What is Friendica?

Friendica is a decentralised communications platform that integrates social communication. Our platform links to independent social projects and corporate services.

How to use this image

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: root@friendica.local)

Using the apache image

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 friendica

Now you can access the Friendica installation wizard at http://localhost:8080/ from your host system.

Using the fpm image

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 docker-compose file). In both cases you don't want to map the fpm port to you host.

$ docker run -d friendica: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.

Background tasks

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 use cron.sh as startup command (like this Example)

Possible Environment Variables

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 to true, the URL and E-Mail validation will be disabled.
• FRIENDICA_DATA Set the name of the storage provider (e.g Filesystem to use filesystem), default is 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 to true, 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 (default 512M) 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 (default 512M) This sets the upload limit (post_max_size and upload_max_filesize) for big files. Note that you may have to change other limits depending on your client, webserver or operating system.

Administrator account

Because Friendica links the administrator account to a specific mail address, you have to set a valid address for MAILNAME.

Mail settings

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. no-reply@friendica.local)
• 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).

Database settings

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.

Persistent data

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
  friendica

Database:

• /var/lib/mysql MySQL / MariaDB Data

$ docker run -d \
  -v mysql-vol-1:/var/lib/mysql \
  --network some-network
  mariadb

Automatic installation

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.

Docker Secrets

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:

version: '3.2'

services:
  db:
    image: mariadb
    restart: always
    volumes:
      - db:/var/lib/mysql
    environment:
       - MYSQL_DATABASE_FILE=/run/secrets/mysql_db
       - 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_db
      - 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.

Maintenance of the image

Updating to a newer version

You have to pull the latest image from the hub (docker pull friendica). The stable branch gets checked at every startup and will get updated if no installation was found or a new image is used.

Running this image with docker-compose

The easiest way to get a fully featured and functional setup is using a docker-compose 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.

Base version - apache

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.

version: '2'

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: friendica
    restart: always
    volumes:
      - friendica:/var/www/html
    ports:
      - "8080:80"
    environment:
      - MYSQL_HOST=db
      - MYSQL_USER=friendica
      - MYSQL_PASSWORD=
      - MYSQL_DATABASE=friendica
      - FRIENDICA_ADMIN_MAIL=root@friendica.local      
    depends_on:
      - db

volumes:
  db:
  friendica:

Then run docker-compose up -d, now you can access Friendica at http://localhost:8080/ from your system.

Base version - FPM

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 and MYSQL_USER before you run the setup.
• Create a nginx.conf in the same directory as the docker-compose.yml file (take it from example)

version: '2'

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: friendica:fpm
    restart: always
    volumes:
      - friendica:/var/www/html    
    environment:
      - MYSQL_HOST=db
      - MYSQL_USER=friendica
      - MYSQL_PASSWORD=
      - MYSQL_DATABASE=friendica
      - FRIENDICA_ADMIN_MAIL=root@friendica.local
    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.

Special settings for DEV/RC images

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.

Questions / Issues

If you got any questions or problems using the image, please visit our Github Repository and write an issue.