Two NodeBB instances on same server

[eeeee]

The question of having two completely different nodebb forums, (with seperate databases), running on same server has been asked previously... but I am confused on something.
I have zero experience of docker, is docker absolutely required to have two instances, or can the two setups can just be put in seperate directories?
If so does the Nodebb code need to be installed twice, or can they both point to the same codebase?

[phenomlab]

@eeeee Docker isn't required for two separated installations. You can just place the NodeBB files inside another directory, use a different database name, and in the config, use a different port than the default.

[eeeee]

@phenomlab Thanks! So for 2 forums would it need two sets of the nodebb source files?
Just thinking that if they could both use the same source code, then when upgrading, both forums would increment version from one upgrade process?

[phenomlab]

@eeeee no they need to have separate sources for full autonomy. Besides, you need two config files also to logically and physically define them.

[julian]

@phenomlab theoretically one could run NodeBB with config defined strictly via environment variables, so you could use one codebase (this is untested of course)

[eeeee]

@julian can you elaborate please about how that could be done with
'environment variables'?
I want to try it as it will make updating both quicker and save on storage

[julian]

@eeeee Sure. When NodeBB tries to load the values in config.json, it checks nconf value config first. You can send in config as an environment variable to point to the path of a different config file.

e.g. config=configA.json ./nodebb start

So you can have multiple configs in the same folder, and launch separate processes off of the same file structure.

If I run config=what.json ./nodebb dev on my local machine, it will launch the web installer, since what.json does not exist.

[PitaJ]

There's are other reasons to have two separate NodeBB installs:

• you may want to run different sets of plugins
• uploaded files are stored within the NodeBB directory, best to keep those separate
• plugins like emoji and customize store files specific to a certain forum, and all plugin files are within the NodeBB folder