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Install WordPress Pete on Digital Ocean (Production)

1 — Provision the server

  1. Go to DigitalOcean and log in (create an account if you don’t already have one).
  2. In the left menu, click Droplets → Create Droplet.
  3. Choose an image:
    • Select Ubuntu 24.04 LTS (x64).
  4. Choose a plan:
    • For WordPress Pete in production, select the Regular / Premium Droplet with at least:
    • CPU: 4 vCPUs
    • Memory: 8 GB RAM
    • Disk: 160 GB SSD
    • Transfer: 5 TB bandwidth
  5. Choose datacenter region:
    • Pick the closest region to your users (e.g., New York, San Francisco, Amsterdam).
  6. Authentication:
    • Select SSH keys (recommended) and add your public SSH key, or use a strong root password.
  7. Finalize and create:
    • Name your Droplet (e.g., wordpress-pete-prod)
    • Enable Monitoring
    • Click Create Droplet
  8. Once provisioned, copy the public IP address of your Droplet.

2 — Connect over SSH

From your local terminal, replace <PUBLIC_SERVER_IP> with the server’s address and connect as root:

3 — Run the Pete installer

ssh root@<PUBLIC_SERVER_IP>

Paste the one-liner below into the SSH session; it downloads, makes executable, and launches the installer:

curl -o pete_installer.sh -L https://deploypete.com/pete_installer.sh && chmod 755 pete_installer.sh && sudo ./pete_installer.sh

4. Launch Pete in your browser

When the script completes, simply visit:

http://<YOUR_SERVER_IP>

5. (Optional — Recommended) Harden SSH & Firewall

Still connected as root, tighten basic security in one sweep

# ── Change SSH to a non-standard port (2222) ──
sed -i 's/^#\?Port .*/Port 2222/' /etc/ssh/sshd_config
systemctl restart ssh
# ── Refresh UFW rules ──
# drop old SSH port
ufw delete limit 22/tcp
# rate-limited new SSH port
ufw limit 2222/tcp
# Allow HTTP
ufw allow 80/tcp
# Allow HTTPS
ufw allow 443/tcp
ufw --force enable

Next time you connect:

ssh -p 2222 root@<YOUR_SERVER_IP>

System Passwords & Environment Variables

All secrets generated during installation—database credentials, API keys, reload tokens, etc.—live in /opt/wordpress-pete/.env

# View the file (read-only)<br />
sudo cat /opt/wordpress-pete/.env

Switching WordPress Pete to a Different PHP Version — Zero Downtime

1. Edit the version flag

Keep it safe

  • This file is the single source of truth for every password and token in your stack—treat it like a vault key.

  • Restrict access: chmod 600 /opt/wordpress-pete/.env (owner-read/write only).

  • Never commit it to version control or share it in support tickets.

sudo vim /opt/wordpress-pete/.env

Find PHP_VERSION= and set it to 8.1, 8.2, or 8.3. Save & exit.

2. Re-build the PHP image

docker compose build --no-cache php

3. Hot-swap the container

Launch the freshly built PHP container (no other services are touched)

docker compose up -d php

4. Verify

Sign back in to WordPress Pete and visit /admin/phpinfo to confirm the new PHP version is active.

Docker Compose Cheat-Sheet

Task Command (inside your project folder) When / Why you use it
WordPress Pete Docker project route cd /opt/wordpress-pete Browse to the project dir
Start or re-build the stack

cd /opt/wordpress-pete

docker compose pull
docker compose build
docker compose up -d
 Builds images if they changed and launches every service in the foreground. Hit Ctrl +C to stop.
Open a shell in a container

docker compose exec php bash

docker compose exec apache bash

docker compose exec mysql bash

 Inspect logs, run WP-CLI / Artisan, edit files quickly.
Re-build after editing a Dockerfile docker compose build --no-cache apache
docker compose build --no-cache php
docker compose build --no-cache mysql		 Forces a clean image rebuild for wordpress, apache, or php after you tweak their Dockerfile.
Delete all volumes (nuke-and-pave) bash docker compose down -v Stops containers and removes every named/anonymous volume—irreversible.
Restart Apache inside its container bash docker compose exec apache bash -c "apache2ctl restart" Applies v-host changes without recreating the whole stack.
Where Apache keeps v-hosts /etc/apache2/sites-available – staging configs /etc/apache2/sites-enabled – live symlinks Edit a file in sites-available, then run apache2ctl graceful (from inside the container).
Where Apache keeps the website files /var/www/html Pete files path:
/var/www/html/Pete
Enter MySQL as root docker compose exec mysql -u root -p (password = MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD in .env) Handy for one-off queries or importing .sql dumps.