Deployment

Requirements

• Docker 20.10+ (or Node.js 22.12+ to run without Docker)
• About 256 MB of RAM. Image processing peaks at ~150 MB per upload in flight.
• Disk space for the photos: about 3 MB per photo (original plus two previews)
• A domain name with HTTPS (required by phone cameras)

Images are published for linux/amd64 and linux/arm64 on GHCR (ghcr.io/achedon12/guestroll) and Docker Hub (achedon12/guestroll), with the same tags.

Tag	Meaning
latest	Newest release
1, 1.2	Newest release in that major / minor line
1.2.3	An exact release. Pin this in production.

Docker Compose

services:
  guestroll:
    image: ghcr.io/achedon12/guestroll:latest
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - "127.0.0.1:3000:3000" # only reachable through the reverse proxy
    environment:
      PUBLIC_URL: https://photos.example.com
      ADMIN_PASSWORD: ${GUESTROLL_ADMIN_PASSWORD}
      TRUST_PROXY: "true"
    volumes:
      - ./data:/data

With a bind mount (./data), set PUID and PGID to the owner of that folder (id -u, id -g): the container hands the folder to that user on start, then drops root and runs the server as them. Run with --user to skip that step entirely and manage permissions yourself.

The repository's docker-compose.yml reads everything from .env, including the published port (HOST_PORT), the interface it binds to (HOST_BIND), the data path and the image tag:

cp .env.example .env   # then edit it
docker compose up -d

HTTPS and reverse proxies

Always set TRUST_PROXY=true behind a proxy, and only then: it makes Guestroll read the client IP from X-Forwarded-For, which anyone could forge without a proxy in front.

Raise the proxy's body size limit above MAX_UPLOAD_MB (25 MB by default).

Caddy

photos.example.com {
	request_body {
		max_size 30MB
	}
	reverse_proxy guestroll:3000
}

Traefik (labels)

    labels:
      - traefik.enable=true
      - traefik.http.routers.guestroll.rule=Host(`photos.example.com`)
      - traefik.http.routers.guestroll.entrypoints=websecure
      - traefik.http.routers.guestroll.tls.certresolver=letsencrypt
      - traefik.http.services.guestroll.loadbalancer.server.port=3000

nginx

server {
    listen 443 ssl http2;
    server_name photos.example.com;
    # ssl_certificate / ssl_certificate_key …

    client_max_body_size 30m;

    location / {
        proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:3000;
        proxy_set_header Host $host;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Host $host;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
        # Stream ZIP downloads instead of buffering them on disk.
        proxy_buffering off;
    }
}

Without Docker

git clone https://github.com/achedon12/guestroll && cd guestroll
npm ci
npm run build
cp -r .next/static .next/standalone/.next/ && cp -r drizzle .next/standalone/
cd .next/standalone
DATA_DIR=/var/lib/guestroll ADMIN_PASSWORD=… PUBLIC_URL=… node server.js

Run it under systemd or another supervisor, as an unprivileged user that owns DATA_DIR.

A public demo

DEMO_MODE=true turns an instance into a demo anyone can try: docker compose -f docker-compose.demo.yml up -d.

• On first start it seeds three events (a wedding with challenges, a guestbook, favorites, frames and a mosaic wall; a birthday with moderation; a conference) with generated photos, messages and a gallery link.
• A shared owner account, demo / guestroll-demo, is shown on the login page and in a banner on every page, with the gallery link's password.
• Everything is reset on DEMO_RESET_CRON (every night at 4:00 UTC): visitors' events, photos and accounts are gone, the seed runs again.
• Nothing leaves the instance: emails and webhooks stay queued, the update check is off, and email, webhook, backup, update, password, two-step and account settings answer 403. ADMIN_PASSWORD remains the operator's own admin account.

Backups

The simplest way: Admin → Settings → Data → Download a backup (owners). One ZIP with the database (an online snapshot, consistent while guests keep uploading), every photo, logo and voice note whatever the storage driver, and the generated session secret. Restore on the same page replaces the whole instance with a backup; it is also how photos move from disk to an S3 bucket (back up, set STORAGE_DRIVER=s3, restart, restore). Restores are sent as one upload: raise your reverse proxy's body limit (client_max_body_size in nginx) above the backup's size.

To script it, the same ZIP comes from GET /api/admin/backup?download=1 with an owner's session. Or copy the data folder yourself; everything lives in /data:

/data
├── guestroll.db          # events, photo metadata, stats, accounts, settings
├── guestroll.db-wal      # SQLite write-ahead log, part of the database
├── .session-secret       # only if SESSION_SECRET isn't set
└── uploads/<event-id>/   # photos, logo, messages/ (empty with STORAGE_DRIVER=s3)

For a consistent copy while the app runs, back up the database with SQLite's online backup, then the files:

docker exec guestroll node -e "require('better-sqlite3')('/data/guestroll.db').backup('/data/backup.db').then(()=>console.log('ok'))"
tar czf guestroll-$(date +%F).tgz -C /var/lib/docker/volumes/guestroll-data/_data backup.db uploads

Copying the folder while the container is stopped works just as well.

Upgrades

Guestroll checks GitHub for new releases every 12 hours. When one is out, the owners get an email (and the webhooks subscribed to A new version is available), and Admin → Settings → System shows its release notes.

From the admin, in one click

Like Matomo's: Update to X.Y.Z makes a full backup, then replaces the running container with the same one on the new image (volumes, ports, networks, variables, restart policy kept), waits for its health check, and puts the previous container back if the new one doesn't come up healthy. Database migrations run on their own at start; the update history lists the ones each update applied.

It needs the small updater container next to Guestroll, because a container can't replace itself:

# .env
UPDATER_URL=http://updater:9900
UPDATER_TOKEN=$(openssl rand -hex 32)   # paste the value

docker compose --profile updater up -d

The updater holds the Docker socket, which gives root on the host. It publishes no port, answers only with the token, only ever replaces the Guestroll container, and only pulls new versions of that container's own image. Leave it off if you'd rather not run anything with the socket: updates then stay a command.

From the server

docker compose pull && docker compose up -d

Either way, read the release notes' Upgrading list first. Every release is tested by starting it on the data of the previous one (see Development).

Health check

GET /api/health returns 200 {"status":"ok"} when the database is readable, 503 otherwise. The image declares it as its Docker HEALTHCHECK.