Another 11.0 Docker Setup Tutorial - This one using Ubuntu Server VM

[Hisma]

I originally wrote this for emby users, but because this is certainly relevant to freenas users, I'll cross-post it here, since once you get docker working, you can use it to set up any container you see fit. I will use emby server as my container of choice though.
Here's the original I wrote -
https://emby.media/community/index....0-u2-running-emby-via-docker-in-an-ubuntu-vm/

And here it is for freenas users to pursue, since I figure this may warrant freenas-specific discussion. This is an alternative to RancherOS for those that may feel uncomfortable going that route. Feel free to suggest any improvements or point out any errors. I also copy-pasted directly from some other content, so if this bothers anyone, let me know and I'll delete it. Not trying to claim others work as my own, again, I just think it's useful to have everything accessible in one place.

Note that there's a lot of steps to this, but individually none are particularly difficult... I'm not a linux or bsd expert by any means, in fact I'd consider myself a complete amateur. I just pieced this all together from guides I read online, none of this is really my own. Also, as a newb myself so I wrote this as newb-friendly as possible... not to insult anyone's intelligence, just to reach the largest audience possible.

At the end of this guide you'll have emby server running in a docker container on a Ubuntu Server VM, with everything set to auto-start on reboot.

Note: I installed this on an Ubuntu Server 16.04 VM directly from the Freenas 11 GUI.

PreReqs:

• freenas 11.0-U2 (may work on other 11.0 versions but it's confirmed working on this version for me)
• Ubuntu Server 16.04 ISO x64 (other versions may work but confirmed working on this version for me)
• vnc viewer
• (optional but highly recommended) - dedicated ssh app - i like secureCRT

First Step - Create the Ubuntu VM

Inside the freenas GUI:

• Go to VM tab, and create a new VM. Create VM name, and give it a good amount of resources, since this will be your container manager. Based on the specs of my server (xeon 1220v3 w/ 32GB RAM), I gave my VM 4 CPUs and 12GB of RAM.
• Once VM is created, before you start it, go to devices tab, add CDROM, and point it to Ubuntu Server 16.04 iso image (it's free, just grab it from wherever)
• Also add a disk, must have zvol to tie to. If no zvol, create a zvol with sufficient size. Mine was 80GB. I won't show how to set up a zvol here, but just search for it, it's a simple process

Now you can start the VM and connect initially via vnc viewer to the port specified on the VM details. It should boot to the ubuntu cdrom and start the installation process.

Install Ubuntu with basic settings. No GUI, no extra features. Just keep it bare bones to keep it lightweight as possible. It will come up with an option to use UEFI boot. Choose that option as that will allow you to auto-start the VM via the freenas GUI.

UEFI Boot Fix

One annoying thing is that the freenas VM system will not boot to uefi automatically. There's an extra step you need to follow to fix this which is detailed in this forum already. https://forums.freen...ing-uefi.54039/

Summarizing steps from that guide here, if you have shutdown your VM already and try to reboot it (which was my case), it will not automatically start the VM. Instead it will boot to shell. To eliminate this - Just type exit at the shell prompt, and in the EFI menu system navigate to "Boot Maintenance Manager" and then select "Boot from file" to locate and select your grubx64.efi file.

Once the VM is started, log in as root.

Code:

sudo -i

As root, cd to the

Code:

/boot/efi/EFI

directory of your VM in order to create the new BOOT directory and copy the existing grubx64.efi to /EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi.

Code:

mkdir /boot/efi/EFI/BOOT
cp /boot/efi/EFI/ubuntu/grubx64.efi /boot/efi/EFI/BOOT
mv /boot/efi/EFI/BOOT/grubx64.efi /boot/efi/EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi

The end result should look like this, using Ubuntu as an example:

Code:

root@ubuntu-vm:/boot/efi# tree -L 3 .
.
└── EFI
├── BOOT
│ └── bootx64.efi
└── ubuntu
├── fbx64.efi
├── grub.cfg
├── grubx64.efi
├── mmx64.efi
└── shimx64.efi
3 directories, 6 files
root@ubuntu-vm:/boot/efi#

The file bootx64.efi is a copy of the grubx64.efi in your VM.

NB: If grubx64.efi gets updated you will need to re-create bootx64.efi

Restart the VM from the freenas GUI, and see if it boots directly to VM.

Now your ubuntu VM should be up and running, and it will auto-start on reboots.

As soon as I got Ubuntu up and running, I made sure to enable ssh access.



Set Up SSH Access (Optional but Reccomended)

Code:

sudo apt-get install openssh-server 

Now you can access the VM via ssh (I like secureCRT) instead of relying on vnc viewer.

Also, make sure to mount NAS folder to give NAS access to your VM -

• Install cifs-utils

Code:

apt-get install cifs-utils

Create the directory and mount the device using the following commands (I named my mount point "freenas". Name it whatever you want).

Code:

sudo mkdir /mnt/freenas

Now mount the device using cifs

Code:

mount -t cifs //192.168.0.155/nas -o username=anonymous,password=,rw,nounix,iocharset=utf8,file_mode=0644,dir_mode=0755 /mnt/freenas

Change the ip address and folders to match the path to your particular NAS setup. My nas is setup for anonymous access internally. You might want to be more secure if you have multiple users, so change those settings as you see fit.

Code:

sudo df -Th /mnt/freenas/

Test the directory and make sure your VM now has access to your freenas files. Once tested, you'll wan to make permanent so it persists on reboot.

edit /etc/fstab and append -

Code:

//192.168.0.155/nas /mnt/freenas cifs username=anonymous,password=,rw,nounix,iocharset=utf8,file_mode=0755,dir_mode=0755

Again, change the path and options as it matches your particular setup. Test that all this is working by stopping your VM, restarting it, and making sure that your NAS is still accessible via your mount point.

Now you're ready to actually install docker.

Installing Docker
taken from here
https://www.digitalo...on-ubuntu-16-04

The Docker installation package available in the official Ubuntu 16.04 repository may not be the latest version. To get the latest and greatest version, install Docker from the official Docker repository. This section shows you how to do just that.

First, add the GPG key for the official Docker repository to the system:

Code:

curl -fsSLhttps://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu/gpg  | sudo apt-key add -

Add the Docker repository to APT sources:

Code:

sudo add-apt-repository "deb [arch=amd64] https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu/ $(lsb_release -cs) stable"

Next, update the package database with the Docker packages from the newly added repo:

Code:

sudo apt-get update

Make sure you are about to install from the Docker repo instead of the default Ubuntu 16.04 repo:

Code:

apt-cache policy docker-ce

You should see output similar to the follow:

Output of apt-cache policy docker-ce

Code:

docker-ce:
Installed: (none)
Candidate: 17.03.1~ce-0~ubuntu-xenial
Version table:
17.03.1~ce-0~ubuntu-xenial 500
500 https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu xenial/stable amd64 Packages
17.03.0~ce-0~ubuntu-xenial 500
500 https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu xenial/stable amd64 Packages

Notice that docker-ce is not installed, but the candidate for installation is from the Docker repository for Ubuntu 16.04. The docker-ce version number might be different.

Finally, install Docker:

Code:

sudo apt-get install -y docker-ce

Docker should now be installed, the daemon started, and the process enabled to start on boot. Check that it's running:

Code:

sudo systemctl status docker

The output should be similar to the following, showing that the service is active and running:

Code:

docker.service - Docker Application Container Engine
Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/docker.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
Active: active (running) since Sun 2016-05-01 06:53:52 CDT; 1 weeks 3 days ago
Docs: https://docs.docker.com
Main PID: 749 (docker)

Installing Docker now gives you not just the Docker service (daemon) but also the docker command line utility, or the Docker client. All we need for now.

Install and Set Up Portainer (Optional but recommended)
taken from here

https://www.ostechni...-manage-docker/

Code:

sudo docker pull portainer/portainer

Let us check whether the Portainer image has been pulled or not.

Code:

sudo docker images

Sample output:

Code:

portainer/portainer latest ec91653336d4 7 days ago 9.132 MB

As you see in the above output, Portainer image size is less than 10 MB, which is very small so that I won’t consume more RAM and Hdd space.

We have now Portainer in our local Ubuntu system. Let us start the container using command (this command allows portainer to be persistent on restart):

Code:

docker run -d -p 9000:9000 --restart always --name portainer -v /opt/portainer-data:/data -v /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock portainer/portainer

Now, Portainer is running! Let us go ahead and access the Portainer UI. To do so, open your wbe browser and point it to – http://localhost:900..._Address:9000/.You will be presented with a screen like below that asks to setup a password for the admin user.

Enter the password twice and hit Validate button to create the admin user password.



Finally - Add Emby Docker Image
Taken from here -

https://hub.docker.c...dukrbdutjzkjtz/

We recommend you install directly from the Docker Hub. Before starting the install procedure please verify the following prerequisites are fulfilled:

• ensure the user running installation command can run docker

Start the installation by issuing the following command from within a terminal (restart always & define port will make persistent on restart):

Code:

docker run -it --rm -v /usr/local/bin:/target emby/embyserver instl

Set Up Emby

run the emby-server command

Code:

emby-server

It will ask you to add volume locations.

Use the mounted freenas directory to give access to NAS (or whatever folder you set up to mount with your NAS)

Code:

/mnt/freenas

That's it for the cli portion of emby set-up. Just ctrl+D to exit.

Now, go into portainer, check images. You should see emby server. Click the link hyperlink. Look for the expose detail. Use one of the available tcp ports. For me, it was tcp port 8096.

Now just enter the url of the docker VM with the correct port number:

That should go directly to the emby set up screen. You're done!

But one last thing before we finish...

Enable Systemd Emby (Optional - allows emby-server to auto-start with docker VM)

By deafult, containers don't auto-start on reboot. If you want this to happen, which is extremely convenient, you need to give it an appropriate run command. There's several ways to do this with docker, but in Ubuntu, systemd seems to be the recommended way to go. This is probably the most complex part of this tutorial, since the contents of your custom unit will vary depending on your personal setup. Use mine as a general guide and tweak as needed.

On some emby docker tutorials, there are one-line commands that get emby-server to get included in systemd, but I couldn't get any of them to work for me for some reason, so I had to set up my own systemd service to make it work.

I installed an app called systemd-docker for docker auto starts. Found it in a suggestion in the emby docker thread and it worked for me.

Code:

apt-get install systemd-docker

Then create the unit emby-docker.service file that goes into /etc/systemd/system/

things to note on the switches used in the "ExecStart" section -

-v = volume

-e = environment variable

A good tip is to go into Portainer, look at the emby-server container you set up earlier, and look at the details of the container to get the settings of your ENV and volume sections. Then use the switches as shown in my example to configure your unit to match your personal setup. Some other tips -

• For my set-up, my volume referred to my mount point of my NAS. Change that to match what yours is.
• I run my emby container as root user. I have no problem with this. If you want to run it as some other user, you need to change the user as needed
• TZ = timezone. It's important to have that match your local timezone. Look up linux timezones and find one that matches yours.

The rest I think you can keep the same and it shouldn't cause you many issues, but of course depends on your set-up. This took me a while to figure out and get right, and there may very well be easier ways to do this.

Here's my sample emby-docker.service file. Make sure to give the file full rw permissions so it can be executed by systemd.

Code:

[Unit]
Description=Emby-Server Docker
After=docker.service
Requires=docker.service

[Service]
ExecStart=/usr/bin/systemd-docker run --rm --name %n --net=host -v /home/root/.emby-server:/config -v /mnt/freenas:/mnt/freenas -e APP_UID=0 -e APP_GID=0 -e APP_USER=root -e EDGE=0 -e UMASK=002 -e TZ='America/New_York' emby/embyserver
Restart=always
RestartSec=10s
Type=notify
NotifyAccess=all
TimeoutStartSec=120
TimeoutStopSec=15

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Enable it to make it persistent -

Code:

sudo systemctl enable emby-docker

Then start it

Code:

sudo systemctl start emby-docker

You should see the container running in portainer in your containers list, and you should be able to access your emby server on the default 8096 port. This time however, the container will always auto-start with your VM.

 

[Jailer]

Good tutorial and thanks for writing it up.

Having said that , good friggin lord! And people wonder why I like using jails. pkg install name_of_package

 

[Hisma]

Good tutorial and thanks for writing it up.

Having said that , good friggin lord! And people wonder why I like using jails. pkg install name_of_package

I agree, it's a lot of steps. But the bulk of it is getting the VM set up correctly to work with docker and portainer. Once docker & portainer are all up and running, adding new images will be a snap. And the VM can be manipulated from the GUI, and containers can be managed from a web interface (portainer). I also included just about every single cli command you need, whereas other may assume knowledge.

I'm curious to see how easy it is for others to follow.

 

[Zwck]

I do like docker quite a bit, however i have noticed that if i allocate all the resources i have to my docker machine an emby transcode uses much more resources. Not entirely sure why.

Cheers

 

[BillCardiff]

If only Ubiquiti would make a port for Aircontrol !!
Would like to add that this is a great write up but still doesn’t work for me. My VM doesn’t stay RUNNING long enough for me to connect to it. Just too many steps to even bother if I’m failing on step 4.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[appoli]

Do you have to use cifs or can I go the NFS route? I ask because it’s Linux and I’d like the added ability of the nfs com system

Thanks

 

[Hisma]

Do you have to use cifs or can I go the NFS route? I ask because it’s Linux and I’d like the added ability of the nfs com system

Thanks

I would think you can. The point is to just have a way for the VM to reach the "outside world". I used cifs, probably bc the guide I was following was assuming that the user would be connecting the VM to a windows share. But, for our purposes, we should probably be using nfs instead. Not sure if it causes any issues w/ emby or docker, but I can't imagine it would. Give it a shot and let us know.

 

[Hisma]

I went ahead and set up a nfs share in place of the cifs share and it seems to work just fine within my VM and plays well w/ emby. So I definitely think that's the way to go.

Was easy to do. If anyone wants instructions on how to do that, let me know. I should probably update the tutorial to replace the cifs share with the nfs share... but I won't go through the trouble of doing that unless there's any actual demand for it.

 

[appoli]

I went ahead and set up a nfs share in place of the cifs share and it seems to work just fine within my VM and plays well w/ emby. So I definitely think that's the way to go.

Was easy to do. If anyone wants instructions on how to do that, let me know. I should probably update the tutorial to replace the cifs share with the nfs share... but I won't go through the trouble of doing that unless there's any actual demand for it.

Thanks!
I imagine the difference would get to get NFS Utils and then mount using NFS. Anything else?

I added the fan control software (since I can’t get my IPMI controller to kick in quickly enough to keep my HDs at a nice temp), but after that I just can’t get Docker to work on my Corral box. I had been sticking with it until 11.1 comes out, but it seems like I may have to make the change early if I can’t get it back up....

Couple questions: since there is an emby plug-in why did you go this route if you were just doing emby? (Unless you wanted Docker for more).

And how is the performance vs using something like rancherOS/centOS? I like the idea of using a Linux distro that’s meant for Docker, but this looks pretty simple...maybe simpler (and possibly could have other benefits like running some other programs from that VM).


Question for the naive:
In the Corral boot2docker world, If one mapped the media folder via the container setup - would it access that using the network drivers? Or would that have been setup as a physical drive for the container?

I ask because I have been using Nextcloud with MySQL setup in another container, but the performance hadn’t been amazing - seems like to access another container it would have had to use the network drivers (I feel like I knew this at the time, but maybe I wasn’t thinking and/or forgot something along the way). Connecting to MySQL wouldn’t have actually gone through the NiC, right? Or would it have?
I remember reading up on Docker and about how it sets up its own ‘docker’ subnet.


Oh and that’s also another thing - would need to create the Docker network bridge using a non-standard Docker deployment...

I really want to go back to Docker since it was so easy & I know I could get all my data back in a jiffy, but for Nextcloud I’d like the best performance possible...and I honestly don’t know how the Nextcloud plugin operates (MySQL or the free sql/Lite package)..... the first time I made a FreeNAS system was in Feb of this year right when Corral came out....and I figured if the new version was in production it might have some teething issues, but it should be stable & should continue to go through development....oops

 

[Hisma]

Thanks!
I imagine the difference would get to get NFS Utils and then mount using NFS. Anything else?

I added the fan control software (since I can’t get my IPMI controller to kick in quickly enough to keep my HDs at a nice temp), but after that I just can’t get Docker to work on my Corral box. I had been sticking with it until 11.1 comes out, but it seems like I may have to make the change early if I can’t get it back up....

Couple questions: since there is an emby plug-in why did you go this route if you were just doing emby? (Unless you wanted Docker for more).

And how is the performance vs using something like rancherOS/centOS? I like the idea of using a Linux distro that’s meant for Docker, but this looks pretty simple...maybe simpler (and possibly could have other benefits like running some other programs from that VM).


Question for the naive:
In the Corral boot2docker world, If one mapped the media folder via the container setup - would it access that using the network drivers? Or would that have been setup as a physical drive for the container?

I ask because I have been using Nextcloud with MySQL setup in another container, but the performance hadn’t been amazing - seems like to access another container it would have had to use the network drivers (I feel like I knew this at the time, but maybe I wasn’t thinking and/or forgot something along the way). Connecting to MySQL wouldn’t have actually gone through the NiC, right? Or would it have?
I remember reading up on Docker and about how it sets up its own ‘docker’ subnet.


Oh and that’s also another thing - would need to create the Docker network bridge using a non-standard Docker deployment...

I really want to go back to Docker since it was so easy & I know I could get all my data back in a jiffy, but for Nextcloud I’d like the best performance possible...and I honestly don’t know how the Nextcloud plugin operates (MySQL or the free sql/Lite package)..... the first time I made a FreeNAS system was in Feb of this year right when Corral came out....and I figured if the new version was in production it might have some teething issues, but it should be stable & should continue to go through development....oops

Obviously, it wouldn't make much sense to use docker just for emby, since as you mentioned, there's already a native app. I wanted to get docker going so that
a) I can use native linux apps instead of ported bsd apps.
b) I can update apps myself in an automated manner without relying on who is maintaining the bsd port

Some plugins, like emby, have great support for freebsd. But others don't get updated for years. Docker gives you more control.

Having said that, here's how you get nfs working -
In Freenas:

• Make sure nfs service is on
  • services -> NFS (turn on)
• Make sure an nfs share is enable
  • Sharing -> nfs -> add nfs share -> point to NAS path. This is the path you'll add via the mount command in the cli. For me my path was "/mnt/NAS".

In the VM cli -

Code:

sudo apt-get install nfs-common

Code:

sudo mount 192.168.0.155:/mnt/NAS /mnt/NAS

Test and make sure it works.

After being tested, add to /etc/fstab -

Code:

192.168.0.155:/mnt/NAS	/mnt/NAS   nfs auto,nofail,noatime,nolock,intr,tcp,actimeo=1800 0 0

another tip for newbs, replace the built-in VIM editor with nano

Code:

sudo apt-get install nano

My personal favorite cli text editor. If you're not skilled with vim you're gonna have a tough time editing files. Just an extra layer of frustration to avoid if you just use a different text editor.

By the way, you can run the cifs share and nfs share in parallel. No harm in that.

 

[appoli]

Obviously, it wouldn't make much sense to use docker just for emby, since as you mentioned, there's already a native app. I wanted to get docker going so that
a) I can use native linux apps instead of ported bsd apps.
b) I can update apps myself in an automated manner without relying on who is maintaining the bsd port

Some plugins, like emby, have great support for freebsd. But others don't get updated for years. Docker gives you more control.

Having said that, here's how you get nfs working -
In Freenas:

• Make sure nfs service is on
  • services -> NFS (turn on)
• Make sure an nfs share is enable
  • Sharing -> nfs -> add nfs share -> point to NAS path. This is the path you'll add via the mount command in the cli. For me my path was "/mnt/NAS".

In the VM cli -

Code:

sudo apt-get install nfs-common

Code:

sudo mount 192.168.0.155:/mnt/NAS /mnt/NAS

Test and make sure it works.

After being tested, add to /etc/fstab -

Code:

192.168.0.155:/mnt/NAS	/mnt/NAS   nfs auto,nofail,noatime,nolock,intr,tcp,actimeo=1800 0 0

another tip for newbs, replace the built-in VIM editor with nano

Code:

sudo apt-get install nano

My personal favorite cli text editor. If you're not skilled with vim you're gonna have a tough time editing files. Just an extra layer of frustration to avoid if you just use a different text editor.

By the way, you can run the cifs share and nfs share in parallel. No harm in that.

Thanks!! That saves me the hassle of figuring it out.

To confirm - you can have cifs and nfs run in parallel to the same dataset? (As mentioned, starting with Corral i run under the assumption it’s one or the other for a given dataset as that’s how the GUI works).

Many thanks again!!

And have you had the chance to see the performance dif between your headless Ubuntu setup & rancher/centOS?

Thanks for all the tips!
Yea vi is a pain - I’m not horrible experienced with FreeBSD so have had a couple vi pages bookmarked for when I need to edit files. Didn’t want to go through the nano install process for some reason....(I think the whole “get whatever” command boggles my mind...it’s just too simple haha. I’ve never had a nano install go bad, but have had others so I think subconsciously I didn’t want to risk it).

 

[Hisma]

Thanks!! That saves me the hassle of figuring it out.

To confirm - you can have cifs and nfs run in parallel to the same dataset? (As mentioned, starting with Corral i run under the assumption it’s one or the other for a given dataset as that’s how the GUI works).

Many thanks again!!

And have you had the chance to see the performance dif between your headless Ubuntu setup & rancher/centOS?

Thanks for all the tips!
Yea vi is a pain - I’m not horrible experienced with FreeBSD so have had a couple vi pages bookmarked for when I need to edit files. Didn’t want to go through the nano install process for some reason....(I think the whole “get whatever” command boggles my mind...it’s just too simple haha. I’ve never had a nano install go bad, but have had others so I think subconsciously I didn’t want to risk it).

Yes, same dataset in parallel is no harm. I have mine doing that right now.

Haven't tested rancher but I'm fairly certain performance differences would be negligible enough to not notice. Ubuntu server is lightweight enough if you keep it bare bones. Ubuntu gives you a uefi boot option that allows you to control the VM from the FreeNAS gui, rancher does not allow that. Plus you'll have way easier experience troubleshooting problems in Ubuntu vs rancher since Ubuntu is so widely used and supported. No right or wrong way though, just preference.

 

[appoli]

Yes, same dataset in parallel is no harm. I have mine doing that right now.

Haven't tested rancher but I'm fairly certain performance differences would be negligible enough to not notice. Ubuntu server is lightweight enough if you keep it bare bones. Ubuntu gives you a uefi boot option that allows you to control the VM from the FreeNAS gui, rancher does not allow that. Plus you'll have way easier experience troubleshooting problems in Ubuntu vs rancher since Ubuntu is so widely used and supported. No right or wrong way though, just preference.

Cool! Thanks!
I’ve been trying to figure out the best way to run all the applications I want (and a lot of them have webpage guis...had just finished setting up my reverse proxy as well...oh well)

Good to know that the performance is similar, I like the idea of Ubuntu quite a bit from the troubleshooting perspective

 

[craigdt]

Many thanks for the write up, this will make my life easier implementing docker when I soon get around to upgrading to FreeNAS 11.0.

I do have a question in regards to CIFS vs NFS.

For datasets that are setup for Windows and have had the permissions setup using Windows explorer with groups, users etc.... Should we stick to CIFS for docker images that may write/modify files on a dataset ?

I ask because I remember reading that the NFS protocol should be use for Unix based datasets and the CIFS protocol should be used for the Windows datasets.

Obviously if the docker image is only reading the files from a dataset I imagine it wouldn't matter what protocol is used.

 

[Zwck]

From my experience, very little, NFS works reasonably well, if you dont mind giving root permissions to certain datasets/shares. Often containers, especially databases or container that use SQLlite dbs envoke root and run into issues if it does not work.

At the moment, i have all my storage connected to my rancher system via NFS. However, in the depth of the corral part of the forum, you can follow my struggle with CIFS and boot2docker permissions, especially when you throw windows into the mix.