In this tutorial we will learn to install Apache, MySQL, PHP on macOS Catalina 10.15.

About macOS Catalina

Apple released macOS Catalina 10.15 on 7th October 2019 and it includes Apache and PHP. So, all we have to do is enable them. Then install MySQL and we are ready for development. So, lets get started.

Homebrew’s package index. Homebrew complements macOS (or your Linux system). Install your RubyGems with gem and their dependencies with brew. “To install, drag this icon” no more. Homebrew Cask installs macOS apps, fonts and plugins and other non-open source software. $ brew install -cask firefox. Making a cask is as simple as creating a formula. Make sure to check out Part One, How To Install Apache on macOS 10.15 Catalina Using Homebrew, which is a pre-requisite for this piece. In the past, I used to rely on the version of Apache and PHP that came pre-loaded with the OS on my MacBook Pro.

Note! Support for 32 bit apps is removed in Catalina so, all your 32 bit applications will no longer work. Kindly upgrade your applications.

Apple has also made zsh as the default shell. You can learn more about it here.

To change the default shell check the tutorial How to change default shell to bash on macOS Catalina.

We will be using the pre-installed Apache and PHP and we will download and setup MySQL database.

If you are using macOS Mojave then check out this tutorial How to install Apache, MySQL, PHP on macOS Mojave 10.14

Lets go ahead and configure our LAMP stack development environment on macOS Catalina.

Apache

The new macOS Catalina comes with Apache pre-installed. All we have to do is switch it on.

Open Terminal using macOS Spotlight or go to /Applications/Utilities and open Terminal.

To check the version of Apache installed run the following command in the Terminal.

Note! macOS Catalina comes with Apache 2.4.41

To start Apache web server run the following command.

This command will start Apache server.

When you use sudo in the terminal then you will be prompted to enter your admin password to proceed.

If you want to stop the Apache server then run the following command.

And to restart Apache server run the following command.

After starting Apache server go ahead and test it by opening a browser like Safari or Chrome and visit http://localhost.

You will get to see the following output in your browser.

By default, the file is getting served from /Library/WebServer/Documents directory. We will change this is the following sections.

In case you don't get to see the above output then run the following command to check the error.

Document Root

This is the location in the computer file system from where the files are accessed when we visit the http://localhost in a browser.

Document Root is a directory where we put our website files.

On Mac we have two document root. One is at the system level and the other is at the user level.

System level document root

The system level document root in macOS Catalina is located in the following directory.

User level document root

For the user level we can create a directory called Sites in user directory. So, open Terminal and get ready to create the user level document root directory.

Creating Sites directory

Run the following command in the Terminal to switch to the user home directory.

Now, run the following command to create the Sites directory.

You can merge the above two commands into one by running the following command.

For me the user document root path is the following.

You will get a similar path for your Mac.

Creating username.conf file

Now, we will create a username.conf file to configure our document root.

Note! Replace the username with your username.

For example, my username is yusufshakeel so, my file is yusufshakeel.conf.

Type the whoami command in the terminal and it will tell you your username.

Open terminal and go to the following directory.

Now create the configuration file username.conf inside the users directory.

In the following example I am using vi editor. You can use other editors like vim or nano.

Press the i key to enter into INSERT mode and then type the following in the file.

Don't forget to replace YOUR_USER_NAME with your username.

Here is what I have written in my yusufshakeel.conf file.

Brew Install Mac Catalina Os

Now, come out of the INSERT mode by pressing the Esc key. Now save the file and exit by typing the following :wq and then hit Enter.

The permission of this file should be the following.

You can change the permission by typing the following command.

Where, username is your username that you have set.

Configuring the httpd.conf file

Now we switch to apache2 directory by typing the following command in the Terminal.

Inside this directory we have the httpd.conf file.

As a good practice we will make a backup copy of the httpd.conf file by typing the following command.

Now open the httpd.conf file using vi and uncomment the following lines.

To uncomment the lines remove the # from the start of the line.

Uncomment the following line for User home directories.

Now change the DocumentRoot.

Find the following lines and comment them by adding # at the beginning of the line.

And add the following two lines below the commented lines.

Don't forget to replace YOUR_USERNAME with your username.

And set the AllowOverride None to AllowOverride All.

Your DocumentRoot should now look something like the following.

Now, come out of the INSERT mode by pressing the Esc key. And save and exit the file by typing :wq key and then Enter.

Configuring the httpd-userdir.conf file

Now, time to make some changes in the httpd-userdir.conf file.

In the terminal type the following command to go to the extra directory.

As a good practice create a backup copy of the httpd-userdir.conf file.

Now open the file using vi.

Enter into INSERT mode and uncomment the following line.

Now, come out of the INSERT mode and save the changes.

Now, check if everything is configured properly by typing the given command.

Now restart Apache using the following command.

PHP

macOS Catalina comes with PHP 7.3.8 pre-installed.

To check the version of PHP in the Terminal type the following command.

Now we go to the apache2 directory.

Next, we open the httpd.conf file.

Now, enter into INSERT mode and uncomment the following line to run PHP 7 by removing the # sign from the start of the line.

Now, save the changes and exit the file by typing :wq keys and hit Enter.

You can now restart Apache by running the following command.

Printing phpinfo

Create index.php file inside the Sites directory.

Now open the file in your favourite text editor or PHP IDE and write the following code.

Now, visit http://localhost and you will get to see a similar output.

Download MySQL community server

Head over to mysql.com website and download the latest version of the MySQL Community Server.

Download and run the installer and follow the steps to install MySQL database on your Mac.

Set the root password when prompted and note it down.

To run MySQL server open System Preferences and go to MySQL.

Click on the Start MySQL Server button to start the server.

You will be asked to enter your admin password. Enter the password and the MySQL server will start running.

Extra

To access your MySQL database tables you can either use phpMyAdmin, MySQL Workbench or Sequel Pro.

Alright, this brings us to the end of this tutorial. Hope this helped. Please share if you find this website useful. Have fun developing. See you in the next tutorial.

Introduction

The command line interface is a non-graphical way to interact with your computer. Instead of clicking buttons with your mouse, you’ll type commands as text and receive text-based feedback. The command line, also known as a shell, lets you automate many tasks you do on your computer daily, and is an essential tool for software developers.

While the command line interface on macOS has a lot of the functionality you’d find in Linux and other Unix systems, it does not ship with a package manager. A package manager is a collection of software tools that work to automate software installations, configurations, and upgrades. Package managers keep the software they install in a central location and can maintain all software packages on the system in formats that are commonly used.

Homebrew is a package manager for macOS which lets you install free and open-source software using your terminal. You’ll use Homebrew to install developer tools like Python, Ruby, Node.js, and more.

In this tutorial you’ll install and use Homebrew on your Mac. You’ll install system tools and desktop applications from the command line interface.

Prerequisites

You will need a macOS computer running Catalina or higher with administrative access and an internet connection. While older versions of macOS may work, they are not officially supported.

Step 1 — Using the macOS Terminal

To access the command line interface on your Mac, you’ll use the Terminal application provided by macOS. Like any other application, you can find it by going into Finder, navigating to the Applications folder, and then into the Utilities folder. From here, double-click the Terminal application to open it up. Alternatively, you can use Spotlight by holding down the COMMAND key and pressing SPACE to find Terminal by typing it out in the box that appears.

To get more comfortable using the command line, take a look at An Introduction to the Linux Terminal. The command line interface on macOS is very similar, and the concepts in that tutorial are directly applicable.

Now that you have the Terminal running, let’s install some additional tools that Homebrew needs.

Step 2 — Installing Xcode’s Command Line Tools

Xcode is an integrated development environment (IDE) that is comprised of software development tools for macOS. You won’t need Xcode to use Homebrew, but some of the software and components you’ll want to install will rely on Xcode’s Command Line Tools package.

Execute the following command in the Terminal to download and install these components:

You’ll be prompted to start the installation, and then prompted again to accept a software license. Then the tools will download and install automatically.

You can now install Homebrew.

Step 3 — Installing and Setting Up Homebrew

To install Homebrew, you’ll download an installation script and then execute the script.

First, download the script to your local machine by typing the following command in your Terminal window:

The command uses curl to download the Homebrew installation script from Homebrew’s Git repository on GitHub.

Let’s walk through the flags that are associated with the curl command:

• The -f or --fail flag tells the Terminal window to give no HTML document output on server errors.
• The -s or --silent flag mutes curl so that it does not show the progress meter, and combined with the -S or --show-error flag it will ensure that curl shows an error message if it fails.
• The -L or --location flag will tell curl to handle redirects. If the server reports that the requested page has moved to a different location, it’ll automatically execute the request again using the new location.
• The -o switch specifies a local filename for the file. Rather than displaying the contents to the screen, the -o switch saves the contents into the file you specify.

Before running a script you’ve download from the Internet, you should review its contents so you know what the script will do. Use the less command to review the installation script so you understand what it will do'

Once you’re comfortable with the contents of the script, execute the script with the bash command:

The installation script will explain what it will do and will prompt you to confirm that you want to do it. This lets you know exactly what Homebrew is going to do to your system before you let it proceed. It also ensures you have the prerequisites in place before it continues.

You’ll be prompted to enter your password during the process. However, when you type your password, your keystrokes will not display in the Terminal window. This is a security measure and is something you’ll see often when prompted for passwords on the command line. Even though you don’t see them, your keystrokes are being recorded by the system, so press the RETURN key once you’ve entered your password.

Press the letter y for “yes” whenever you are prompted to confirm the installation.

Once the installation process is complete, you will want to put the directory Homebrew uses to store its executables at the front of the PATH environment variable. This ensures that Homebrew installations will be called over the tools that macOS includes.

The file you’ll modify depends on which shell you’re using. ZSH is the default shell on macOS Mojave and higher. The Bash shell is a popular shell that older versions of macOS used as the default, and if you’ve upgraded your OS, you may still be using Bash.

Execute the following command to determine your shell:

You’ll see either bash or zsh.

If you’re using ZSH, you’ll open the file ~/.zshrc in your editor:

If you’re using the Bash shell, you’ll use the file ~/.bash_profile:

Once the file opens up in the Terminal window, add the following lines to the end of the file:

The first line is a comment that will help you remember what this does if you open this file in the future.

To save your changes, hold down the CTRL key and the letter O, and when prompted, press the RETURN key. Then exit the editor by holding the CTRL key and pressing X. This will return you to your Terminal prompt.

To activate these changes, close and reopen your Terminal app. Alternatively, use the source command to load the file you modified.

If you modified .zshrc, execute this command:

If you modified .bash_profile, execute this command:

Once you have done this, the changes you have made to the PATH environment variable will take effect. They’ll be set correctly when you log in again in the future, as the configuration file for your shell is executed automatically when you open the Terminal app.

Now let’s verify that Homebrew is set up correctly. Execute this command:

If no updates are required at this time, you’ll see this in your Terminal:

Otherwise, you may get a warning to run another command such as brew update to ensure that your installation of Homebrew is up to date. Follow any on-screen instructions to fix your environment before moving on.

Step 4 — Installing, Upgrading, and Removing Packages

Now that Homebrew is installed, use it to download a package. The tree command lets you see a graphical directory tree and is available via Homebrew.

Install tree with the brew install command:

Homebrew will update its list of packages and then download and install the tree command:

Homebrew installs files to /usr/local by default, so they won’t interfere with future macOS updates. Verify that tree is installed by displaying the command’s location with the which command:

The output shows that tree is located in /usr/local/bin:

Run the tree command to see the version:

The version prints to the screen, indicating it’s installed:

Occasionally, you’ll want to upgrade an existing package. Use the brew upgrade command, followed by the package name:

You can run brew upgrade with no additional arguments to upgrade all programs and packages Homebrew manages.

When you install a new version, Homebrew keeps the older version around. After a while, you might want to reclaim disk space by removing these older copies. Run brew cleanup to remove all old versions of your Homebrew-managed software.

To remove a package you’re no longer using, use brew uninstall. To uninstall the tree command, execute this command:

The output shows that the package was removed:

You can use Homebrew to install desktop applications too.

Brew Install Mac Catalina Free

Step 5 — Installing Desktop Applications

You’re not restricted to using Homebrew for command-line tools. Homebrew Cask lets you install desktop applications. This feature is included with Homebrew, so there’s nothing additional to install.

Install Brew On Mac Catalina

Test it out by using Homebrew to install Visual Studio Code. Execute the following command in your terminal:

The application will install:

You’ll find the application in your Applications folder, just as if you’d installed it manually.

To remove it, use brew uninstall:

Homebrew will remove the installed software:

It performs a backup first in case the removal fails, but once the program is fully uninstalled, the backup is removed as well.

Step 6 — Uninstalling Homebrew

If you no longer need Homebrew, you can use its uninstall script.

Brew Install Mac Catalina Update

Download the uninstall script with curl:

As always, review the contents of the script with the less command to verify the script’s contents:

Once you’ve verified the script, execute the script with the --help flag to see the various options you can use:

The options display on the screen:

Use the -d flag to see what the script will do:

The script will list everything it will delete:

When you’re ready to remove everything, execute the script without any flags:

This removes Homebrew and any programs you’ve installed with it.

Conclusion

In this tutorial you installed and used Homebrew on your Mac. You can now use Homebrew to install command line tools, programming languages, and other utilities you’ll need for software development.

Homebrew has many packages you can install. Visit the official list to search for your favorite programs.