Allow for custom server for frontend apps

[DennisGaida]

Since the server is now open-sourced and can be hosted using Docker, I would love to keep using the existing frontend apps (Android, iOS & Windows), but use my own backend / URL.

I can do that when building everything myself, but it is quite a hassle - taking iOS as an example with needing an Apple developer account and a developer enabled iOS device etc.

I want to be able to use the default consumer apps, but just be able to switch to a custom server. I'm especially interested in ente Auth having this feature. The official Bitwarden app has exactly that feature - you can self-host the Bitwarden server and just use its URL in the official app instead of the commercially hosted Bitwarden version.

Feature request in short: I want to be able to use my custom server URL / backend in the existing frontend apps for iOS, Android & Windows.

[ioslife]

This would be huge. I'm super excited about getting the chance to selfhost this and compare it to Immich!

[davidSGE]

Same here!

[arthurlt]

I’ve landed on just using Synology Photos, but I’m uncomfortable with the theoretical access I have to everyone’s photos as the admin. Plus, the backup experience on iOS leaves a lot to be desired.

I’m super interested in pivoting my family to using this when this feature is implemented.

Side note: If I didn’t already have replicated local storage I would be interested in the paid hosted solution. Are there any ways to recurrently donate? You’re providing a unique feature set.

[natebc]

Github Sponsorship is active for this project, You could donate there.

[tarunkumar519]

This feature would be awesome, super interested

[bdonvr]

I'm super, super interested in this. I'm selfhosting everything else and would really like to be able to selfhost my 2FA app. As soon as we can have an easy to deploy server and web app (docker?), and the ability to use a custom server URI without building the app from source I'll be thrilled.

[DennisGaida]

We do have an easy to deploy server and web app in docker. That is the reason I created this issue because now we're only missing the frontend apps (aside the web app).

[monarc83]

is the docker already available for public somewhere? That would be great. Thanks.,

[qdlmcfresh]

Have a look at: https://github.com/ente-io/ente/blob/main/server/README.md

[monarc83]

Thanks for the quick reply, but to be honest, I think I need more of a step by step guide with some more explanations for better understanding. If there is something like that already available somewhere, it would be great if someone can point me to it or maybe someone is willing to write this guide.

[aravindhsampath]

Since this feature would amount to letting self hosters running the whole thing for free - as in beer, I would even be happy if the folks behind the project would make a copy of the app titled specifically as “ente - selfhosted” or something like that, and charge a reasonable fee for it.

This way, self hosters can pay for the convenience of the app, contributing financially to the project, while still using their own server and photo storage.

Count me as your customer #1 if you get there.

I played around with the ente app, in view of replacing iCloud Photos. But, the lack of ability to use the app to my own backend stopped me from proceeding any further. If I need to pay a cloud vendor anyway, I might as well pay Apple and enjoy the integration convenience.

[immanuelfodor]

I think an opposing opinion should also be expressed and heard, not just the "shut up and take my money" one, so I'm adding a counter argument 😀

I'd be happy if it could stay free as in beer for self-hosting folks. The huge majority of users probably wouldn't be able to self-host it anyways, and those who can, probably can be considered power users. And power users are usually enthusiastic about the project, can do beta test, provide feedback, report bugs, open feature requests, etc. so the project can benefit from them even if not charging for the self-hosted deployment.

However, maybe it would need tiers to not let companies self-host it for free, so a differentiation of self-hosters. Like my home usage could go free with up to ~3-5 users, but any more users than that could go with a self-hosted license. But I wouldn't lock the feature availability behind a paid license.

I'm looking for something that can replace my personal Google Photos which I'm using for free, and this project looks like the best alternative so far. I'd go with a private self-hosted install, but if it'd require payment, I'd immediately unsubscribe from watching the repo which I started because of the news of going open-sourced and the possibility of self-hosting the whole stack.

[tarunkumar519]

as @immanuelfodor said opening the apps to self-hosting will give the software lot of traction with many new users who may also convert to paid subs, new PRs, new ideas and good community kicking in. I have seen this benefiting a lot of good open source projects for a long time.

[primeinc]

Considering the importance of cost and data management, perhaps exploring a hybrid storage model would be beneficial. This model could allow for archiving less critical photos on personal servers, while keeping frequently accessed ones on Ente's cloud.

It acknowledges the practicality of self-hosting for archival data, ensuring seamless integration with Ente's cloud for essential access, even when the self-hosted servers are temporarily offline. This approach promotes data autonomy and cost savings, aligning with our shared goals of efficiency and control over our digital footprint.

[vishnukvmd]

Update: We will first allow Auth to connect to a self-hosted instance.

This necessary changes are done in #726, and will be available in the next release.

Photos will follow.

[mkdirmushroom]

Great, thank you very much!

[mkdirmushroom]

@natebc This may go against their original intentions, considering security and privacy, the use of object storage is understandable.

[aravindhsampath]

I don’t want miss an update that brings the ability for ente photos iOS app to connect to a self hosted backend. Is there any place I can watch for that action?

[mnvr]

You can watch this discussion (you'll already be watching it since you commented here). We'll make sure we announce here when that change is done.

EDIT: GitHub will notify you I mean when there is a new comment on this discussion.

[jo-chemla]

Thanks @mnvr for the clarifications! Indeed what I had in mind as a selfhoster was indeed to host both server (+db, storage) and webapp, I'll watch the other threads (like this one) regarding the progress on publishing an ente photos/auth webapp.

[wayneyaoo]

Hey thank you very much for the great product!! Not sure if I should start a separate discussion on this but, a dumb question... does Ente Auth server share the same backend with Ente Photo? I mean when I look at the dir structure I only see museum. Did I miss something? Can I self-host only the 2FA auth server?

[mnvr]

Yes, they share the same backend. And yes, you can self-host only the 2FA auth server. The starter Docker compose will work fine for either Photos or Auth (or both!) ☺️

(I think a separate discussion would've been better, many people are watching this particular discussion and they might be getting spammed by unrelated posts 😬)

[wayneyaoo]

Yes I understand and I've got the answer. Thank you very much! Let me mute and not spam people :)...

[DevBefell]

Not sure if already a thing but since implementing a custom server for the frontends it also would be great for us developers to have some debugging features (which can be enabled via the same way of the changing the server), whether logs etc.

[mnvr]

Off the top of my head - It isn't really something we're too keen on doing. We don't want ente to become a kitchen sink. But if you feel it's useful, please create a new discussion for this! We'll see if it gets some traction, and implement the needful (I'm just trying to keep this discussion scoped, so that watchers don't get unnecessary notifications).

[vishnukvmd]

Update: Photos app now supports connecting to a self-hosted instance.

The changes were made in #1302 and the release is available here: https://github.com/ente-io/ente/releases/tag/photos-v0.8.75

Will keep this issue open until the release is live on PlayStore, AppStore & F-Droid.

[vishnukvmd]

Just fyi - our GitHub releases support auto-updates

[the-hotmann]

Seems like the update is out ^^

[wjbeckett]

Will this extend to the desktop app too?

[mnvr]

It isn't planned, the web and desktop apps are much easier to build compared to building say the iOS app which requires Xcode, so with mobile apps this was needed more.

That said, we'll add it to this option to the desktop app too once we get a bit of time, will keep this in mind.

[wjbeckett]

It isn't planned, the web and desktop apps are much easier to build compared to building say the iOS app which requires Xcode, so with mobile apps this was needed more.

That said, we'll add it to this option to the desktop app too once we get a bit of time, will keep this in mind.

Fair enough. Do self-hosters have the ability to bulk upload though? I thought that was only achievable via the Desktop app?

[mnvr]

Self hosters can always build a desktop app and bulk upload, there is no restriction. This feature request was only for making that even easier.

As I said, I understand the need.

[vishnukvmd]

@wjbeckett FYI: Our web app supports bulk upload as well. The important feature the desktop app offers for uploads is parsing of zipped Google Takeouts.

So if you're importing from your hard disk, the web app should do just fine!

[wjbeckett]

Thanks for the info.
Just waiting for the web app to be containerised :-)

[jpeeler]

Is the web app planning to be containerized? I'm not able to get it to run, but will patiently wait if it's on the roadmap somewhere.

[mnvr]

There are two different things -

1. Allowing connecting to a custom self hosted instance from the desktop app. This is on the cards.

2. Containerizing the web app. This is a different feature request, e.g. see here - Submit PR to FOSS_Photo_Libraries #983. This too is on the roadmap - we'd like people to be able to directly run a docker cluster that has the web app and the server itself, a sort of a "demo" instance (Demo Instance #982), but I'm not sure when we'll be able to carve out time to get around to doing it. In the linked issue there are some comments and docker files that already do it, but nothing point-and-click yet.

Re running the web app itself, these might be useful (just in case you haven't seen these yet): https://help.ente.io/self-hosting/guides/web-app

[TesterEU]

Hello,
I'm sorry that I didn't manage to read the entire discussion, but I've a question (I'm a non-technical person):
Is it possible to run the ente application on a shared hosting provider (I've purchased an account)? I don't have a VPS, and my hosting has php, mysql, composer (not to be confused with git). I'd like to test Your server application because it seems great ;) I currently have Piwigo installed.

[mnvr]

This thread is not the correct place to ask general self hosting questions, you end up notifying all the people who're watching it for updates on the original issue. If people keep doing this we'll have to lock this thread.

About your question itself - If you're a non-technical person, I generally would not recommend trying to self host, it is not in a state where it is seamless enough (we're hoping to improve that, cf see this #983 (comment)). Immich, for example, might be a better option.

About the shared hosting provider - From your description it doesn't seem like they give the ability to run Docker images, in that case unfortunately you won't be able to self host on that provider. It sounds like they setup they provide is for PHP apps.