data psql -d brep To troubleshoot, see PostgreSQL logs, for example: $ sudo tail -f /var/log/postgresql/*.log 2. Create Database Schema and Load the Repository All the commands are executed from brep project root. $ migrate/brep-migrate $ load/brep-load tests/load/r.conf # Or some other loader config. To verify: $ psql -d brep -c 'SELECT name, summary FROM repository' 3. Setup Apache2 Module Here we assume Apache2 is installed and you have an appropriate VirtualServer ready (the one for the default site is usually a good candidate). Open the corresponding Apache2 .conf file and add the following inside VirtualServer, replacing and with the actual absolute paths (if you built brep in the source tree, then the two would be the same). # Load the brep module. # LoadModule brep_module /brep/mod_brep.so # Repository root. Use / for web server root. And don't forget to also # update the Location and Alias directives below. # brep-root /pkg SetHandler brep DirectoryIndex disabled DirectorySlash Off # Brep module configuration. # brep-conf /etc/brep-module.conf # Static brep content (CSS files). # # Note: trailing slashes are important! # Alias /pkg/@/ /www/ /www"> Require all granted You may want to replace /etc/brep-module.conf with a custom configuration file if you often need to modify it. Restart Apache2 (use the second version for systemd): $ sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart $ sudo systemctl restart apache2 To verify, visit the repository root. To troubleshoot, see Apache logs, for example: $ sudo tail -f /var/log/apache2/error.log 4. Reloading During Development To do a "complete reload" (i.e., recreate database schema, load the repository data, and reload the Apache2 plugin), execute the following from brep/: migrate/brep-migrate --recreate load/brep-load tests/load/r.conf sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart sudo systemctl restart apache2