Ubuntu 6.06 server with the preconfigured LAMP

My goal was to build a setup that I could host my personal web site from. Embarking on this journey I had no idea how much knowledge I lacked and in turn would learn in my quest to host. I floundered around on forums and clung helplessly to Google for aid in all the places I fell short. I found that a really good resource for building a LAMP configuration for complete Linux noobs was either not available, or stuffed neatly in some Google Bermutan triangle which my browser was afraid to go. Hence, I am writing this as a partial documentation of my trials and tribulations with hopes of aiding all Linux noobs on the steps necessary to create a basic Linux, Apache2, MySQL5 and PHP5 system with FTP. Again, this document is tailored to complete Linux beginners and is in no way a complete guide to attacking such a setup. It will get you up and running but will need security hardening like no other..."
http://www.howtoforge.com/node/1388

any particular reason you chose ubuntu?

Centos 4.3 has great package support, and yum makes it really easy to install packages.

Here is a short tutorial on setting up a basic LAMP setup.

http://www.quantact.com/wiki/index.php/ ... key_system

-Tim