Deployment Guide

This guide will help you get ShareTracker up and running on your own server or computer. It assumes you have downloaded and extracted the source code.

🚀 Option 1: Docker (Recommended)

This is the easiest and most reliable way to run the application. It bundles Python, the database, and the web server into a single package and handles production settings automatically.

Prerequisites: Docker Desktop (Windows/Mac) or Docker Engine (Linux) installed.

1. Navigate & Configure

cd path/to/sharetracker

# Windows (PowerShell or CMD):

copy .env.example .env

# Mac / Linux:

cp .env.example .env

Open .env in a text editor and change SECRET_KEY to a random string for security.

2. Start the Application

docker compose up –build -d

The -d flag runs the app in the background.

3. Access & Control

Open your browser and go to: http://127.0.0.1:8000

To stop the application later, run: docker compose down

🛠️ Option 2: Manual Installation (Development)

Use this option if you want to run the app locally for testing or development without Docker.

Prerequisites: Python 3.10 or higher installed.

1. Create venv, install, and prepare

# Create & Activate Virtual Environment

# Windows (PowerShell or CMD):

python -m venv .venv

.venv\Scripts\activate

# Mac / Linux:

python3 -m venv .venv

source .venv/bin/activate

# Install & Initialize (same on Windows, Mac, Linux):

pip install -r requirements.txt

python manage.py migrate

python manage.py download_vendor_assets

python manage.py collectstatic –noinput

2. Configure and run (optional .env)

For local dev, copy .env.example to .env and set DEBUG=True so CSS/JS load without running collectstatic again. Then start the server:

# Windows: copy .env.example .env

# Mac/Linux: cp .env.example .env

python manage.py runserver

Open http://127.0.0.1:8000 in your browser.

🌍 Option 3: Manual Production Setup (Linux/VPS)

Use this for deploying to a Linux server (e.g., Ubuntu, DigitalOcean) when you cannot use Docker.

1. Environment & Config

Follow the Manual Dev steps to install dependencies. Edit .env with production values:

DEBUG=False

SECRET_KEY=your-long-random-key

ALLOWED_HOSTS=yourdomain.com,your-vps-ip

2. Prepare database and static files

Apply migrations, then collect CSS/JS into the static folder (required when DEBUG=False):

python manage.py migrate

python manage.py collectstatic –noinput

3. Run with Gunicorn

Do not use runserver in production. Use the gunicorn server:

gunicorn –bind 0.0.0.0:8000 sharetracker.wsgi:application

Note: For permanent setups, configure Systemd and Nginx as a proxy.

💾 Data Backups

Your data is stored in db.sqlite3 or a Docker volume:

Docker: Data persists automatically in the sqlite_data volume.
Manual: The db.sqlite3 file in the project folder contains all data.

You can also download a JSON snapshot via the “Backup Database” feature in the Jobs menu.