Self-Hosting

This guide covers deploying Ding to production.

1. Prepare the environment

Clone the repository on your server:

git clone https://github.com/UncleTeslim/ding
cd ding

Create production secrets:

npm install
npm run setup

This generates a .env file with a bcrypt password hash, JWT secret, and IP hashing salt.

Review the generated .env:

DING_ADMIN_USERNAME=admin
DING_ADMIN_PASSWORD_HASH=...
DING_JWT_SECRET=...
DING_IP_SALT=...
DING_DB_PATH=/app/data/ding.db
DING_TRUST_PROXY=true
PORT=3000
NODE_ENV=production

2. Run with Docker Compose

docker compose up --build -d

Check health:

curl http://localhost:3000/health

Expected response:

{ "ok": true, "db": "connected" }

3. Configure a reverse proxy

Ding expects HTTPS to be handled by your reverse proxy.

Caddy

ding.example.com {
  reverse_proxy localhost:3000
}

Nginx

server {
  server_name ding.example.com;

  location / {
    proxy_pass http://localhost:3000;
    proxy_set_header Host $host;
    proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
    proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
    proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
  }
}

After the instance is reachable over HTTPS, embed the widget:

<script
  src="https://ding.example.com/widget.js"
  data-position="bottom-right"
  data-color="#155eef"
  data-trigger="both"
  async
></script>

5. Backups

Ding stores data in SQLite. Back up the database file regularly.

docker compose stop
cp /path/to/ding.db /path/to/backups/ding-$(date +%Y-%m-%d).db
docker compose up -d

For busier installations, use SQLite online backup tooling or snapshot the volume at the infrastructure layer.

6. Upgrades

git pull
docker compose up --build -d

Migrations run automatically on startup.

7. Operational checks

Confirm /health returns ok
Confirm the admin dashboard loads
Confirm /widget.js returns JavaScript
Confirm the widget appears in a test page
Confirm announcements remain after container restart