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====== Pi-Hole - Setup Pi-Hole running in Ubuntu ======

It is recommended to have a dedicated Ubuntu instance for pi-hole. 

This could be an actual physical machine, or a VM.

<WRAP info>
**NOTE:**  The pi-hole is very lean and uses a minimal amount of system resources.

So you do not need to allocate a huge amount of memory to this Ubuntu instance; 8G should be sufficient.

20G of Hard disk space is also more than enough.

</WRAP>

----

===== Update and Configure Ubuntu =====

On the Ubuntu instance where you want to run pi-hole, run updates:

<code bash>
sudo apt update
</code>

Next install the ssh server:

<code bash>
sudo apt install -y openssh-server
</code>

Now add a username other than the default. Just go through the dialogue and answer the prompts for the new user:

<code bash>
sudo adduser piuser
</code>

Now grant the new user privilege:

<code bash>
sudo usermod -aG sudo piuser
</code>


Ensure that you know the IP Address of this Ubuntu instance:

<code bash>
ip addr
</code>

<WRAP info>
**NOTE**:  For this example, we assume the IP Address is 192.168.1.25
</WRAP>


----

===== SSH into the Ubuntu =====

Open a terminal back on your desktop computer and "ssh" to the Ubuntu machine with the IP Address:

<code bash>
ssh piuser@192.168.1.25
</code>

Get root privileges in the command window:

<code bash>
sudo -i
</code>

Install "curl":

<code bash>
sudo apt install curl
</code>

Now you can install pi-hole:

<code bash>
curl -sSL https://install.pi-hole.net | bash
</code>

Select the defaults until the DNS screen and then choose Cloudflare as your DNS.

  * Accept all the rest of the defaults and be careful not to change them.  This will assure that you get the admin web interface and that statistics are logged.
  * The installation will continue for a few minutes after you answer the prompts.
  * After your installation completes, you will receive a message telling you to set up the DHCP settings on your router to make the address of your Pi-Hole the primary DNS for your network.
    * That will insert the Pi-Hole as the "man-in-the-middle" to scrutinize all DNS names before they are either passed to the Internet or "Pi-Holed".

When you return to the prompt in the "ssh" terminal session, enter the following command to set your Pi-hole password:

<code bash>
pihole -a -p
</code>

You can now close the "ssh" terminal session.

<code bash>
exit
</code>

----

===== Go to your Pi-Hole Website =====

Go to your web browser and enter the address of your Pi-Hole followed by /admin:

<code bash>
http://192.168.1.25/admin
</code>

Select the **login** option and you should be able to log in with the password you just set.

<WRAP info>
**NOTE:**  Since this is running in a standard Ubuntu instance, you will be able to reboot without any problems and even upgrade Pi-Hole when new releases are available.

The pi-hole is also very lean and uses a minimal amount of system resources.

</WRAP>


<WRAP important>
**IMPORTANT:**  Don't forget to set the DNS settings for your DHCP server on your router because Pi-Hole will not be used by any of your network clients until that occurs.

A good practice is to make the Pi-Hole DNS 1 and then Cloudflare 1.1.1.1 as DNS 2.

That will assure DNS translation when your Pi-Hole is not running.

</WRAP>

----

===== References =====