I just start using my homelab to host some new good services, and I want to know what is the approach of a docker setup, what is the best distro for? How to deploy them correctly? Basically I’m a real noob in this subject. Thank you
Debian with the docker convenience script. Stay away from Ubuntu server, for the love of dog.
Make a folder such as /stacks and put everything there by building docker compose stacks. I bind mount everything local to a subfolder with the docker-compose.yml for that application so when I restore it, it’s all in one spot, not spread all over the hell like docker likes to do if you don’t use bind mounts.
Add lazydocker for getting easy log and stats access for each stack.
Avoid bare docker run commands. It makes an unmanageable mess when you get more that a couple containers running.
Consider using the nextcloud AIO master container. It runs docker containers inside a master container compose file, and it is by far the easiest way to manage and run nextcloud.
I’ve become very partial to Dozzle. I roll out right into my compose scripts and it’s incredibly lightweight.
I found dozzle a bit rudimentary as it only does logs, but I liked that there was an android app to interface it.
Lazydocker is more like Portainer on running stacks in that you can see logs, configs, stats and do operations on the stacks and components all from an SSH TUI.
I’ll have to check it out. TIL about the app.
Anything.
Personally I use Debian. But Docker doesn’t care. I chose Debian because it is very stable and simple
And what is the good way of deploying it? After pulling the image, how do we autostart it etc…
The Docker documentation is pretty terrible, but it’s a decent start. Start by looking at docker-compose.yml files for the services you want to run and the write-ups for those.
Something nobody ever told me, that I had to figure out myself, is that docker-compose.yml files can be placed anywhere you want.
Should I make the docker compose files or pull the image from hub.docker.com?
At its simplest:
docker run -d --name servicename --restart unless-stopped containerThat’ll get you going. Youi’ll have containers running, they restart, etc. There are more sophisticated ways of doing things (create a systemd file that starts/stops the container, use kubernetes, etc.) but if you’re just starting this will likely work fine.
Are they starting automatically at boot?
EDIT : how do you run a container with a simple name instead of using his id?
Yes - they’ll start automatically. There are other options for “restart” that define the behavior.
You can give whatever you like to “servicename” and use that rather than the ID.
For example:
docker run -d --name mysite --restart unless-stopped nginx docker stop mysite docker start mysitethx
Create a systemctl service for it, create a cron, or of there is a lot of interconnectivity between your containers look at something like K3S.
What do you want to do with containers? That’s sort of the driver for making architectural decisions.
Network and services containers. Nextcloud, Homepage, filesharing, …
Ubuntu server is pretty user friendly and has more frequent updates op. Plenty of info out there. My preference is uninstall snaps.
