Discourse installation end to end on Windows Server 2016

Installation
1

HI,
I would like to know the steps involved in Discourse installation end to end on Windows Server 2016.

Thanks,
Arun

2

You won’t find them here. If you want support here you must follow these instructions: https://github.com/discourse/discourse/blob/master/docs/INSTALL-cloud.md.

2 Likes
3

Easy, switch the darn thing off and follow these instructions :wink:

Seriously though, I understand you can get docker running on Windows within a Linux container … that sounds messy, but good luck!

You could always share the results of your adventure here when you’ve got it working?

4

Thanks merefield and Jay. I was thinking the below route:

  1. Provision Windows Server 2016(which has inbuilt Docker) in AWS or Azure.
  2. Install Ubuntu Container image
  3. Start the docker like below
    .\docker.exe run -it ubuntu
  4. now install discourse in the linux shell
    GitHub - discourse/discourse_docker: A Docker image for Discourse

Will the above work, are there any issues?
If this works, this would be awesome in terms of easier deployment and scalability (single container to multi container).
Let me know you thoughts!

5

No, it won’t work. You can’t run docker inside docker.

Running production Discourse in Windows isn’t supported. Since you are using AWS/Azure just provision a Linux VM.

3 Likes
6

Thanks Rafael for the reply. The problem being, currently my enterprise does not support Docker in Linux machines On-Prem or Cloud for security reasons. Trying to see the best work around in this scenario?

Now im left with the below options:

  1. Is there any way that i can make the Discousre work on Windows server using Docker? OR
  2. Just go with No Docker option, where I can provision a Linux machine and install all Rails, PostgreSQL, Redis, NGINX etc. Is this option good enough for production?
  3. Any other options available?

Just saw this – https://tutorials.ubuntu.com/tutorial/tutorial-windows-ubuntu-hyperv-containers#0

7

Let me preface this by saying Discourse is FOSS, you can do whatever you want. However, we limit our free support to only official installations that use our guide, which uses Linux + Docker.

This may work, but it’s unsupported by us. Also the double virtualization (AWS Hypervisor, Windows virtualization for Docker) can be a big hit for performance. Not recommended.

This may work, but it’s unsupported by us. Getting correct versions of all the OS level dependencies and tracking updates to those will be time consuming, and can lead to subtle broken features. Also you will very soon be running deprecated and potentialy insecure versions of the software. Not recommended.

4 Likes
8

Thanks for the detailed explanation Rafael.

  • Changing your enterprise policy and running a Linux server
    ----------Long way to go
  • Buying our hosted Discourse service: https://discourse.org/buy 1
    ----------We cannot take this option. Because of app’s personal data, have to be on our servers.
  • Using another forum software that complies with your requirements.
    ---------Will check on this.
9

You could do a development install (Beginners Guide to Install Discourse on Windows 10 for Development) and then stick an nginx in front of it. But that’s not really recommended either.

10

Thanks Jay. Many close options but mostly not recommended :frowning: