Deploying OwnCloud with Docker

Installing OwnCloud directly on Ubuntu 18 can be challenging due to dependency conflicts and database configuration issues. After struggling with a manual installation, I discovered that the Dockerized version of OwnCloud is much easier to set up and maintain.

Here is my installation and configuration log.

Prerequisites

• Install Docker
• Install Docker Compose

Docker Compose Configuration

I referenced the official OwnCloud Docker installation guide and the official example to create a customized docker-compose.yml.

Customizations:

• External Database: I removed the database container dependencies because I wanted to connect to an existing AWS RDS instance.
• External Storage: I configured volumes to mount my existing NAS storage.
• Redis Removed: Since this instance serves very few users and I wanted to minimize CPU usage on the VM, I removed the Redis service.

Here is the docker-compose.yml file:

version: '2.1'

services:
  owncloud:
    image: owncloud/server:10.0
    restart: always
    ports:
      - 8080:8080
    environment:
      - OWNCLOUD_DOMAIN=localhost
      - OWNCLOUD_DB_TYPE=mysql
      - OWNCLOUD_DB_NAME=db_name
      - OWNCLOUD_DB_USERNAME=db_username
      - OWNCLOUD_DB_PASSWORD=db_password
      # db can be any remote url with accessing privilege
      - OWNCLOUD_DB_HOST=db_url
      - OWNCLOUD_ADMIN_USERNAME=admin
      - OWNCLOUD_ADMIN_PASSWORD=admin
      # for owncloud >= 9.0, add this config to allow local directory as external storage
      - OWNCLOUD_ALLOW_EXTERNAL_LOCAL_STORAGE=true
    healthcheck:
      test: ["CMD", "/usr/bin/healthcheck"]
      interval: 30s
      timeout: 10s
      retries: 5
    volumes:
      - /mnt/data/owncloud:/mnt/data
      - /other-directory1:/mnt/data/d1
      - /other-directory2:/mnt/data/d2

Running OwnCloud

1. Start the service:

   sudo docker-compose up -d
   

2. Access OwnCloud at http://server_ip:8080.
3. Note: Ensure port 8080 is open in your VM’s firewall/security group settings.

Adding Local Storage

To add local directories as external storage, verify that OWNCLOUD_ALLOW_EXTERNAL_LOCAL_STORAGE=true is set, and refer to the Local Storage Configuration documentation.

Useful Commands

• Scan files manually copied to the data directory:

    docker-compose exec owncloud occ files:scan --all