Host a YSF Reflector on Debian Linux

A lot of guides follow the install on a raspberry pi. Today we will focus on installing a YSFReflector on Debian Linux. We will also cover installing the dashboard, and configuring PiStar to connect to your reflector, as well as registering your reflector online so others may join.

Creating Sudo User

First we need to create our super user. We do that by installing sudo as root, and adding our user to the sudoers file like so:
su
nano /etc/sudoers
Add This line:
username ALL=(ALL) ALL
Under:
%sudo ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL
Ctrl+x then Shift+y To save
exit

Install the YSF reflector Software:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install git
sudo apt-get install build-essentialgit clone https://github.com/n5amd/YSFReflector-debian-installer
cd YSFReflector-debian-installer
./YSFReflector-debian-installer
Input the name by typing two letters of your country, then a space, and then the name you’d like for your reflector.
So in the US, mine would be “US MODERNHAM”. Just keep in under 16 chars.
Then input your description, just keep it under 14 chars.
Once you’ve done that, you will enter your domain name if you have one. Otherwise, your public IP address which you can find here: https://whatismyipaddress.com/

Install Apache For the Dashboard

sudo apt-get install apache2
sudo groupadd www-data
sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/html
sudo chmod -R 775 /var/www/html
sudo apt install php libapache2-mod-php
sudo systemctl restart apache2
cd ~
git clone https://github.com/dg9vh/YSFReflector-Dashboard.git
cp -R YSFReflector-Dashboard/* /var/www/html/
sudo rm /var/www/html/index.html
Once you’ve done that, you can navigate to your server and configure the dashboard.
Visit localserverip/setup.php in your browser.
Once you are here, you want to fill in the Path to the Logfile as default.
Leave the logfiel prefix as default.
The Path to YSFReflector.ini should be /ysfreflector/
The ini filename should be left as default.
And the path to the YSFreflector-executable will be the same as the path to the ini, /ysfreflector/.
Finish filling out the rest of the information on the bottom as you see fit and then click Save configuration.
Once saved we need to remove the setup.php so nobody can mess with your server:
sudo rm /var/www/html/setup.php

Open your Ports

Now we will open ports on the server like so for the YSFreflector as well as the dashboard.
sudo iptables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 42000 -j ACCEPT
sudo iptables -A INPUT -p udp --dport 42000 -j ACCEPT
sudo iptables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 80 -j ACCEPT
sudo iptables -A INPUT -p udp --dport 80 -j ACCEPT
You will also need to forward the ports on your router to your server ip, which you can see with the command:
ip a

Register your reflector

Now we need to visit https://register.ysfreflector.de/register to register your ysf reflector. Put the information in to match your ini file. Then click Register. Activate it via the email link sent to you. You can then login with your email and the temporary password sent to you to manage your server. and thats it! After several hours – a day, you should see your reflector come up on your hotspot after an update.