Forem Creators and Builders 🌱

Step by Step tutorial on how to install Forem

Akhil Naidu on July 08, 2021

Keep in Mind To make the installation process simple and more user friendly, I re-adjusted the initial ENV dependencies. Once you have s...

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Dhanabal • Jul 10 '21

My error

Akhil Naidu • Jul 10 '21

I updated the post with post-installation instructions. Check it to resolve your issues.

Dhanabal • Jul 10 '21

Really thanks

Dhanabal • Jul 10 '21

Is there any ways to host images in digital ocean

Akhil Naidu • Jul 10 '21

Configuring s3 will make a lot of things easy.

It helps hosting images
Dokku's postgress backup is attached with s3(you can also do this manually)
s3 has free tier of 1 year and very cheap image hosting plans. (Digital Ocean has competitive pricing too)

Presently(This might change in later date) => Forem is using s3_direct_upload ruby gem. So effectively you can also configure any object storage using it. (even digital ocean storage, but I never tested it)

Akhil Naidu • Jul 10 '21

For you to effectively do this, all you have to do is => while configuring your s3 ENV variables, rather than using s3 credentials, you can use Digital Ocean Object storage credentials.

Dhanabal • Jul 10 '21

Is need to set AWS_ID to digital ocean key
AWS_SECRET = digitalocean api secret key

Is correct?

Akhil Naidu • Jul 10 '21

You need to configure all these ENV variables.
AWS_ID=
AWS_SECRET=
AWS_BUCKET_NAME=
AWS_UPLOAD_REGION=

And for those values you need to create a space in digital ocean, not just your VPS. Use this like to know more about spaces.

Also, first try to understand a bit more about Forem, rather than focusing just on making it live. If you want to self-host Forem, knowing about is important. Or else you can wait for a while and launch your Forem using Forem-Cloud(I'm expecting that Forem might release a premium hosting plan of their own)

Dhanabal • Jul 10 '21

Yes i correctly set all env. Now i upload images i have error "Unexpected token < in JSON at position 0"

Dhanabal • Jul 10 '21

Aws id to do api id
Aws secret to do api secret key
Aws bucket name to do bucket name
Aws upload region which one is need to update
Nyc3 or nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com

Akhil Naidu • Jul 10 '21

restart your application => you can use dokku ps:restart nforem
Once try to use different image(may be with JPEG/JPG extension)

Dhanabal • Jul 10 '21

Hi,
I am installed successfully. But website some time have an error

Akhil Naidu • Jul 10 '21

It is always best to configure your s3 bucket, it takes care of your image hosting without any issues.

You can do it, by adding ENV variables; watch the end of the video for more info about how to add your other ENV variables.

Dhanabal • Jul 10 '21

Yes i watched your video 3 time. You show only community name change only. I am new to forem.

Akhil Naidu • Jul 10 '21

Then it is best to get familiar with Forem. You can do this by exploring admin section of your Forem and exploring the admin Forem website.

Dhanabal • Jul 10 '21

Ok. I will check

Dhanabal • Jul 10 '21

Are you checked wherret.com. why my first post "oooops you have encounterd error"

Akhil Naidu • Jul 10 '21

Yes, that is what I'm trying to say!

First configure your S3.

Dhanabal • Jul 10 '21

Wherret.com is my website please check

Akhil Naidu • Jul 10 '21

It is uptop to you to configure it; using your admin account.

Checkout this link: admin.forem.com/

I can see you have a fully working Forem without any issues during installation.

Dhanabal • Jul 10 '21

Ok i will check. How do we backup forem websites

Akhil Naidu • Jul 10 '21

You can do it using dokku commands, but I'm also updating the script with update features; but for this you need to configure your s3 bucket.

techkoool • Feb 25 '22

First of all, thank you for the script, it helped me a lot. I have successfully installed using this method before. Now I try again and it doesn't work. I had the error at the releasing nforem app step. The error is:

[250] ! Unable to load application: ActiveRecord::ConnectionNotEstablished: connection to server at "127.0.0.1", port 6000 failed: ERROR:  server login failed: wrong password type
       bundler: failed to load command: puma (/app/vendor/bundle/ruby/3.0.0/bin/puma)
       /app/vendor/bundle/ruby/3.0.0/gems/activerecord-6.1.4.6/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/postgresql_adapter.rb:83:in `rescue in new_client': connection to server at "127.0.0.1", port 6000 failed: ERROR:  server login failed: wrong password type (ActiveRecord::ConnectionNotEstablished)

@akhil Do you have any idea about this error?

techkoool • Feb 26 '22

following up

Akhil Naidu • Feb 26 '22

I will try to reproduce it and will update on it.

Gilad Levi • Nov 17 '21 • Edited

Hi, @akhil Thank you!, I managed to build Forem on my Linode VPS using this method.
I have few quotations

Is there a way to use my own fork with this method so I will be able to do custom changes and update?
Is there a way to custom css without rebuilding?

Akhil Naidu • Nov 18 '21

I replied to your email.

Gilad Levi • Nov 18 '21

Sorry @akhil , I can't find the email you sent anywhere can you please send it again? You can also contact me at gilad@011.ninja
Thank you!

blackego30 • Jul 8 '21

I followed the previous tutorials and ran into the white screen after the welcome page. I will try this later today to see if I can get this thing fully deployed but I am hopeful!

Akhil Naidu • Jul 10 '21

This means, you have successfully installed Forem. The rest is up to you to configure through your Admin panel.

Check this Video for more info

blackego30 • Jul 13 '21

I was able to successfully deploy Forem. However, I am having issues posting images. I have S3 provisioned and hosting the Forem site on Digital ocean. However, I continue to get errors when uploading Images. I feel that I missed a step somewhere or my server is not authenticating to S3.

Akhil Naidu • Jul 13 '21

Link your Forem website over here, it might help be check few essential and so I can comment about a way forward.

I've seen your mail too. So if you want to mention a particular issue, you can ping me over the forem.dev chat.

blackego30 • Jul 13 '21

indadirt.com/ is the url, thanks!

Akhil Naidu • Jul 13 '21

The signup method was not allowed to public, make it open so that I can create an account and inspect more.

Also, I guess your SSL was not configured properly, check this too.

Akhil Naidu • Jul 8 '21 • Edited

Please feel free to share more info, if you came across any errors. Usually, scripts might end in errors in two known cases.

Using Different Environment.
Unable to provide the right inputs.

To solve the issue one, I developed the script entirely on digital ocean VPS. But, regarding the second, you should carefully read and respond to what the script has presented you(t2d = talk to dokku)

techkoool • Sep 20 '21

it seems like all the images uploaded are broken after restart the app with:

dokku ps:restart nforem

Akhil Naidu • Sep 20 '21

I would suggest you go through the Post Installation Tips, which I tried to emphasis as much as possible.

In it the 4th point goes like this:

Before uploading any images, configure s3 bucket

Throughly go through the article once, and enjoy Foreming.

techkoool • Sep 20 '21

The thing is I can upload images without s3 (I think it stores images in VPS). The images were broken when I restart the app.

Akhil Naidu • Sep 20 '21 • Edited

It is not that you cannot upload, you can upload. But t2d script is based on docker in background and which doesnot support persistant data out of the box.

In case of any reastart, all the previous data will be wiped out. This is the reason, I choose to make s3 as the image storage.

If you prefer to have persistant data storage between restarts or rebuids or updates, it would be in your interest to add s3. If you figure out another way of solving this issue => you can proceed with it. But the easiest and cost effective method is to attach s3.

Akhil Naidu • Aug 30 '21

I'm coming up with a web-ui for t2d. If you like t2d script, you can keep an eye out for it.

Comment deleted

Akhil Naidu • Jul 8 '21 • Edited

Sure! Once done, attach your Forem URL over here.

Also, let me know if you had faced any difficulties during the installation process, I will try to update things!

zhoumo01 • Jul 16 '21

Successfully deploy forem on vultr with your script, thanks @akhi
my instance test.newbility.io/

A little problem when create admin account, as @blackego30 , ran into the white screen after the welcome page. Reset the APP_PROTOCOL variable to https:// solve the problem.

Muhammed Cetin • Jul 8 '21

You're awesome, @akhil . Thanks a lot for all your efforts.