Installing SimpleSAMLphp from the repository

These are some notes about running SimpleSAMLphp from the repository.

Prerequisites

Review the prerequisites from the main installation guide.

Installing from git

Go to the directory where you want to install SimpleSAMLphp:

cd /var

The master branch is not stable and targets the next major release. Pick a tag to use.

Then do a git clone:

git clone --branch <tag_name> https://github.com/simplesamlphp/simplesamlphp.git simplesamlphp

Initialize configuration and metadata:

cd /var/simplesamlphp
cp config/config.php.dist config/config.php
cp config/authsources.php.dist config/authsources.php
cp metadata/saml20-idp-hosted.php.dist metadata/saml20-idp-hosted.php
cp metadata/saml20-idp-remote.php.dist metadata/saml20-idp-remote.php
cp metadata/saml20-sp-remote.php.dist metadata/saml20-sp-remote.php

SimpleSAMLphp uses Symfony to maintain a cache which is by default stored at /var/cache/simplesamlphp . You are encouraged to consider something like the ACL commands from the Symfony website to enable access to this cache directory.

The cache directory is stored at the location indicated by the cachedir option in your config.php (defaulting to /var/cache/simplesamlphp ). This directory should exist and be writable by the web server user and the user you use to run composer.

Some commands which may be run from composer will want to clear this cache which leads to a situation that the cache directory will need permission to be updated by both the web server and also from your regular user account that you use to checkout the git repository and run composer.

This is why it is recommended to use the solution provided on the Symfony website linked above to enable access to this cache directory.

Install the external dependencies with Composer (you can refer to getcomposer.org to get detailed instructions on how to install Composer itself):

php composer.phar install

When installing on Windows, use:

php composer.phar install --ignore-platform-req=ext-posix

Upgrading

Go to the root directory of your SimpleSAMLphp installation:

cd /var/simplesamlphp

Ask git to update to update the local repository information:

git fetch origin

If you installed as described above, you will be using a tag for a specific release. You can see the current tag you are using and checkout a newer one with the below commands:

git branch
* (HEAD detached at v2.2.1)
git checkout v2.2.2

Install or upgrade the external dependencies with Composer:

php composer.phar install

When using Windows see the additional options for this composer command shown at the end of the installation step above.