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Plausible Analytics

Self-hosting is possible based on the docker images and are automatically pushed into Dockerhub registry for all commits on master branch. At the moment, latest is the only tag on DockerHub as we haven't reached a stable release of self-hosted Plausible yet.

Architecture

Plausible runs as a single server, backed by two databases: PostgreSQL for user data and ClickhouseDB for the stats. When you download and run the docker image you also need to provide connection details for these two databases.

Most hosting providers will offer a managed PostgreSQL instance, but it's not as simple with Clickhouse. You can install Clickhouse on a VPS, run it using their official Docker image, or use a managed service provided by Yandex Cloud. Aiven has announced that they are planning offer a managed ClickHouse service in the future and more hosting providers are following suit.

As of June 2020, here's the setup of the official cloud version of Plausible for reference:

  • Web server: Digital Ocean Droplet w/ 1vCPU & 2GB RAM. Managed via the official Docker app.
  • User database: Digital Ocean Managed PostgreSQL w/ 1vCPU & 1GB RAM.
  • Stats database: Digital Ocean Droplet w/ 6vCPU & 16GB RAM. Installed on Ubuntu 18.04 using the official tutorial

Total cost: $105/mo

Building Docker image

Besides the DockerHub registry, one can build docker image from Dockerfile.

Up and Running

The repo supplies with a Docker Compose file and the sample environment variables , this serves as a sample for running Plausible with Docker.

  • Running the setup takes care of the initial migration steps, this needs to be executed only once, on the first run.

    docker-compose run --rm setup
docker-compose down

  • After the setup, you can start plausible as --

    docker-compose up -d plausible

    after a successful startup (can take upto 5 mins), plausible is available at port 80, navigate to http://localhost.

  • stopping plausible --

    docker-compose down

  • purging and removing everything --

    docker-compose down
docker volume rm plausible_event-data -f
docker volume rm plausible_db-data -f

Note:

  • #1 you need to stop plausible and restart plausible if you change the environment variables.
  • #2 With docker-compose, you need to remove the existing container and rebuild if you want your changes need to be reflected: 
    docker rmi -f  plausible_plausible:latest
docker-compose up -d plausible

Non-docker building

It is possible to create a release artifact by running a release.

MIX_ENV=prod mix release plausible

the release will create the pre-packed artifact at _build/prod/rel/plausible/bin/plausible, the release will also create a tarball at _build/prod/ for convenience.

Note, that you have to feed in the related environment variables (see below Environment Variables)

Database Migration

On the initial setup, a migration step is necessary to create database and table schemas needed for initial bootup. Normally, this done by mix aliases like ecto.setup defined in the mix.exs. As this not available in "released" artifact, plausible_migration.ex facilitates this process. The overlay scripts take care of these.

After the release, these are available under _build/prod/rel/plausible --

_build/prod/rel/plausible/createdb.sh
_build/prod/rel/plausible/init-admin.sh
_build/prod/rel/plausible/migrate.sh
_build/prod/rel/plausible/rollback.sh
_build/prod/rel/plausible/seed.sh

the same is available in the docker images as follows --

docker run plausible:master-12add db createdb
docker run plausible:master-12add db init-admin
docker run plausible:master-12add db migrate
docker run plausible:master-12add db rollback
docker run plausible:master-12add db seed

Environment Variables

Plausible relies on the several services for operating, the expected environment variables are explaiend below.

Server

Following are the variables that can be used to configure the availability of the server.

  • HOST (String)
    • The hosting address of the server. For running on local system, this can be set to localhost. In production systems, this can be your ingress host.
  • SCHEME (String)
    • The scheme of the URL, either http or https. When using a reverse proxy with https, it'll be required to set this. defaults to http
  • PORT (Number)
    • The port on which the server is available.
  • SECRET_KEY_BASE (String)
  • ENVIRONMENT (String)
    • The current running environment. defaults to prod
  • APP_VERSION (String)
    • The version of the app running. defaults to current docker tag
  • DISABLE_AUTH (Boolean String)
    • Disables authentication completely, no registration, login will be shown. defaults to false
    • Note: This option is not recommended for production deployments.
  • DISABLE_REGISTRATION
    • Disables registration of new users, keep your admin credentials handy ;) defaults to false
  • DISABLE_SUBSCRIPTION
    • Disables changing of subscription and removes the trial notice banner (use with caution!) defaults to false

Default User Generation

For self-hosting, a default user can be generated using the db init-admin command. To be noted that, a default user is a user whose trial period expires in 100 Years ;). It is highly recommended that you configure these parameters.

  • ADMIN_USER_NAME
    • The default ("admin") username. if not provided, one will be generated for you
  • ADMIN_USER_EMAIL
    • The default ("admin") user email. if not provided, one will be generated for you
  • ADMIN_USER_PWD
    • The default ("admin") user password. if not provided, one will be generated for you

Mailer/SMTP Setup

  • MAILER_ADAPTER (String)
    • The adapter used for sending out e-mails. Available: Bamboo.PostmarkAdapter / Bamboo.SMTPAdapter
  • MAILER_EMAIL (String)
    • The email id to use for as from address of all communications from Plausible.

In case of Bamboo.SMTPAdapter you need to supply the following variables:

  • SMTP_HOST_ADDR (String)
    • The host address of your smtp server.
  • SMTP_HOST_PORT (Number)
    • The port of your smtp server.
  • SMTP_USER_NAME (String)
    • The username/email for smtp auth.
  • SMTP_USER_PWD (String)
    • The password for smtp auth.
  • SMTP_HOST_SSL_ENABLED (Boolean String)
    • If ssl is enabled for connecting to Smtp, defaults to false
  • SMTP_RETRIES (Number)
    • Number of retries to make until mailer gives up. defaults to 2
  • SMTP_MX_LOOKUPS_ENABLED (Boolean String)
    • If MX lookups should be done before sending out emails. defaults to false

Database

Plausible uses postgresql as database for storing all the user-data. Use the following the variables to configure it.

  • DATABASE_URL (String)
    • The repo Url as dictated here
  • DATABASE_POOL_SIZE (Number)
    • A default pool size for connecting to the database, defaults to 10, a higher number is recommended for a production system.
  • DATABASE_TLS_ENABLED (Boolean String)
    • A flag that says whether to connect to the database via TLS, read here

For performance reasons, all the analytics events are stored in clickhouse:

  • CLICKHOUSE_DATABASE_URL (String)
    • Connection string for Clickhouse. The protocol is either http or https depending on your setup.
  • CLICKHOUSE_DATABASE_POOLSIZE (Number)
    • A default pool size for connecting to the database, defaults to 10, a higher number is recommended for a production system.

IP Geolocation

Plausible uses the GeoLite2 database created by MaxMind for enriching analytics data with visitor countries. Their end-user license does not make it very easy to just package the database along with an open-source product. This is why, if you want to get country data for your analytics, you need to create an account and download their GeoLite2 Country database.

Once you have the database, mount it on the Plausible docker image and configure the path of the database file:

  • GEOLITE2_COUNTRY_DB (String)

To make this as easy as possible you can use the maxmindinc/geoipupdate Docker image. You just need to add your account details, mount the database in the plausible container and let the image update the database automatically. To run the complete setup including geoip see docker-compose-geoip.yml.

If the Geolite database is not configured, no country data will be captured.

External Services

  • Google Client
    • GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID
    • GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET
  • Sentry
    • SENTRY_DSN
  • Paddle
    • PADDLE_VENDOR_AUTH_CODE
  • PostMark, only in case of Bamboo.PostmarkAdapter mail adapter.
    • POSTMARK_API_KEY

Apart from these, there are also the following integrations

  • Twitter
    • TWITTER_CONSUMER_KEY
    • TWITTER_CONSUMER_SECRET
    • TWITTER_ACCESS_TOKEN
    • TWITTER_ACCESS_TOKEN_SECRET
  • Slack
    • SLACK_WEBHOOK