Step by step installation for RHEL7 / CentOS 7, based on the official installation instructions on this wiki.

Basic installation

You need EPEL repo for zlib-devel mod_proxy_uwsgi uwsgi-plugin-python

Install EPEL :

yum install epel-release && yum update

Install packages :

yum install gcc zlib-devel git openssl-devel libffi-devel python-babel python-virtualenv libxslt-devel

Install searx :

cd /usr/local
git clone https://github.com/asciimoo/searx.git
useradd searx -d /usr/local/searx
chown searx:searx -R /usr/local/searx

Install dependencies in a virtualenv :

su - searx
cd /usr/local/searx
virtualenv searx-ve
. ./searx-ve/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt
python setup.py install

Configuration

sed -i -e "s/ultrasecretkey/`openssl rand -hex 16`/g" searx/settings.yml

Edit searx/settings.yml if necessary.

Check

Start searx :

python searx/webapp.py

Go to http://localhost:8888

At this point searx is not demonized ; uwsgi allows this.

You can exit the virtualenv and the searx user bash (enter exit).

uwsgi

Install packages :

yum install uwsgi uwsgi-plugin-python

Create the configuration file /etc/uwsgi.d/searx.ini with this content :

[uwsgi]
# Who will run the code
uid = searx
gid = searx

# disable logging for privacy
disable-logging = true

# Number of workers (usually CPU count)
workers = 4
socket = 127.0.0.1:8888

# Plugin to use and interpretor config
single-interpreter = true
master = true
plugin = python

# Module to import
module = searx.webapp

# Virtualenv and python path
virtualenv = /usr/local/searx/searx-ve/
pythonpath = /usr/local/searx/
chdir = /usr/local/searx/searx/

Change ownership of the new config file :

chown uwsgi:uwsgi /etc/uwsgi.d/searx.ini

Activate the uwsgi application and restart :

systemctl enable uwsgi
systemctl start uwsgi

Web server

with nginx

TODO ...

with apache

Add and enable wsgi mod :

yum install mod_proxy_uwsgi
echo "LoadModule proxy_uwsgi_module modules/mod_proxy_uwsgi.so" > /etc/httpd/conf.modules.d/00-uwsgi.conf

Create a proxy configuration file :

echo "ProxyPass / uwsgi://127.0.0.1:8888/" > /etc/httpd/conf.d/searx.conf

Note that if your instance of searx is not at the root, you should change ProxyPass / by the location of your instance, like ProxyPass /searx.

Restart Apache :

systemctl restart httpd

If you have SELinux enabled, you must allow httpd to allow network connect :

setsebool -P httpd_can_network_connect 1

How to update (no tested)

cd /usr/local/searx
su - searx
. ./searx-ve/bin/activate
git stash
git pull origin master
git stash apply
pip install --upgrade -r requirements.txt
exit
systemctl restart uwsgi