Friendica is a decentralised communications platform that integrates social communication. Our platform links to independent social projects and corporate services.
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The images are designed to be used in a micro-service environment. There are two types of the image you can choose from.
The apache
tag contains a full Friendica installation including an apache web server. It is designed to be easy to use and gets you running pretty fast. This is also the default for the latest
tag and version tags that are not further specified.
The second option is a fpm
container. It is based on the php-fpm image and runs a fastCGI-Process that serves your Friendica server. To use this image it must be combined with any Webserver that can proxy the http requests to the FastCGI-port of the container.
(Admin-E-Mail: [email protected]
)
You need at least one other mariadb/mysql-container to link it to Friendica.
The apache image contains a webserver and exposes port 80. To start the container type:
$ docker run -d -p 8080:80 --network some-network %%IMAGE%%
Now you can access the Friendica installation wizard at http://localhost:8080/ from your host system.
To use the fpm image you need an additional web server that can proxy http-request to the fpm-port of the container. For fpm connection this container exposes port 9000. In most cases you might want use another container or your host as proxy. If you use your host you can address your Friendica container directly on port 9000. If you use another container, make sure that you add them to the same docker network (via docker run --network <NAME> ...
or a compose.yaml
file). In both cases you don't want to map the fpm port to you host.
$ docker run -d %%IMAGE%%:fpm
As the fastCGI-Process is not capable of serving static files (style sheets, images, ...) the webserver needs access to these files. This can be achieved with the volumes-from
option. You can find more information in the Docker Compose section.
Friendica requires background tasks to fetch and send all kind of messages and maintain the complete instance. This setup is crucial for the Friendica node. There are two options to enable background tasks for Friendica:
- Using the default Image and manually setup background tasks (see Friendica Install)
- Using the default image (apache, fpm, fpm-alpine) and starting a dedicated
cron
instance and usecron.sh
as startup command (like this Example)
Friendica Settings
FRIENDICA_URL
The Friendica complete URL including protocol, domain and subpath (example: https://friendica.local/sub/ ).FRIENDICA_TZ
The default localization of the Friendica server.FRIENDICA_LANG
The default language of the Friendica server.FRIENDICA_SITENAME
The Sitename of the Friendica server.FRIENDICA_NO_VALIDATION
If set totrue
, the URL and E-Mail validation will be disabled.FRIENDICA_DATA
Set the name of the storage provider (e.gFilesystem
to use filesystem), default ist the DB backend.FRIENDICA_DATA_DIR
The data directory of the Friendica server (Default: /var/www/data).FRIENDICA_UPGRADE
Force starting the Friendica update even it's the same version (Default:false
).
Friendica Logging
FRIENDICA_DEBUGGING
If set totrue
, the logging of Friendica is enabled.FRIENDICA_LOGFILE
(optional) The path to the logfile (Default: /var/www/friendica.log).FRIENDICA_LOGLEVEL
(optional) The loglevel to log (Default: notice).FRIENDICA_LOGGER
(optional) Set the type - stream, syslog, monolog (Default: stream).FRIENDICA_SYSLOG_FLAGS
(optional) In case syslog is used, set the corresponding flags (Default:LOG_PID | LOG_ODELAY | LOG_CONS | LOG_PERROR
).FRIENDICA_SYSLOG_FACTORY
(optional) In case syslog is used, set the corresponding factory (Default:LOG_USER
).
Database (required at installation)
MYSQL_USER
Username for the database user using mysql / mariadb.MYSQL_PASSWORD
Password for the database user using mysql / mariadb.MYSQL_DATABASE
Name of the database using mysql / mariadb.MYSQL_HOST
Hostname of the database server using mysql / mariadb.MYSQL_PORT
Port of the database server using mysql / mariadb (Default:3306
)
Lock Driver (Redis)
REDIS_HOST
The hostname of the redis instance (in case of locking).REDIS_PORT
(optional) The port of the redis instance (in case of locking).REDIS_PW
(optional) The password for the redis instance (in case of locking).REDIS_DB
(optional) The database instance of the redis instance (in case of locking).
PHP limits
PHP_MEMORY_LIMIT
(default512M
) This sets the maximum amount of memory in bytes that a script is allowed to allocate. This is meant to help prevent poorly written scripts from eating up all available memory, but it can prevent normal operation if set too tight.PHP_UPLOAD_LIMIT
(default512M
) This sets the upload limit (post_max_size
andupload_max_filesize
) for big files. Note that you may have to change other limits depending on your client, webserver or operating system.
Because Friendica links the administrator account to a specific mail address, you have to set a valid address for MAILNAME
.
The binary ssmtp
is used for the mail()
support of Friendica.
You have to set the --hostname/-h
parameter correctly to use the right domainname for the mail()
command.
You have to set a valid SMTP-MTA for the SMTP
environment variable to enable mail support in Friendica. A valid SMTP-MTA would be, for example, mx.example.org
.
The following environment variables are possible for the SMTP examples.
SMTP
Address of the SMTP Mail-Gateway. (required)SMTP_PORT
Port of the SMTP Mail-Gateway. (Default: 587)SMTP_DOMAIN
The sender domain. (required - e.g.friendica.local
)SMTP_FROM
Sender user-part of the address. (Default:no-reply
- e.g. [email protected])SMTP_TLS
Use TLS for connecting the SMTP Mail-Gateway. (Default: empty)SMTP_STARTTLS
Use STARTTLS for connecting the SMTP Mail-Gateway. (Default:On
)SMTP_AUTH
Auth mode for the SMTP Mail-Gateway. (Default:On
)SMTP_AUTH_USER
Username for the SMTP Mail-Gateway. (Default: empty)SMTP_AUTH_PASS
Password for the SMTP Mail-Gateway. (Default: empty)
Addition to STARTTLS
the tls_starttls
setting is either On
or Off
, but never unset. That's because in case it's unset, starttls
would be activated by default (which would need additional configuration like a separate port).
You have to add the Friendica container to the same network as the running database container, e. g. --network some-network
, and then use mysql
as the database host on setup.
The Friendica installation and all data beyond what lives in the database (file uploads, etc) is stored in the unnamed docker volume volume /var/www/html
. The docker daemon will store that data within the docker directory /var/lib/docker/volumes/...
. That means your data is saved even if the container crashes, is stopped or deleted. To make your data persistent to upgrading and get access for backups is using named docker volume or mount a host folder. To achieve this you need one volume for your database container and Friendica.
Friendica:
/var/www/html/
folder where all Friendica data lives
$ docker run -d \
-v friendica-vol-1:/var/www/html \
--network some-network
%%IMAGE%%
Database:
/var/lib/mysql
MySQL / MariaDB Data
$ docker run -d \
-v mysql-vol-1:/var/lib/mysql \
--network some-network
mariadb
The Friendica image supports auto configuration via environment variables. You can preconfigure everything that is asked on the install page on first run. To enable the automatic installation, you have to the following environment variables:
FRIENDICA_URL
The Friendica complete URL including protocol, domain and subpath (example: https://friendica.local/sub/ ).FRIENDICA_ADMIN_MAIL
E-Mail address of the administrator.MYSQL_USER
Username for the database user using mysql / mariadb.MYSQL_PASSWORD
Password for the database user using mysql / mariadb.MYSQL_DATABASE
Name of the database using mysql / mariadb.MYSQL_HOST
Hostname of the database server using mysql / mariadb.
As an alternative to passing sensitive information via environment variables, _FILE may be appended to the previously listed environment variables, causing the initialization script to load the values for those variables from files present in the container. In particular, this can be used to load passwords from Docker secrets stored in /run/secrets/<secret_name> files. For example:
services:
db:
image: mariadb
restart: always
volumes:
- db:/var/lib/mysql
environment:
- MYSQL_DATABASE_FILE=/run/secrets/mysql_database
- MYSQL_USER_FILE=/run/secrets/mysql_user
- MYSQL_PASSWORD_FILE=/run/secrets/mysql_password
secrets:
- mysql_database
- mysql_password
- mysql_user
app:
image: friendica
restart: always
volumes:
- friendica:/var/www/html
ports:
- "8080:80"
environment:
- MYSQL_HOST=db
- MYSQL_DATABASE_FILE=/run/secrets/mysql_database
- MYSQL_USER_FILE=/run/secrets/mysql_user
- MYSQL_PASSWORD_FILE=/run/secrets/mysql_password
- FRIENDICA_ADMIN_MAIL_FILE=/run/secrets/friendica_admin_mail
depends_on:
- db
secrets:
- friendica_admin_mail
- mysql_database
- mysql_password
- mysql_user
volumes:
db:
friendica:
secrets:
friendica_admin_mail:
file: ./friendica_admin_mail.txt # put admin email to this file
mysql_database:
file: ./mysql_database.txt # put mysql database name to this file
mysql_password:
file: ./mysql_password.txt # put mysql password to this file
mysql_user:
file: ./mysql_user.txt # put mysql username to this file
Currently, this is only supported for FRIENDICA_ADMIN_MAIL
, MYSQL_DATABASE
, MYSQL_PASSWORD
, MYSQL_USER
.
You have to pull the latest image from the hub (docker pull %%IMAGE%%
). The stable branch gets checked at every startup and will get updated if no installation was found or a new image is used.
The easiest way to get a fully featured and functional setup is using a compose.yaml
file. There are too many different possibilities to setup your system, so here are only some examples what you have to look for.
At first make sure you have chosen the right base image (fpm or apache) and added the features you wanted (see below). In every case you want to add a database container and docker volumes to get easy access to your persistent data. When you want your server reachable from the internet adding HTTPS-encryption is mandatory! See below for more information.
This version will use the apache image and add a mariaDB container. The volumes are set to keep your data persistent. This setup provides no ssl encryption and is intended to run behind a proxy.
Make sure to set the variable MYSQL_PASSWORD
before run this setup.
services:
db:
image: mariadb
restart: always
volumes:
- db:/var/lib/mysql
environment:
- MYSQL_USER=friendica
- MYSQL_PASSWORD=
- MYSQL_DATABASE=friendica
- MYSQL_RANDOM_ROOT_PASSWORD=yes
app:
image: %%IMAGE%%
restart: always
volumes:
- friendica:/var/www/html
ports:
- "8080:80"
environment:
- MYSQL_HOST=db
- MYSQL_USER=friendica
- MYSQL_PASSWORD=
- MYSQL_DATABASE=friendica
- [email protected]
depends_on:
- db
volumes:
db:
friendica:
Then run docker compose up -d
, now you can access Friendica at http://localhost:8080/ from your system.
When using the FPM image you need another container that acts as web server on port 80 and proxies requests to the Friendica container. In this example a simple nginx container is combined with the Friendica-fpm image and a MariaDB database container. The data is stored in docker volumes. The nginx container also need access to static files from your Friendica installation. It gets access to all the volumes mounted to Friendica via the volumes_from
option. The configuration for nginx is stored in the configuration file nginx.conf
that is mounted into the container.
An example can be found in the examples section.
As this setup does not include encryption it should to be run behind a proxy.
Prerequisites for this example:
- Make sure to set the variable
MYSQL_PASSWORD
andMYSQL_USER
before you run the setup. - Create a
nginx.conf
in the same directory as thecompose.yaml
file (take it from example)
services:
db:
image: mariadb
restart: always
volumes:
- db:/var/lib/mysql
environment:
- MYSQL_USER=friendica
- MYSQL_PASSWORD=
- MYSQL_DATABASE=friendica
- MYSQL_RANDOM_ROOT_PASSWORD=yes
app:
image: %%IMAGE%%:fpm
restart: always
volumes:
- friendica:/var/www/html
environment:
- MYSQL_HOST=db
- MYSQL_USER=friendica
- MYSQL_PASSWORD=
- MYSQL_DATABASE=friendica
- [email protected]
networks:
- proxy-tier
- default
web:
image: nginx
ports:
- 8080:80
links:
- app
volumes:
- ./nginx.conf:/etc/nginx/nginx.conf:ro
restart: always
networks:
- proxy-tier
volumes:
db:
friendica:
networks:
proxy-tier:
Then run docker compose up -d
, now you can access Friendica at http://localhost:8080/ from your system.
The *-dev
and *-rc
branches are directly downloaded and verified at each docker start to ensure that the latest sources are used. The parameter FRIENDICA_UPGRADE
is required to be true
(Default: false
) to activate this behavior.
If you got any questions or problems using the image, please visit our Github Repository and write an issue.