Running Mastodon on FreeBSD? reddit / freebsd ---------------------------------------------------------------------- redditthinks · 2022-11-16 20:12 Mastodon has been getting a lot of press recently, and I've been curious to install it on my FreeBSD server. It seems there used to be a [port](https://www.freshports.org/net-im/mastodon), but it's now dead. Any experience with installing it on FreeBSD? Perhaps someone would be interested in creating an updated port as well. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- johnklos · 2022-11-16 21:53 In spite of the fact that it's based on Ruby on Rails, and Ruby on Rails has always been, and still appears to be, a hot mess, I tried to get Mastodon running on NetBSD. From the very start we have versioning issues. First, it seems to require Ruby 3.0.3, which is a year old, and it already won't work with Ruby 3.1.1 or 3.1.2. The `bundle install` step fails with varying versions of included bundles, requiring `bundle update`, then manual fixes. In other words, Ruby on Rails hasn't changed much in the last decade. Even after getting everything installed correctly, launching fails with a completely meaningless error without an inkling of information about what happened. In other words, it doesn't work out of the box, necessitating specific repositories, VMs, or Docker images that keep around older versions of stuff, meaning when there are security issues, you'll have to choose between insecure or broken. (note that I haven't tried the very latest Mastodon 4.0 which just came out) Instead, I'm going to try out [Akkoma](https://docs.akkoma.dev/stable/). For starters, they have clear and concise instructions for [NetBSD](https://docs.akkoma.dev/stable/installation/netbsd_en/) and [FreeBSD](https://docs.akkoma.dev/stable/installation/freebsd_en/). I'll try to remember to report back here when I give it a go. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- deaddodo · 2022-11-17 01:36 This is one of my major worries with all of the modern UI and tooling for Linux and FreeBSD moving to JavaScript, Python, Vala, Ruby, etc; sure when it works it’s super easy and fast to develop for. But the dependency trees are *massive* and one thing falling apart will break the whole thing or lock you on an outdated version of its bootstrap environment. That being said; I would recommend running something like Mastadon in a container, docker VM, jail, etc even if it were fully updated. So, in this case, spin up a jail, run the older version of RoR in it and see how it goes. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ivan_linux · 2022-11-17 03:24 I've had good experiences deploying Rails apps on OpenBSD, had to do a little tweaking of my GEM_PATH and stuff but it worked fairly flawlessly. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- lenzo1337 · 2022-11-17 03:31 I tried it before but.....meh. jmho but I would skip it. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fergus653 · 2022-11-17 09:28 Theres a cute command line client, I just installed it a few days ago. [https://github.com/ihabunek/toot](https://github.com/ihabunek/toot) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- zolotkey · 2022-11-17 16:09 If you follow the instructions from the Mastodon documentation there is only 2 gotchas. 1 gem needs manual installation so you can specify `/usr/local/` to find lib and include. The other gotcha is they only include systemd service files. You have to create your own RC scripts or if you look in the right places one can be downloaded. I used daemontools for the web/workers. I have my mastodon [Imperial Base Mastodon](https://holonet.imperialba.se/@zolotkey) on FreeBSD. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- opseceu · 2022-11-17 20:42 I asked bofh@ if he can make a new port. He's looking into this. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- opseceu · 2022-12-06 18:25 The port landed today, see: https://lists.freebsd.org/archives/dev-commits-ports- all/2022-December/046130.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- motific · 2022-12-30 00:31 Its why they’re so desperate to run other people’s VMs, erm I mean Docker containers? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2023-02-17 23:37 [deleted] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- edthesmokebeard · 2023-05-12 01:28 >had to do a little tweaking of my GEM\_PATH and stuff but it worked fairly flawlessly. So it didn't work out of the box. And then it mostly worked properly? None of this sounds like "flawless". ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ivan_linux · 2023-05-12 14:38 What? Adding an ENV var is far nicer than deploying most applications. In my eyes that is flawless. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- edthesmokebeard · 2023-05-12 21:35 Words have meaning. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ivan_linux · 2023-05-13 15:21 They do. There isn't a single application you can deploy that doesn't need at least one piece of configuration. So, if you think about it relative to that fact, it is flawless? I'm not sure why you care so much.