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Docker Compose Installation

Installation of Sync-in with Docker Compose.

Sync-in is distributed as an official Docker image, available on Docker Hub: https://hub.docker.com/r/syncin/server

This image is specifically designed to be deployed and run in a Docker Compose environment.

📋 Prerequisites​

⚙️ Minimum hardware requirements​

  • RAM: 1 GB
  • CPU: 1 core/vCPU
  • Disk space: 2 GB

🐳 Docker Compose​

This configuration relies on Docker Compose files using the x-include extension. You will need:

  • Docker Engine version 24 or higher
  • Docker Compose version 2.20 or higher

✅ You can check the installed versions with:

docker --version
docker compose version

🔗 If Docker is not installed, follow the official Docker installation guide.

📦 Configuration files​

To retrieve the Sync-in Docker Compose files (sync-in-docker) from https://github.com/Sync-in/server/releases, use one of the following methods:

  • curl and unzip: 
    curl -L -o sync-in-docker.zip \
    https://github.com/Sync-in/server/releases/latest/download/sync-in-docker.zip && \
    unzip sync-in-docker.zip
  • or with curl and tar: 
    curl -L -o sync-in-docker.tar.gz \
    https://github.com/Sync-in/server/releases/latest/download/sync-in-docker.tar.gz && \
    tar zxvf sync-in-docker.tar.gz

You should get the following structure in the sync-in-docker directory:

├── config
│   ├── collabora
│   │   └── docker-compose.collabora.yaml
│   ├── drawio
│   │   └── docker-compose.drawio.yaml
│   ├── nginx
│   │   ├── collabora.conf
│   │   ├── docker-compose.nginx.yaml
│   │   ├── drawio.conf
│   │   ├── nginx.conf
│   │   ├── onlyoffice.conf
│   │   └── eurooffice.conf
│   ├── onlyoffice
│   │   └── docker-compose.onlyoffice.yaml
│   ├── eurooffice
│   │   └── docker-compose.eurooffice.yaml
│   └── sync-in-desktop-releases
│       ├── docker-compose.sync-in-desktop-releases.yaml
│       └── update.sh
├── docker-compose.yaml
└── environment.yaml

You can check the structure and content from the GitHub repository.

🚀 Quick start​

1. Configure required secrets​

Navigate to the Docker Compose directory:

cd sync-in-docker

Before starting the server, define the required access-token and refresh-token secrets, and configure a dedicated encryption key.

Edit the environment.yaml file:

server:
  # Optional for now; required in the next major release
  publicUrl: 'https://sync-in.domain.com'
mysql:
  # Use the root password defined in docker-compose.yaml
  url: 'mysql://root:MySQLRootPassword@mariadb:3306/sync_in'
auth:
  encryptionKey: 'REPLACE_WITH_LONG_RANDOM_ENCRYPTION_KEY'
  token:
    access:
      secret: 'REPLACE_WITH_LONG_RANDOM_ACCESS_SECRET'
    refresh:
      secret: 'REPLACE_WITH_LONG_RANDOM_REFRESH_SECRET'
Public URL

publicUrl must match the address exposed to users, including the scheme and any non-standard port. It remains optional until the next major release. The URL must be reachable from users' browsers and, for office editors that communicate with Sync-in, from their containers. When publicUrl is omitted, editors use the request origin as a compatibility fallback. For security, it will become required in the next major release so editor endpoints are built from a trusted origin controlled by the administrator rather than from request headers.

Then, edit the docker-compose.yaml file to ensure the MySQL password matches:

services:
  mariadb:
    environment:
      MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD: 'MySQLRootPassword'
Security

Use long, randomly generated strings for your secrets to ensure maximum security.

info

In YAML files, use single quotes for passwords containing special characters.

tip

You can use environment variables to configure the previously defined secrets. See the Environment variables section for more details

2. Configure data storage​

Data from Sync-in and MariaDB is already persisted in named Docker volumes. No changes are required for a test installation. In production, you can mount host directories to directly control where the data is stored and how it is backed up. The examples below show how to replace each volume with a host directory.

Sync-in​

The data volume, mounted at /app/data, stores the files managed by Sync-in.

services:
  sync_in:
    volumes:
      # Default Docker volume
      # - data:/app/data

      # Host directory
      - '/home/sync-in-data:/app/data'
Fixed container data path

The Docker entrypoint always forces applications.files.dataPath to /app/data. Do not add dataPath to environment.yaml or try to override it with SYNCIN_APPLICATIONS_FILES_DATAPATH: any value provided to the container is replaced. To choose where data is stored, configure only the source of the volume mounted at /app/data.

MariaDB​

The mariadb_data volume, mounted at /var/lib/mysql, stores the MariaDB database data.

services:
  mariadb:
    volumes:
      # Default Docker volume
      # - mariadb_data:/var/lib/mysql

      # Host directory
      - '/home/sync-in-mariadb:/var/lib/mysql'

3. Start the Sync-in server​

To set your own administrator credentials on first launch, use:

INIT_ADMIN=true INIT_ADMIN_LOGIN='user' INIT_ADMIN_PASSWORD='password' docker compose up -d

Replace user and password with your desired credentials.

For Compose-file examples and quote-handling details, see Variables & Secrets.

If you don't set these variables and simply run:

INIT_ADMIN=true docker compose up -d

The server will use the default administrator credentials:

  • Login: sync-in
  • Password: sync-in
warning

Important: For security reasons, it is strongly recommended to change these credentials upon your first login.

info

To check the status of containers: docker compose ps

4. Access the Web interface​

Once the server is started, open your browser at the following address:

http://localhost:8080

Log in using the administrator credentials defined in step 3.

To expose Sync-in through the bundled Nginx service on standard HTTP/HTTPS ports, see the Docker reverse proxy configuration.