Hubzilla¶

Hubzilla is a powerful platform for creating interconnected websites featuring a decentralized/nomadic identity.

The docker image comes from voryzen/hubzilla:4.6 and currently does not support arm devices. If you are aware of a suitable substitution or replacement (good place to start), please see issue 478 and test your idea using the documentation.

Setup¶

To enable Hubzilla, run the following command:

make set hubzilla.enable true

then run make update_one hubzilla to finalise the changes

alternatively, you can set the appropriate service settings in settings/config.yml to True, and then run make update_one hubzilla

eg.

hubzilla:
  enable: True

First Run¶

The first time you access Hubzilla, you will need to set up the admin account BEFORE you set any other user account.

To do this: 1. go to your Hubzilla instance, and on the login screen, click register 2. create an account using the admin email that was set during installation.

Unless you modified the docker-compose file, the default admin email will be admin@your.domain.com
check out the **Access** part of these docs, if you're unsure, which domain you used.

3. Unless you have some immediate administration tasks that need finishing, log out and create your own user account using your own email address. 4. Now you can log back into the admin account, and play around. I suggest setting the verify email option, or closing registrations to your hub.

Step 4 is a suggestion/ reminder from HomelabOS. It is beyond the scope of HomelabOS to provide 'how-to' specifics to Hubzilla.
Hubzilla isn't new, so there is plenty of information out there.

SMTP/ Mail¶

Hubzilla makes pretty good use of a mail server. If you don't want to run your own, sign up for a service like mailgun.

Setting up such a service is beyond the scope of the HomelabOS documentation, however there is plenty of information out there.

Once you have access to a mail server, or a mail service provide Hubzilla with the necessary information.

run make decrypt to decrypt the vault.yml file, located in your homelabos settings folder.
Access that file (you might need superuser/root/administrator permissions) and change the following options to reflect your own credentials

# SMTP Settings
smtp:
  host:
  port:
  user:
  pass:
  from_email:
  from_name:

3. Then run make update_one hubzilla to update Hubzilla; HomelabOS will automatically re-encrypt your vault.yml file

Access¶

It is available at https://hubzilla.{{ domain }}/ or http://hubzilla.{{ domain }}/

{% if enable_tor %} It is also available via Tor at http://hubzilla.{{ tor_domain }}/ {% endif %}

Security enable/disable https_only and auth¶

To enable https_only or auth, run the appropriate command:

make set hubzilla.https_only true

make set hubzilla.auth true

then run make update_one hubzilla to finalise the changes

alternatively, you can set the appropriate service settings in settings/config.yml to True, and then run make update_one hubzilla

eg.

hubzilla:
  https_only: True
  auth: True

Last update: January 6, 2022