Website feature removed

[DavidxDGM]

problem description

I recently did a complete reinstall on my Respberry Pi and wanted to reinstall Cobalt via Docker compose.

After the installation, I noticed that the website no longer exists and the image URL no longer exists in docker-compose.yml.

How can I fix this?

Many thanks in advance.

your instance configuration

services:
    cobalt-api:
        image: ghcr.io/imputnet/cobalt:10
        restart: unless-stopped
        container_name: cobalt-api

        init: true

        ports:
            - 9000:9000/tcp
            # if you're using a reverse proxy, uncomment the next line and remove the one above (9000:9000/tcp):
            #- 127.0.0.1:9000:9000

        environment:
            # replace https://api.cobalt.tools/ with your instance's target url in same format
            API_URL: "https://api.cobalt.tools"
            # if you want to use cookies when fetching data from services, uncomment the next line and the lines under >            # COOKIE_PATH: "/cookies.json"
            # see docs/run-an-instance.md for more information
        labels:
            - com.centurylinklabs.watchtower.scope=cobalt

        # if you want to use cookies when fetching data from services, uncomment volumes and next line
        #volumes:
            #- ./cookies.json:/cookies.json

    # update the cobalt image automatically with watchtower
    watchtower:
        image: ghcr.io/containrrr/watchtower
        restart: unless-stopped
        command: --cleanup --scope cobalt --interval 900 --include-restarting
        volumes:
            - /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock

[KwiatekMiki]

You don't need to host the frontend anymore, you can use your own instance on cobalt.tools.

https://cobalt.tools/settings/instances

[DavidxDGM]

You don't need to host the frontend anymore, you can use your own instance on cobalt.tools.

https://cobalt.tools/settings/instances

Ah lol. Thanks for the tip. Unfortunately, I only have one problem: I don't have a public (static) IP address. That means that the entire local docker setup is pointless now. Which is a shame.

[conichonhaa]

How do you enable it without web interface ?

[KwiatekMiki]

enable what? (selfhosted) cobalt?

by 'enable' do you mean 'use'?

[conichonhaa]

Yes, web interface disappear between version 7 and 10. After update, i can't reach my self hosted website

[wukko]

you can use your api instance with main frontend instance: https://cobalt.tools/settings/instances#community

[conichonhaa]

Thanks i read it a bit more up in this discussion, but it's that part i don't understand what to do with

[wukko]

just paste the instance url there

[conichonhaa]

Just go it. I paste my URL there
One last question. Do i also have to replace the url in docker-compose.yml or do i leave api.cobalt.tools ?

For the moment i let api.cobalt.tools but i only see that when i load my URL

cobalt":{"version":"10.1.0","url":"https://api.cobalt.tools/","startTime":"1728801652969","durationLimit":10800,"services":["bilibili","bluesky","dailymotion","facebook","instagram","loom","ok","pinterest","reddit","rutube","snapchat","soundcloud","streamable","tiktok","tumblr","twitch","twitter","vine","vimeo","vk","youtube"]},"git":{"branch":"main","commit":"c33017283d20ee9a998b7c19ad5f24fc17bdede7","remote":"imputnet/cobalt"}}

[wukko]

Do i also have to replace the url in docker-compose.yml

yes, you have to replace it or else tunnels (youtube & etc) won’t work

[conichonhaa]

Ok, i replace API URL with my domain name. I'm also under a reverse proxy, i uncomment line 127.0.0.1:9000:9000 and comment 9000:9000/tcp but it leads me to a bad gateway 502 error

[AlexAltea]

I managed to build and serve both the website and API with minor tweaks to the Dockerfile.

It's probably still a better idea to just replace the instance in https://cobalt.tools/, but hey, if really wants to host the frontend, see below (requires two arguments WEB_HOST and WEB_DEFAULT_API which turn into env vars, see docs):

FROM node:23-alpine AS base
ENV PNPM_HOME="/pnpm"
ENV PATH="$PNPM_HOME:$PATH"

FROM base AS build
WORKDIR /app
COPY . /app

RUN corepack enable && pnpm add -g serve
RUN apk add --no-cache python3 alpine-sdk

# Build backend (cobalt-api)
FROM build AS build-api
WORKDIR /app
RUN --mount=type=cache,id=pnpm,target=/pnpm/store \
    pnpm install --prod --frozen-lockfile
RUN pnpm deploy --filter=@imput/cobalt-api --prod /prod/api

# Build frontend (cobalt-web)
FROM build AS build-web
WORKDIR /app/web
RUN --mount=type=cache,id=pnpm-web,target=/pnpm/store \
    pnpm install --prod=false --frozen-lockfile
ARG WEB_HOST
ARG WEB_DEFAULT_API
ENV WEB_HOST=${WEB_HOST}
ENV WEB_DEFAULT_API=${WEB_DEFAULT_API}
RUN pnpm run build

# Merge api+web results
FROM base AS final
WORKDIR /app

RUN apk add --no-cache python3
COPY --from=build-api --chown=node:node /prod/api /app
COPY --from=build-web --chown=node:node /app/web /app/web
COPY .git /app/.git

USER node

EXPOSE 9000
EXPOSE 9001
CMD [ "sh", "-c", "python3 -m http.server 9001 --directory /app/web/build & node src/cobalt" ]

For those using docker-compose here's the an example docker-compose.yml file:

services:
  cobalt:
    container_name: cobalt
    build:
      context: ./cobalt
      dockerfile: Dockerfile
      args:
        WEB_HOST: "https://cobalt.example.com/"
        WEB_DEFAULT_API: "https://cobalt-api.example.com/"
    init: true
    read_only: true
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - 127.0.0.1:8000:9000 # api
      - 127.0.0.1:8001:9001 # web
    environment:
      API_URL: "https://cobalt-api.example.com/"
      API_AUTH_REQUIRED: 0
      DURATION_LIMIT: 86400 # 24 hours

Not very elegant, but does its job.

[KweezyCode]

You don't need to host the frontend anymore, you can use your own instance on cobalt.tools.

https://cobalt.tools/settings/instances

That's not how it works. If someone decides to bring up their own instance, there are reasons why they don't want to use the official site

[wukko]

That's not how it works. If someone decides to bring up their own instance, there are reasons why they don't want to use the official site

what are the reasons though? and they're still able to host it just fine, just without docker because it's a static build: https://github.com/imputnet/cobalt/tree/main/web

[KweezyCode]

what are the reasons though?

Developers can change the code of the official web page at will and these changes will not be public, for example metrics for commercial purposes.

And some just physically can not use selfhosted backend, because they are behind NAT.

I could also mention the problem of foreign sites being blocked in Russia, which can accidentally cause another site to be blocked (once all sites hosted on Hetzner didn't work), but I think that's a local problem

[lostdusty]

you can't use cobalt for commercial purposes (see https://github.com/imputnet/cobalt/blob/main/web/LICENSE)

[jo-chemla]

Another thread to track that feature suggestion: #1095