Self-Hosting Discourse Just Got a Whole Lot Easier

[Canapin (Coin-coin le Canapin)]

For those who want to see what the new process looks like.

I installed Discourse on a Hetzner CAX11 server (ARM architecture, 2 vCPUs, 4 GB RAM).
It took approximately 7 minutes from the time I ran the installation script to the site going live.

1. Magic starts happening here:
   

   

2. The new installation script asks for the admin’s email, one of the few remaining requirements :
   

   

3. It then asks for a domain name (default: YES). If we don’t have one, it prompts us to go to id.discourse.com/my/subdomain.

   

   
   

   

   Beautiful, it is.
   

   

4. After creating the subdomain, we need to generate a verification code to enter during the installation script process:
   

   

5. After entering the verification code, the domain is validated on id.discourse.com. You’re happy that no one stole the subdomain you deeply wanted, and the script asks if you want to configure SMTP (interestingly, default is NO, presumably because we used Discourse ID’s subdomain):
   

   
   
   
   

6. Then, the script validates all the entered information and asks us if everything’s OK (default is YES, as it should be):
   

   

7. After all those quick steps, the rest of the installation is well-known to Discourse’s admins and devs. It rebuilds the app, which takes about 5 minutes on a low-spec server.
   

   

8. After a few minutes of waiting and a cup of coffee, the site is live and asks for our Discourse ID:
   

   

9. You’ll notice that the Wizard now has only 2 steps: the initial login, and this (also well-known) one:
   

   

10. Welcome to Discourse: it was never that easy