How to Enable Cockpit Server Manager in CentOS 8

Are you looking for a tutorial on how to enable Cockpit server manager in CentOS 8? Then this guide is what you are looking for.

Cockpit, also known as ‘Web Console’ is a graphical interface that helps manage servers. It is entirely web-based, meaning you can use it from your internet browser. Cockpit is an excellent solution for both new and experienced Linux users, and it’s free to use! You can find the source code on their GitHub.

Furthermore, Cockpit is known for its simplicity, compatibility with existing workflows, integration with existing APIs on the system, and its extendability. Its extensibility allows you to install applications built by the Cockpit team or others with a click of a button.

In this guide, we will show you how to install, enable, and configure Cockpit on a CentOS 8 device. Let’s get started.

Prerequisites

There aren’t any major requirements. Make sure that you have:

• CentOS 8 installed
• Sufficient knowledge about using the command line
• An internet connection
• A good web browser(Google Chrome or Firefox)

How to Enable Cockpit Server Manager in CentOS 8

If you have fulfilled all the requirements, you can start immediately.

Install Cockpit in CentOS 8

Before you can enable Cockpit, you need to install it. It’s a straightforward process. But first, it is a good practice to update your system before you install anything new. To update your system, type this command in the Terminal:

$ sudo yum update

Output:

Once you’re done, you can proceed to install Cockpit. On CentOS 7 or later, it might already be installed by default. But in case it isn’t, you can install Cockpit by running this command:

$ sudo yum install cockpit

Output:

It is a very small package and should not take too long to download and install.

Start and Enable Cockpit on CentOS 8

Once you’ve installed Cockpit, you can start and enable it. If you try to check its status, you will find it is currently inactive. You can check the active status with this command:

$ sudo systemctl status cockpit

Output:

First, let’s enable Cockpit. To do that, run the below command:

$ sudo systemctl enable --now cockpit.socket

Output:

This creates a symbolic link for Cockpit. By enabling it, you are basically telling the system to start the service automatically at boot. After enabling it, do a reboot. For that, run this command:

$ sudo systemctl reboot

After enabling it, you have to do one more thing. You can open the firewall if you think it is necessary. For that purpose, run these two commands:

$ sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --zone=public --add-service=cockpit
$ sudo firewall-cmd --reload

Output:

You may face a red warning sign. But there’s nothing to worry about.

Likewise, you can also disable Cockpit. To disable it, use this command:

$ sudo systemctl disable cockpit.socket

Output:

This will remove the symbolic link from /etc/systemd/system/sockets.target.wants/. If you want to start Cockpit in the current session, then run this command:

$ sudo systemctl start cockpit.socket

Output:

To check whether this successfully started the process or not, you can again see the status. To do that, run this command:

$ sudo systemctl status cockpit

Output:

And also for Cockpit, you can do the same by running these commands:

$ sudo systemctl start cockpit
$ sudo systemctl status cockpit

Output:

As you can see from the previous screenshot, Cockpit is active now and listening to a particular port. From there, press “Q” to quit from this menu.

Another way to see this is by checking the current processes, which you can do with this command:

$ ps aux | grep cockpit

Output:

Alternatively, you can check the status with this command:

$ sudo netstat -pnltu | grep cockpit

And that will confirm if Cockpit has been installed and is running successfully. And if it did, this means we can proceed to the next step.

Run and Configure Cockpit

Now that we’ve installed and enabled Cockpit, let’s test it out and configure it as well. For that, you need to use a browser. Currently, Cockpit recommends Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox. But they also support Microsoft Edge, Apple Safari, and GNOME Web. 

We will use Mozilla Firefox for this tutorial. Make sure that the current version is 82 or higher. If you have an old version of Firefox installed, remember to update it.

Now go to ‘Activities’. Then open Firefox.

Now copy and paste this URL into the search bar:

http://localhost:9090

Since Cockpit is listening to port number 9090, we use that to access it.

You may see a warning page like the one below saying there is a potential security risk in accessing that web page.

You can ignore it and move on. Press ‘Advanced’ and then ‘Accept the Risk and Continue’.

After that, you’ll be welcomed with a login page that looks like this:

Enter your User name and Password and press ‘Log in’. After a successful login, you will be taken to the Cockpit dashboard, which should look like this:

The left sidebar contains all the categories you can go through and manage. The ‘Overview’ tab displays the overall usage information of your system. You can check the Health status, CPU and Memory usage, System information, and Configuration.

There are two major categories: System and Tools. System contains the system-related information such as Logs, Storage, Networking, Accounts, Services, etc. Tools contain info about Applications, Diagnostic Reports, Kernel dump, SELinux, Software updates, etc. 

If you prefer the terminal over GUI, you can use it directly from Cockpit. You can find it in the Tools section.

Final Thoughts

And that’s everything you need to know in this tutorial! Here, we showed you how to enable Cockpit server manager in CentOS 8. It’s a fairly easy process that you can get done in just a few minutes. If you face any problems following this guide, let us know in the comments below. You can also refer to Cockpit’s official documentation to learn more.

If this guide helped you, please share it.