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Installation via package managers (Debian/Ubuntu)

Ferron 3 has official packages available for Debian, Ubuntu, and derivatives. Below are the instructions on how to install Ferron 3 on Debian or Ubuntu via a package manager.

Installation steps⁠#

1. Add the Ferron repository⁠#

To add the Ferron repository, run the following commands (applicable for Debian and Ubuntu). If you use a derivative, replace $(lsb_release -cs) with the closest matching Debian or Ubuntu version codename:

# Install packages required for adding a new repository
sudo apt install curl gnupg2 ca-certificates lsb-release debian-archive-keyring

# Add the public PGP key
curl https://deb.ferron.sh/signing.pgp | gpg --dearmor | sudo tee /usr/share/keyrings/ferron-keyring.gpg >/dev/null

# Add a new Debian package repository
echo "deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/ferron-keyring.gpg] https://deb.ferron.sh $(lsb_release -cs) main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ferron.list

# Fetch the package lists
sudo apt update

2. Install Ferron⁠#

To install Ferron 3, run the following command:

sudo apt install ferron3
Tip

Keep Ferron up to date by running sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade ferron3.

FIPS-certified cryptography variant⁠#

A FIPS-certified variant is available as the ferron3-fips package. Install it if you must run Ferron in a FIPS-compliant environment:

sudo apt install ferron3-fips

The ferron3-fips package conflicts with the standard ferron3 package, so you cannot install both at the same time. A FIPS build restricts cryptography to FIPS-approved algorithms: OCSP stapling, TLS cipher suites and key exchange groups are filtered, and HTTP basic auth password verification accepts only PBKDF2 hashes (Argon2 and scrypt are rejected).

3. Access the web server⁠#

By default, Ferron serves content from the /var/www/ferron directory. Open a web browser and navigate to http://localhost to check if the server works and serves the default index.html file.

If you see a “Ferron is installed successfully!” message on the page, the web server works correctly.

Tip

If you cannot access the server from another machine, make sure your firewall allows incoming connections on port 80. If port 80 is in use, change the listen port in /etc/ferron/ferron.conf and reload the service.

File structure⁠#

Ferron 3 installed via the package for Debian/Ubuntu has the following file structure:

  • /usr/sbin/ferron - Ferron web server
  • /usr/sbin/ferron-fmt - Ferron configuration formatter
  • /usr/sbin/ferron-kdl2ferron - Ferron configuration conversion tool
  • /usr/sbin/ferron-passwd - Ferron user password generation tool
  • /usr/sbin/ferron-precompress - Ferron static files precompression tool
  • /usr/sbin/ferron-serve - Ferron zero-configuration static file serving
  • /var/log/ferron/access.log - Ferron access log in Combined Log Format
  • /var/log/ferron/error.log - Ferron error log
  • /var/www/ferron - the Ferron web root
  • /etc/ferron/ferron.conf - Ferron configuration

Managing the Ferron service⁠#

Stopping the service⁠#

To stop the Ferron service, run:

sudo systemctl stop ferron

Restarting the service⁠#

To restart the service:

sudo systemctl restart ferron

Reloading the configuration⁠#

To reload the configuration without restarting the service:

sudo systemctl reload ferron