Using Joomla to Build a Content Management System

Scenarios

Joomla is a website content management system (CMS) for enterprise websites and e-commerce. It is one of the world's three most popular open source CMSs. The Joomla application image is running Ubuntu 24.04 and deployed with Docker. It comes pre-installed with Joomla and all required runtime environments. This section describes how to use Joomla to build a CMS.

If your Joomla application image was purchased before August 28, 2026, see Using Joomla to Build a Content Management System (Historical Version) for instructions.

Resource Planning and Costs

Procedure

Step 1: Purchase FlexusL Instances

1. Log in to the FlexusL console and click Buy FlexusL.
2. Specify required parameters for the FlexusL instance.
   

   Parameter	Example Value	Description
   Region	CN-Hong Kong	For low network latency and quick resource access, select the region nearest to your target users. After a FlexusL instance is created, the region cannot be changed. Exercise caution when selecting a region.
   Application Images	Joomla	Select the Joomla application image.
   Instance Specifications	2 vCPUs | 2 GiB of memory and 60 GiB of the system disk	Select instance specifications as needed.
   Instance Name	Joomla-Example	Customize an instance name that is easy to identify, for example, Joomla-Example.
   (Optional) Associated Services	Data Disk: 10 GiB Host Security Cloud Backup Vault: 70 GB	You can bundle any of EVS, HSS (basic edition), and CBR to your FlexusL instances as needed and set specifications as needed.
   Required Duration	1 month	Set the required duration. FlexusL supports auto-renewal. Once enabled, FlexusL instances automatically renew before they expire. If you do not enable auto-renewal during purchase, you can still enable it after your FlexusL instances are created. For more information about auto-renewal rules, see Auto-Renewal Rules.
   Quantity	1	Set the number of FlexusL instances to be purchased.

3. Click Next: Confirm.

   On the displayed page, confirm the order details, read and select the agreement, and click Submit.

4. Select a payment method and complete the payment.
5. Go back to the FlexusL console and view the purchased FlexusL instance.

Step 2: Configure Security Groups

Add inbound security group rules to ensure that the application pre-installed in the image can be accessed.

1. Log in to the FlexusL console and click the target resource card or instance name to go to the instance details page.
2. In the navigation pane on the left, choose Cloud Servers and click the target server name to view its details.

   

3. On the Security Groups tab, click Add Rule to add the rules listed in the following table.

   The following only lists common rules. You can add more rules as needed.

   Table 1 Security group rules

   Priority	Action	Type	Protocol & Port	Source	Description
   1	Allow	IPv4	TCP: 8080	0.0.0.0/0	Allows external access to the application dashboard.

Step 3: Reset the Password

A FlexusL instance does not have an initial password. After creating a FlexusL instance, set a password for the FlexusL instance.

1. In the Image area on the Overview page of the FlexusL console, click Access to go to the application dashboard and check whether the application has been up and running. If yes, go to the next step.
   

   Wait for several minutes until the application is up and running. Then, you can perform operations such as restarting or stopping the instance, or resetting the password. Otherwise, the initial password may become invalid and you cannot log in to the application dashboard.

   Figure 1 Access to the application dashboard
   

   After the application is started, the initialization wizard page of the dashboard is displayed.

   Figure 2 Initialization wizard page of the Joomla dashboard
   
   

   If the dashboard is not properly displayed, check the following causes:

   • The port for accessing the dashboard is not enabled. Enable it as needed.
   • The dashboard is being started. Try again later.
2. Locate the resource card and choose > Reset Password. Alternatively, in the list view, click Reset Password in the Operation column to reset the password for the FlexusL instance.

   A FlexusL instance does not have an initial password. Set a password for the FlexusL instance before logging in to it. For details, see Resetting the Password for a FlexusL Instance.

   Figure 3 Resetting a password
   

Step 4: Initialize Joomla

Application images use code-based Ubuntu. They provide graphical user interfaces to make your operations easier. You need to initialize the application dashboard upon the first login. Then you can directly log in to the dashboard from the FlexusL console afterwards.

1. Remotely log in to the cloud server and obtain the username and password for logging in to the application dashboard.

   cat /root/joomla_deploy_info.txt

   

2. In the Image area on the Overview page of the FlexusL console, click Access to go to the application dashboard.
   Figure 4 Access to the application dashboard
   
   

   If the dashboard is not properly displayed, check the following causes:

   • The port for accessing the dashboard is not enabled. Enable it as needed.
   • The dashboard is being started. Try again later.
3. Enter the username (ADMIN_USER) and password (ADMIN_PASSWORD) obtained in 1 and click Log in.
   Figure 5 Initialization wizard page of the Joomla dashboard
   
   

   If you cannot log in to the application dashboard, see Why Cannot I Access the Dashboard of the Application Pre-installed in the Application Image After Entering the Initial Username and Password?

4. Check the application dashboard and preview the page of Joomla CMS.
   • After logging in to the dashboard, information similar to the following is displayed.

     

   • Enter http://server-EIP:8080 in the address bar of the local browser to preview the page of Joomla CMS.

     The initialized application page is blank.

     

After the Joomla application is initialized, you can deploy your applications on the dashboard.

Step 5: Build a CMS

This step uses how to install a website template and publish an article as an example to build a CMS with Joomla.

1. Install a blog template for the website.
   1. On the default home dashboard of the management page, select Blog Sample Data in Sample Data and click Install to install the blog template.

      

   2. In an address bar of a local browser, enter http://server-EIP:8080 to access the blog page.

      The website content has been templated.

      

2. Publish an article on the website.
   1. Choose Content > Articles in the navigation pane of the management page and click New to create an article.

      

   2. Edit the article title and content in Title and Content, set the following parameters, and click Save.

      Categorize articles in Category, for example, Blog. You can also set the access permissions and tags of the article.

      

   3. Click Blog on the blog page. Then you can view the article published on the website.