Quick Guide to Implement WordPress On Docker in Just 10 Min?

Let’s move forward and configure our Docker compose for WordPress. One can do this by using Docker CLI, but here we are going to follow the more simple and systematic method that Docker compose. 

1. Create a new Directory “wordpress” for WordPress:

   mkdir ~/wordpress/

   then move into it: 

   cd ~/wordpress/

2. Create a new folder “.docker” in the newly created folder, this folder will contain all our extra config files:

   mkdir .docker

3. In this “.docker” folder create a file called “uploads.ini”, as the name stats it will provide us control on PHP configurations. Let’s put the content below, you can modify these or addon more based on your project needs –

   file_uploads = On 
   memory_limit = 128M 
   upload_max_filesize = 128M 
   post_max_size = 128M 
   max_execution_time = 120

4. Now create a file in “.docker” folder called “php-apache.conf”, this will set up Virtual Host for our us. Paste the content below, you can modify these or addon more based on your project needs –

   # Virtual Hosts 
   # 
   <VirtualHost *:80> 
       ServerAdmin webmaster@assetlibrary.test 
       DocumentRoot "/var/www/html" 
       ServerName example.wordpress 
       #ErrorLog "logs/example.wordpress-error.log" 
       #CustomLog "logs/example.wordpress-access.log" common 
   </VirtualHost>

    

5. Now let’s create a file “.env” in root folder that is “wordpress” this file contains all environment variables DB details etc., and paste the below content into it –

   # The table prefix (Required) of the WordPress database used in our website 
   # Ex. wp_ 
   db_table_prefix=wp_ 
     
   # You can disable any of the plugins that are not needed for development, ex. Bulletproof Security or any SEO plugin. 
   # Comma (,) separated list as a string (no spaces), leave blank if you don't want to disable plugins.  
   # Ex. plugin-folder-name-1,plugin-folder-name-2 
   wp_plugins_to_disable=  
   wp_debug_mode=0 
     
   #################################################### 
   ### Defaults - can be left as it is for basic usage #################################################### 
   db_host=assetsdb 
   db_user=asset_user 
   db_password=asset_pwd 
   db_name=asset_db 
   db_root_password=root 
   db_port=3309

    

6. Now let’s create a file called “docker-compose.yml”, here this is the main file that holds all the docker configurations for us. Paste the content below in the file. 
    
   Let’s understand a little about the configuration from this file. As you can see there are 2 heads of services and volumes.  
   A. There are 3 services db, wordpress, and phpmyadmin –
   db: Used official mysql image for this service, you can have a look here. 
   wordpress: I used an official wordpress image for this service, you can have a look here. 
   phpmyadmin: I used an official phpmyadmin image for this service, you can have a look here. 
    
   B. There is a volume named persistent, that is used for mysql. It means that our DB volume will be persistent whenever we start the container. One can change this name if he wants to, I used persistent to remember its feature.

       version: "3.9" 
            
       services: 
           db: 
               container_name: assetsdb 
               image: mysql 
               volumes: 
                   - ./dump:/docker-entrypoint-initdb.d 
                   - persistent:/var/lib/mysql 
               restart: always 
               ports:  
                   - '3309:3306' 
               environment: 
                   MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD: $db_root_password 
                   MYSQL_DATABASE: $db_name 
                   MYSQL_USER: $db_user 
                   MYSQL_PASSWORD: $db_password 
         
           wordpress: 
               #depends_on: 
               #  - db 
               links: 
                   - db 
               image: wordpress:latest 
               volumes: 
                   - ./wp-content:/var/www/html/wp-content 
                   - ./apache-logs:/var/log/apache2 
                   - ./.docker/php-apache.conf:/etc/apache2/sites-enabled/000-default.conf 
                   - ./.docker/uploads.ini:/usr/local/etc/php/conf.d/uploads.ini 
               ports: 
                   - "80:80" 
               restart: always 
               environment: 
                   WORDPRESS_DB_HOST: $db_host 
                   WORDPRESS_DB_USER: $db_user 
                   WORDPRESS_DB_PASSWORD: $db_password 
                   WORDPRESS_DB_NAME: $db_name 
                   WORDPRESS_TABLE_PREFIX: $db_table_prefix 
                   WORDPRESS_DEBUG: $wp_debug_mode 
                   DISABLED_PLUGINS: $wp_plugins_to_disable 
                          
           phpmyadmin: 
               image: phpmyadmin 
               restart: always 
               ports: 
                   - 8089:80 
               links:  
                   - db:db 
               environment: 
                   MYSQL_USER: $db_user 
                   MYSQL_PASSWORD: $db_password 
                   MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD: $db_root_password 
              
       volumes: 
           persistent: 

7. This is an optional step to follow, that is to add our Virtual Host in Operating System’s host file. 
   For Windows, with Administrative rights:  
   Hosts file (hosts) location of the in windows – c:\Windows\System32\Drivers\etc\hosts 
   For Linux, with root access use following command:

   sudo nano /etc/hosts

   Append the following line in the file: 

   127.0.0.1 example.wordpress

   Now you are ready to use your WordPress installation at the domain http://example.wordpress after running the container and then install WordPress in Docker Container.