Build Your Own Mastodon Server on Debian (Step by Step Server Build Guide)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 15 ก.ค. 2024
- There's way too much drama with Twitter nowadays, so the alternatives are looking more attractive than ever. Setting up your own Mastodon server is a fun project, and also a potential alternative to Twitter. In this video, Jay walks you through the entire process of setting up your own Mastodon server on a Debian-based VPS.
Note: This video mentions a few regular sponsors (for example, Linode and CrowdSec) however no company has sponsored this video.
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Time Codes
00:00 - Intro
01:40 - What do you need for this tutorial?
06:13 - Building the cloud instance for Mastodon
08:58 - Adding an "A record" in DNS to point to our Mastodon domain
10:52 - Connecting to the server instance via ssh
11:47 - General instance setup tweaks and recommended practices
12:11 - Adding a non-root local user account
12:51 - Enabling sudo access for our user account
14:02 - Installing updates
15:04 - Adding the domain name to the instance
17:17 - Installing the required development packages for Mastodon
20:08 - Creating the PostgreSQL database we'll be using for Mastodon
23:27 - Creating a system user for Mastodon to run under
24:02 - Downloading Mastodon from the git repository
26:10 - Setting the ownership of the mastodon directory
27:49 - Adding the mastodon directory to git's safe list
29:48 - Installing the bundler gem, and adding additional settings
31:09 - Running Mastodon's configuration script to adjust its settings
36:06 - Installing Mastodon's service files
38:28 - Setting up an NGINX reverse proxy for Mastodon
42:10 - Adding a Let's Encrypt certificate to protect our Mastodon server
46:39 - Setting up unattended upgrades
48:53 - Installing CrowdSec to help protect our Mastodon instance
Video Specific Links
- Official blog post for this video ➜ www.learnlinux.tv/?p=2278
The following were helpful articles for figuring out some of the missing commands I needed:
- How to install Mastodon on Ubuntu 22.04/20.04 server ➜ www.linuxbabe.com/ubuntu/how-...
- How to Install Mastodon Social Network on Ubuntu 22.04 ➜ www.howtoforge.com/how-to-ins...
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#debian #mastodon #twitter - วิทยาศาสตร์และเทคโนโลยี
I love that you're incorporating the meme image and the deadpan humor! Your videos are amazing and the touch of nerd humor is icing on an already delicious cake!
Thanks to your guidance, I successfully set up my own Mastodon instance! Your tutorial was by far the most helpful - detailed, clear, and easy to follow. I truly appreciate it! I also encountered some issues with node version conflicts but was able to resolve them smoothly with the help of ChatGPT-4.
wow man finished setting all up and IT WORKS ! 😲
Thx a ton
Made my ear lobes tingle with delight. Thank you!
Brilliant & informative - thanks Jay 👏
Very informative as always... Thanks Jay...
This worked great, thanks for the straightforward instruction in the video and on the blog. Two things that I had to fix in order to get everything working: 1. I had to install imagemagick for image uploading, and 2. I had to downgrade NodeJS to 16.x. I accidentally installed the latest version which was 18.x and that caused some compilation issues. Once I downgraded to 16.x it worked great.
thanks for this! I had figured out the node issue but the imagemagick issue was driving me nuts as I couldn't see any logs for these errors
Excellent content.
Thank you.
Thanks for this extensive tutorial
Now THAT would be the perfect transition to your sponsor Linode 💪😁
I thought about having them sponsor it since I was using them anyway, but I completely forgot about it.
Wow thank you for this!
My pleasure. Literally, this was super fun!
Thanks!
It is so easy,it seems , when you do it 😊,awesome!
When this video came out, you're actually seeing like the 7th attempt or so.
How would you go about updating the mastodon version? would the unattended upgrades just take care of it?
Nice video. Thank you! Would be cool to see how to set this up with docker.
I'm thinking about looking into that too. Sometimes solutions like docker can be TOO easy, but it still might make for an alternative video possibly.
Supercool, thx, subscription...done
Love the video as always. Just a heads up that Mastodon v4.0.2 requires a newer version of node than is provided by Debian 11 currently. Debian 11 currently uses node 12, while the official mastodon documentation is saying node 16. I can also confirm latest stable node, node 18, also does not work, so the sweet spot is definitely node 16.
What is the command for installing node 16?
My server is up and running, however I'm not getting Federated messages to show up? Any one else have this issue? Or did your external federated posts work immediately after setup?
Jay
Thanks. For this.
Yes, yes, yes. Super excited to do that actually. It's been on the list for a while (not specific to Mastodon) but other projects keep getting in the way. I am hoping to be caught up very soon, I would definitely like to knock those out. I think it's the most fun video I could ever work on.
I ran into an issue with nodejs with the newest version of Mastodon. I updated to newest but that isn't supported either so had to downgrade it an earlier version.
I was playing with a cloudron setup but was ready to setup an instance by itself.
You have hit on the very problem I'm having. I really need to get Mastodon working on Debian 12, but I think the OpenSSL issue applies - or there's certainly something too new for compatibility. I am trying to use a Debian 11 VM in the meantime, but it is not provig reliable.
Takk!
Topic suggestion: make your own VPN-server. Find a good server to hire, install Linux on it and use it as a VPN. I think that this might be a great project for many of us and we can share this VPN with friends and familymembers.
Looking to increase the posting from 4, I am having a hard time tracking down that info. Is that something you came across while making this video?
It would be interesting to see bandwidth costs after the Mastodon has been up for a year.
This would've been fun, but I followed the instructions multiple times and the Mastodon site does not come up in the browser. It's a blank page with the Mastodon "M" as the browser tab title. The problem with no full install package with all the compatible software included. I think there is a Docker Compose version.
Which distro linux do you use on your laptop?
Also, a shared Linode Nanode 1 GB server is not large enough (in RAM I suspect) to compile the mastodon files (mastodon:setup) I didn't try Linode 2 GB, but Linode 4 GB dedicated worked.
Thank you Jay!
I followed everything to the latter and you made it look so easy!
I need help at the SMTP server.
And my question is, does it have to be mail from the domain I'm using?
Or I can use an email from another domain.
Thank you
It doesn’t matter if the domain matches, unless the SMTP server itself has restrictions.
I am getting the following error during the email setup: E-mail could not be sent with this configuration, try again.
535 5.7.8 Error: authentication failed: authentication failure. I host my own email server so I am pretty sure I have the right settings. Is there a upgrade or downgrade to the instructions that can help me out on this error?
Nice video, but wouldn't this also work really nicely with Docker given how many different services need setup? Nginx Proxy Manager also makes it incredibly easy to setup reverse proxies.
Jay, many security issues, you dont turn off "root" login? you should probably also only allow certs login
Ever wanted to do a tutorial on basics of using VS-Codium ???
Great tutorial very easy to understand but unfortunately I tried to do the same step by step it looks like this method is not working anymore after Mastodon update that changed the ruby version and I have been getting error, could you make an updated tutorial I will be much appreciated 👍🏻👍🏻
Jay, I've done this several times, but I'm getting stuck on setting up NPM with Mastodon. I've tried both http and http ports for the reverse proxy, but it's not functioning. It just routes to the NGINX default config screen. Any ideas?
since the NGINX config part of the example uses hostname-based routing, you may encounter this issue if you're trying to access the service using your server's IP address rather than the name in the 'server_name' directive. a quick fix can be to add an appropriate entry in your local hosts file.
I used Cloudron to install, worked pretty good, BUT no one was able to join it? any ideas what went wrong?
Node version 16 is required for compiling the mastodon files (mastodon:setup)
Hi Jay,
Thank you for this great video.
Currently, Linode has Mastodon in its marketplace.
I did direct installation from there when I visit my ip address I got the response you got (Nginx) at Time 39:00
I used a sub domain, but visiting the site I still can't access mastodon.
What would you suggest I do.
Did you ever figure it out?
@@NyneIX9 not exactly. I used Digital Ocean instead
I actually thought twitter went bonkers years ago lol. Mastodon is just one option. There are others. Always great to have options.
Hi! What are the other options, if you don't mind me asking?
Where do we find additional security information to add to the server ?
Basically just the other videos I have on the channel. There's a few that will cover this, so that should point you in the right direction.
the only good video around that news so far.
I am Getting a HTTP ERROR 500 any advice?
Hi, I followed your tutorial but keep getting HTTP ERROR 500, I was able to see the NGINX configuration place holder but after the remaining steps I don't see my mastodon installation what would you advice me to do?
My dns is propagated
seems to be an SSL issue, can you guide what can be done?
did you solve it? That happens to me too.
@@christian.mathis I completely chucked this video method and just followed the official documentation process, much easier and quicker result. From this video you can actually pick up a few things, like usermod, not installing in root folder(but i think official documentation does it in home, I dont know if they are the same folder structure) ya but faster and better
Apart from all the media meltdowns the experience on Twitter is completely unaffected - still the same toxic hellhole it's been for years now. Something tells me the issue is a little deeper than "new CEO bad man".
I and many others have had "this tweet is unavailable" that come and go with a refresh. While that's not enough to warrant leaving a platform, some people are using this as an exercise to see what this mastodon thing is. We don't know if Twitter is going away. I personally don't think it'll ever go completely away but it will change. Even if it's an under construction page 🤣
Elon & Twitter is made for each other
There's a couple of issues, there are some technical issues( which is not huge but still annoying). There's now the Twitter blue, Twitter blue comments are taken priority over other Twitter comments by
This aged poorly
@@the-random1 How? Twitter is just fine, if not better. Imagine not liking something all of a sudden because the media tells you not to. What a lil bxtch.
hostnamectl set-hostname works also
It does, kinda. It's not thorough and that command only does half the job. On some distributions I've seen it not even alter the proper file at all. But another hesitation with showing that in videos is that it doesn't update /etc/hosts, so I figure if you have to use a text editor for that, you may as well for the other. Still a good mention on your end, thanks!
Sorry I havent started watching the video yet but will watch it all. My question is can you run multiple Mastodon instances on 1 VM ? Ignore if answered in the video thanks.
Actually, I don't know the answer to that. If you had two different domains and databases, and kept everything in separate places, and also the instance had enough resources for both - then I struggle to think of any reason you couldn't.
You can always dockerize
I literally went down the federated services rabbit hole last night. Use that bandwidth!
Thanks for this - I followed the process and all looked good except for some reason the assets (in var/www/mastodon/system) didn't precompile. After a bit of uninstalling yarn and a couple of Ruby libraries to get versions that worked I got the assets in the directories. Then it looked great. I had to install imagemagick as it was missing. But now I can't upload media to toots - I get a "500 Error processing thumbnail for uploaded media". I've searched Google extensively and can't find a solution. I reinstalled imagemagick from source - but no luck. Is there a definitive software version list out there that I could compare with my set up? Maybe something got upgraded or downgraded and that's the problem? Or is there a directory missing from my setup? There's nothing in the logs (journalctl etc.)
Been trying for days to resolve this. My head hurts from scratching. Any ideas anyone?
Well scratch all that. In desperation, I uninstalled it from source *and* apt. I had ImageMagick installed both ways apparently. Then I installed via apt. And bingo! It worked. So it looks like installing from source is a no-no or at least installing both ways?)
Man you have changed, I can't put my finger on it!!!, do you look younger, or older!, I am not sure!
could we have similar tutorials on Peertube, XMPP, Matrix, Jitsi, Searx and Openvpn please?
Short answer: Yes. Long answer: My content schedule is pretty much set in stone until the end of December, but after that I'm already planning on doing more setup videos. And a few of those you mentioned are on the list already. Great stuff coming!
Uh oh. Noob here. Having ruby version troubles. Heard they're notorious for noobs. Just went full circle with ruby version and rbenv not using local version installed specified in Gemfile.
After going full circle and becoming an amateur ruby user after 2 days, I just changed the config in the Gemfile. Call it good.
[joining server in...]
I want Elon Musk to try to buy TH-cam, so that bloggers like you will release a video on installing PeerTube.
In fact, I just don’t fully understand how to run several services at the same time, on one physical server, so that they don’t interfere with each other, there are no problems with certificates, and there is access both from the local network and from outside (there are nuances with DNS).
This video is 7 days old. Following the instructions to the letter will NOT work. This is how fast technology moves in reality. Now I am trying to figure out if nginx needs something or I need to switch to a particular version of node… it’s late and I am tired!
LOL. Mastodon. Sounds pretty extreme to me.
They are, they were known to grow very large when they walked the Earth. Fossil evidence is teaching us some interesting things.
you are very good in your tutorials BUT YOU HAVE A SERIOUS PROBLEM SOME PEOPLE DO NOT LIKE TO USE MANY COMMANDS AND USE VIRTUAL WEBMIN OTHERS USE OTHERS ETC, be more modern in your tutorials please
Step by Step >>> "I leave this up to you" ... 200 million sperm and THIS DUDE WON????
Yea, can’t have that free speech going on. smh
Twitter has been developing for almost 15 years, and you propose to change it to this unknown crap? Bon Voyage )
Everything was "unknown" at some point.
Twitter is fascist-owned now. Time to leave.
Twitter was commie and now it’s not.
Elon by far is no right wing only idiots think that. He’s a typical billionaire leftie that just says what he thinks.
I think the point isn’t slamming mastodon but instead “why now”?
Why does Twitter suck now? Answer is that it doesn’t, evil people are held accountable no matter what side they’re on so I’m looking forward to using Twitter.
Setting up some cool open source software is great too, for experience.
@@jasonbaldini Musk is a RW scumbag. He told people to vote for Rs and worships Putin. Use your head.
@@paddymurphy-oconnor8255 Twitter protects fascists and billionaire mobsters. Always has. Now it's 1000X worse because one of them owns it.
I create a user in the server learnlinux.socia, but today can't singup (login) with my user and pass... I don't know, maybe Jay is testing something...
just a heads-up; oracle's OCI has free 4vcore/24Gig ram VMs instances which is free for this purpose. lookup "VM.Standard.A1.Flex"