Installation & Setup - FileRise Docs

You can run FileRise with Docker (recommended) or install it on a PHP web server. This page mirrors the README, with additional details for common setups.

1) Docker (recommended)

Quick start

docker run -d \
  --name filerise \
  -p 8080:80 \
  -e TIMEZONE="America/New_York" \
  -e TOTAL_UPLOAD_SIZE="10G" \
  -e SECURE="false" \
  -e PERSISTENT_TOKENS_KEY="change_me" \
  -e SCAN_ON_START="true" \
  -e CHOWN_ON_START="true" \
  -v ~/filerise/uploads:/var/www/uploads \
  -v ~/filerise/users:/var/www/users \
  -v ~/filerise/metadata:/var/www/metadata \
  error311/filerise-docker:latest

Visit:

http://your-server-ip:8080

On first launch you will be prompted to create the admin user.

> Tip: After permissions are correct, set CHOWN_ON_START="false" to avoid recursive chowns on every start.

docker-compose.yml

services:
  filerise:
    image: error311/filerise-docker:latest
    container_name: filerise
    ports:
      - "8080:80"
    environment:
      TIMEZONE: "America/New_York"
      TOTAL_UPLOAD_SIZE: "10G"
      SECURE: "false"
      PERSISTENT_TOKENS_KEY: "change_me"
      SCAN_ON_START: "true"   # one-time scan
      CHOWN_ON_START: "true"  # normalize uploads/metadata perms on first run
    volumes:
      - ./uploads:/var/www/uploads
      - ./users:/var/www/users
      - ./metadata:/var/www/metadata

Uploads folder recommendation

Bind /var/www/uploads to a dedicated folder (not the root of a massive share). If you want FileRise over an existing share, use a subfolder (e.g. /mnt/media/filerise_root).

2) Manual install (PHP web server)

Requirements

PHP 8.3+
Web server (Apache / Nginx / Caddy + PHP-FPM)
PHP extensions: json, curl, zip, and standard defaults
No database required

Recommended layout (default paths)

By default FileRise uses absolute paths:

/var/www/uploads
/var/www/users
/var/www/metadata

Install the app code in /var/www/filerise and set your DocumentRoot to:

/var/www/filerise/public

Install from release ZIP (recommended)

Get the latest tag from Releases.

cd /var/www
sudo mkdir -p filerise
sudo chown -R $USER:$USER /var/www/filerise
cd /var/www/filerise

VERSION="vX.Y.Z"
ASSET="FileRise-${VERSION}.zip"

curl -fsSL "https://github.com/error311/FileRise/releases/download/${VERSION}/${ASSET}" -o "${ASSET}"
unzip "${ASSET}"

Install from git (developer mode)

cd /var/www
sudo git clone https://github.com/error311/FileRise.git filerise
sudo chown -R $USER:$USER /var/www/filerise

cd /var/www/filerise
composer install

Create data directories

sudo mkdir -p /var/www/uploads /var/www/users /var/www/metadata
sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/uploads /var/www/users /var/www/metadata
sudo chmod -R 775 /var/www/uploads /var/www/users /var/www/metadata

Sessions directory (manual installs)

Docker creates /var/www/sessions automatically on startup. For manual installs:

If you keep PHP's default session path, no extra setup is needed.
If you set session.save_path = /var/www/sessions (like the Docker image does), create it:

sudo mkdir -p /var/www/sessions
sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/sessions
sudo chmod 700 /var/www/sessions

Proxy / subpath notes

Set FR_PUBLISHED_URL to the public URL (e.g. https://example.com/files).
If your proxy strips the prefix, set FR_BASE_PATH or send X-Forwarded-Prefix.
If you are behind a reverse proxy, set FR_TRUSTED_PROXIES and FR_IP_HEADER.

First-run security checklist

Set PERSISTENT_TOKENS_KEY to a strong value.
Set SECURE=true when running behind TLS.
Back up /var/www/uploads, /var/www/users, /var/www/metadata.