Docker Installation

Crit Alarm is distributed as a multi-architecture Docker container (linux/amd64 and linux/arm64) with an embedded SQLite database.

Docker One-Liner

Run the container in the background with automatic restart and persistent data storage:

docker run -d \
  --name critalarm \
  --restart unless-stopped \
  -p 8080:8080 \
  -v critalarm_data:/data \
  -e CRITALARM_BASE_URL="https://alerts.example.com" \
  -e CRITALARM_RELAY_URL="https://relay.critalarm.app" \
  -e CRITALARM_RELAY_CONTENT="none" \
  -e CRITALARM_BEHIND_PROXY="true" \
  ghcr.io/anvilnine/critalarm:latest

Docker Compose

Create a docker-compose.yml file:

services:
  critalarm:
    image: ghcr.io/anvilnine/critalarm:latest
    container_name: critalarm
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - "8080:8080"
    volumes:
      - ./data:/data
    environment:
      # Required: Public URL where your server is reached (no trailing slash)
      - CRITALARM_BASE_URL=https://alerts.example.com
      # Default push relay service
      - CRITALARM_RELAY_URL=https://relay.critalarm.app
      # Privacy mode: 'none' (zero message content on relay) or 'full'
      - CRITALARM_RELAY_CONTENT=none
      # Host and port to bind inside the container
      - CRITALARM_LISTEN=:8080
      # Directory where SQLite database is stored
      - CRITALARM_DATA_DIR=/data
      # Set to true when running behind Caddy, Traefik, or Nginx
      - CRITALARM_BEHIND_PROXY=true

Start the service:

docker compose up -d

First Boot and Admin Token

On first start, Crit Alarm generates an admin token (ad_...) and writes it to stdout.

View the Admin Token

Inspect the container logs to find your token:

docker logs critalarm

Alternatively, run the embedded CLI tool inside the container:

docker exec -it critalarm critalarm token show

Keep this token secure. You will enter it in the Crit Alarm mobile app when connecting to your self-hosted server.

Rotate the Admin Token

If your admin token is compromised, rotate it immediately:

docker exec -it critalarm critalarm token rotate

Rotating invalidates old management sessions. Topics, subscriptions and incident history stay.

Verify the Installation

Verify that the server is healthy by calling the unauthenticated info endpoint:

curl http://localhost:8080/v1/info

Expected output:

{
  "name": "critalarm",
  "version": "0.1.0",
  "base_url": "https://alerts.example.com",
  "relay_url": "https://relay.critalarm.app",
  "relay_content": "none",
  "mode": "selfhosted"
}

Backups and Data Persistence

All topics, tokens, incidents, messages, and timers are saved in /data/critalarm.db.

To back up your installation:

# Safe live SQLite backup
docker exec critalarm sqlite3 /data/critalarm.db ".backup '/data/critalarm.backup.db'"
docker cp critalarm:/data/critalarm.backup.db ./critalarm.backup.db

Upgrading

To upgrade to the latest release:

docker compose pull
docker compose up -d

Database migrations apply automatically on container boot.