I've written a guide to installing Ubuntu Server, Lighttpd (an alternative to the Apache web server), Perl CGI, PHP and & MySQL on a machine (or virtual machine) with 64MB of memory or less.
http://www.aoakley.com/articles/2008-03-06-ubuntu-minimal-memory.php Comments very much appreciated, in particular the MySQL config. Although Ubuntu does provide a LAMP default install in Ubuntu Server edition, this requires 256MB memory. In particular, Apache and especially the default MySQL install are real memory hogs, and are designed for reasonably heavy-use environments. I saw around 200MB RAM in use with no users connected! My config, in contrast, is designed for test/development environments or very low-use websites, typically serving no more than 6 concurrent users and only simple SQL requests. My tests under Ubuntu 6 LTS Server showed less than 34MB of memory in use. In particular, my config is suitable for very cheap VPS hosting accounts such as vpsville.ca , tektonic.net , cheapvps.co.uk and so forth - basically your own root-access Internet server for less than five quid a month! -- Andrew Oakley -- ubuntu-uk@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-uk https://wiki.kubuntu.org/UKTeam/