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Vultr profile image Sanskriti Harmukh
Sanskriti Harmukh for Vultr

Posted on with Aashish Chaurasiya • Originally published at docs.vultr.com

Deploying Gogs Simple Git Hosting on Ubuntu 24.04

#git #docker #devops #selfhosted

Gogs (Go Git Service) is a lightweight, self-hosted Git server written in Go, designed to be fast, simple, and easy to run on modest hardware. This guide deploys Gogs with a PostgreSQL backend using Docker Compose, with Traefik handling automatic HTTPS and SSH exposed on port 2222. By the end, you'll have a Gogs instance ready for repositories at your domain.

Set Up the Directory Structure

1. Create the project directory structure:

$ mkdir -p ~/gogs/{data,db,letsencrypt}
$ cd ~/gogs
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2. Create the environment file:

$ nano .env
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POSTGRES_USER=gogs
POSTGRES_PASSWORD=STRONG_DB_PASSWORD
POSTGRES_DB=gogs

DOMAIN=gogs.example.com
LETSENCRYPT_EMAIL=admin@example.com
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Deploy with Docker Compose

1. Add your user to the Docker group:

$ sudo usermod -aG docker $USER
$ newgrp docker
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2. Create the Docker Compose manifest:

$ nano docker-compose.yml
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services:
  traefik:
    image: traefik:latest
    container_name: traefik
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      DOCKER_API_VERSION: "1.44"
    command:
      - "--providers.docker=true"
      - "--providers.docker.exposedbydefault=false"
      - "--entrypoints.web.address=:80"
      - "--entrypoints.websecure.address=:443"
      - "--entrypoints.web.http.redirections.entrypoint.to=websecure"
      - "--entrypoints.web.http.redirections.entrypoint.scheme=https"
      - "--certificatesresolvers.le.acme.httpchallenge=true"
      - "--certificatesresolvers.le.acme.httpchallenge.entrypoint=web"
      - "--certificatesresolvers.le.acme.email=${LETSENCRYPT_EMAIL}"
      - "--certificatesresolvers.le.acme.storage=/letsencrypt/acme.json"
    ports:
      - "80:80"
      - "443:443"
    volumes:
      - /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock:ro
      - ./letsencrypt:/letsencrypt

  db:
    image: postgres:16-alpine
    container_name: gogs-db
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      - POSTGRES_USER=${POSTGRES_USER}
      - POSTGRES_PASSWORD=${POSTGRES_PASSWORD}
      - POSTGRES_DB=${POSTGRES_DB}
    volumes:
      - ./db:/var/lib/postgresql/data

  gogs:
    image: gogs/gogs:latest
    container_name: gogs
    restart: unless-stopped
    depends_on:
      - db
    ports:
      - "2222:22"
    volumes:
      - ./data:/data
    labels:
      - "traefik.enable=true"
      - "traefik.http.routers.gogs.rule=Host(`${DOMAIN}`)"
      - "traefik.http.routers.gogs.entrypoints=websecure"
      - "traefik.http.routers.gogs.tls=true"
      - "traefik.http.routers.gogs.tls.certresolver=le"
      - "traefik.http.services.gogs.loadbalancer.server.port=3000"
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3. Start the services:

$ docker compose up -d
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4. Verify the services are running:

$ docker compose ps
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Complete the Installation

Open https://gogs.example.com in a browser and fill in the install form:

  • Database Host: db:5432
  • Database User / Password / Name: the values from .env
  • SSH Port: 2222
  • Application URL: https://gogs.example.com/

Configure the administrator account and click Install Gogs.

Next Steps

Gogs is running and served securely over HTTPS. From here you can:

  • Create organizations and repositories, and invite collaborators
  • Push and clone via SSH on port 2222 or HTTPS on 443
  • Configure SMTP for email notifications and webhooks for CI integrations

For the full guide with additional tips, visit the original article on Vultr Docs.

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