Docker

The official Docker image is available on https://hub.docker.com/r/etherpad/etherpad.

Downloading from Docker Hub

If you are ok downloading a prebuilt image from Docker Hub, these are the commands:

# gets the latest published version
docker pull etherpad/etherpad

# gets a specific version
docker pull etherpad/etherpad:1.8.0

Build a personalized container

If you want to use a personalized settings file, you will have to rebuild your image. All of the following instructions are as a member of the docker group. By default, the Etherpad Docker image is built and run in production mode: no development dependencies are installed, and asset bundling speeds up page load time.

Rebuilding with custom settings

Edit <BASEDIR>/settings.json.docker at your will. When rebuilding the image, this file will be copied inside your image and renamed to settings.json.

Each configuration parameter can also be set via an environment variable, using the syntax "${ENV_VAR}" or "${ENV_VAR:default_value}". For details, refer to settings.json.template.

Rebuilding including some plugins

If you want to install some plugins in your container, it is sufficient to list them in the ETHERPAD_PLUGINS build variable. The variable value has to be a space separated, double quoted list of plugin names (see examples).

Some plugins will need personalized settings. Just refer to the previous section, and include them in your custom settings.json.docker.

Rebuilding including export functionality for DOC/PDF/ODT

If you want to be able to export your pads to DOC/PDF/ODT files, you can install either Abiword or Libreoffice via setting a build variable.

Via Abiword

For installing Abiword, set the INSTALL_ABIWORD build variable to any value.

Also, you will need to configure the path to the abiword executable via setting the abiword property in <BASEDIR>/settings.json.docker to /usr/bin/abiword or via setting the environment variable ABIWORD to /usr/bin/abiword.

Via Libreoffice

For installing Libreoffice instead, set the INSTALL_SOFFICE build variable to any value.

Also, you will need to configure the path to the libreoffice executable via setting the soffice property in <BASEDIR>/settings.json.docker to /usr/bin/soffice or via setting the environment variable SOFFICE to /usr/bin/soffice.

Examples

Build a Docker image from the currently checked-out code:

docker build --tag <YOUR_USERNAME>/etherpad .

Include two plugins in the container:

docker build --build-arg ETHERPAD_PLUGINS="ep_comments_page ep_author_neat" --tag <YOUR_USERNAME>/etherpad .

Running your instance:

To run your instance:

docker run --detach --publish <DESIRED_PORT>:9001 <YOUR_USERNAME>/etherpad

And point your browser to http://<YOUR_IP>:<DESIRED_PORT>

Options available by default

The settings.json.docker available by default allows to control almost every setting via environment variables.

General

Database

If your database needs additional settings, you will have to use a personalized settings.json.docker and rebuild the container (or otherwise put the updated settings.json inside your image).

Pad Options

Shortcuts

Skins

You can use the UI skin variants builder at /p/test#skinvariantsbuilder

For the colibris skin only, you can choose how to render the three main containers:

• toolbar (top menu with icons)
• editor (containing the text of the pad)
• background (area outside of editor, mostly visible when using page style)

For each of the 3 containers you can choose 4 color combinations:

• super-light
• light
• dark
• super-dark

For the editor container, you can also make it full width by adding full-width-editor variant (by default editor is rendered as a page, with a max-width of 900px).

Logging

Advanced

Add plugin configurations

It is possible to add arbitrary configurations for plugins by setting the EP__PLUGIN__<PLUGIN_NAME>__<CONFIG_NAME> environment variable. It is important to separate paths with a double underscore __.

For example, to configure the ep_comments plugin to use the comments database, you can set the following environment variables:

The original config looks like this:

"ep_comments_page": {
  "highlightSelectedText": true
},

We have two paths ep_comments_page and highlightSelectedText, so we need to set the following environment variable:

EP__ep_comments_page__highlightSelectedText=true

Examples

Use a Postgres database, no admin user enabled:

docker run -d \
	--name etherpad         \
	-p 9001:9001            \
	-e 'DB_TYPE=postgres'   \
	-e 'DB_HOST=db.local'   \
	-e 'DB_PORT=4321'       \
	-e 'DB_NAME=etherpad'   \
	-e 'DB_USER=dbusername' \
	-e 'DB_PASS=mypassword' \
	etherpad/etherpad

Run enabling the administrative user admin:

docker run -d \
	--name etherpad \
	-p 9001:9001 \
	-e 'ADMIN_PASSWORD=supersecret' \
	etherpad/etherpad

Run a test instance running DirtyDB on a persistent volume:

docker run -d \
	-v etherpad_data:/opt/etherpad-lite/var \
	-p 9001:9001 \
	etherpad/etherpad

Ready to use Docker Compose

services:
  app:
    user: "0:0"
    image: etherpad/etherpad:latest
    tty: true
    stdin_open: true
    volumes:
      - plugins:/opt/etherpad-lite/src/plugin_packages
      - etherpad-var:/opt/etherpad-lite/var
    depends_on:
      - postgres
    environment:
      NODE_ENV: production
      ADMIN_PASSWORD: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_APP_ADMIN_PASSWORD:-admin}
      DB_CHARSET: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_APP_DB_CHARSET:-utf8mb4}
      DB_HOST: postgres
      DB_NAME: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_POSTGRES_DATABASE:-etherpad}
      DB_PASS: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_POSTGRES_PASSWORD:-admin}
      DB_PORT: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_POSTGRES_PORT:-5432}
      DB_TYPE: "postgres"
      DB_USER: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_POSTGRES_USER:-admin}
      # For now, the env var DEFAULT_PAD_TEXT cannot be unset or empty; it seems to be mandatory in the latest version of etherpad
      DEFAULT_PAD_TEXT: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_APP_DEFAULT_PAD_TEXT:- }
      DISABLE_IP_LOGGING: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_APP_DISABLE_IP_LOGGING:-false}
      SOFFICE: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_APP_SOFFICE:-null}
      TRUST_PROXY: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_APP_TRUST_PROXY:-true}
    restart: always
    ports:
      - "${DOCKER_COMPOSE_APP_PORT_PUBLISHED:-9001}:${DOCKER_COMPOSE_APP_PORT_TARGET:-9001}"

  postgres:
    image: postgres:15-alpine
    environment:
      POSTGRES_DB: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_POSTGRES_DATABASE:-etherpad}
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_POSTGRES_PASSWORD:-admin}
      POSTGRES_PORT: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_POSTGRES_PORT:-5432}
      POSTGRES_USER: ${DOCKER_COMPOSE_POSTGRES_USER:-admin}
      PGDATA: /var/lib/postgresql/data/pgdata
    restart: always
    # Exposing the port is not needed unless you want to access this database instance from the host.
    # Be careful when other postgres docker container are running on the same port
    # ports:
    #   - "5432:5432"
    volumes:
      - postgres_data:/var/lib/postgresql/data/pgdata

volumes:
  postgres_data:
  plugins:
  etherpad-var: