The task was to install PHP 7.4 on an Ubuntu server (it is also possible on Debian). Vesta CP is used to manage my server and I’ll install PHP 7.4.8 via phpbrew.

Phpbrew pre-setup on Ubuntu/Debian server running Vesta CP

1. Go to /root directory

cd /root

2. Let’s prepare phpbrew for compilation. We will put in an alternative php directory: /usr/local/php

phpbrew init --root=/usr/local/php
  
export PHPBREW_ROOT=/usr/local/php

[[ -e ~/.phpbrew/bashrc ]] && source ~/.phpbrew/bashrc

phpbrew update

3. BUT! First time I tried to build PHP 7.4, I got an error.

Phpbrew build error on Vesta (Debian/Ubuntu) – “No package oniguruma found” (pkg-config)

How to overcome this error?

First, we’ll find and install required, “oniguruma” containing package to satisfy the dependency:

# apt search oniguruma
Sorting... Done
Full Text Search... Done
libjruby-joni-java/oldstable,oldstable 2.1.11-2 all
 Java port of Oniguruma regexp library

libonig-dev/oldstable,oldstable,now 6.1.3-2 amd64 [installed]
 regular expressions library — development files

libonig4/oldstable,oldstable,now 6.1.3-2 amd64 [installed,automatic]
 regular expressions library

libonig4-dbg/oldstable,oldstable 6.1.3-2 amd64
 regular expressions library — debugging symbols

lua-rex-onig/oldstable,oldstable 2.7.2-4 amd64
 Onig regular expressions library for the Lua language

Setup via command:

apt install libonig-dev

Then we’ll edit the build command, taking into account what is written on GitHub:

Here is the complete build command:

phpbrew install 7.4 +default +openssl=shared -- --with-openssl-dir=/usr/include/openssl --with-mysql-sock=/var/run/mysqld/mysqld.sock --with-mysql=mysqlnd --with-mysqli=mysqlnd --enable-pdo --with-pdo-mysql=mysqlnd --enable-exif --with-jpeg=/usr --with-freetype=/usr --with-mcrypt=/usr --with-mhash --with-xsl=/usr --enable-zip --enable-cgi --with-curl --enable-gd --enable-pcntl --enable-mbregex --enable-gd-native-ttf --with-libdir=lib64 --enable-dba=shared --enable-intl --with-readline=/usr --enable-simplexml --enable-soap --enable-zip --with-mhash=yes --enable-shmop --enable-sockets --enable-wddx --enable-calendar --enable-sysvsem --enable-sysvshm --enable-sysvmsg --enable-bcmath --with-bz2 --enable-ctype --with-cdb --with-iconv --enable-exif --enable-ftp --with-gettext --with-pic

At the end, we’ll create a symbolic link in order to set up later in Vesta CP configuration:

ln -s /usr/local/php/php/php-7.4.8 /usr/local/php/php74