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Everwas

Get the server running

This tutorial takes you from a checkout of the repository to a running server with an admin login. It takes about ten minutes, most of it waiting on image builds.

What you need

Section titled “What you need”
  • Docker with the Compose plugin (docker compose, not docker-compose)
  • uv on the host, used once to generate NATS auth keys
  • A hostname pointed at the machine. The stack publishes its services through caddy-docker-proxy labels on an external Docker network named caddy, so a caddy-docker-proxy container should already be running on that network. It handles TLS for every hostname automatically.

The server stack is four services: PostgreSQL, NATS with JetStream, the FastAPI application (everwas-api), and the dispatcher that handles ingest, alerting, and scheduling.

1. Configure the environment

Section titled “1. Configure the environment”

Copy the template and open it:

Terminal window
cp .env.example .env

Set the hostname your fleet and your browser will use:

Terminal window
EVERWAS_DOMAIN=rmm.example.com

The web app and the API share this one origin on purpose, and agents dial wss://nats-rmm.example.com (its own hostname, derived from yours by default). The comments in .env.example explain both choices.

Generate the secrets:

Terminal window
# session cookie signing
openssl rand -hex 32   # → EVERWAS_SECRET_KEY


# internal NATS password for the api/dispatcher
openssl rand -hex 24   # → EVERWAS_NATS_SERVER_PASSWORD


# and a strong POSTGRES_PASSWORD of your choosing

Then generate the NATS auth-callout keypair. This is what lets the server vouch for agents when they connect:

Terminal window
cd server && uv run everwas gen-nats-keys

It prints two lines, EVERWAS_NATS_AUTH_SEED=... and EVERWAS_NATS_AUTH_ISSUER=..., ready to paste into .env.

Finally, make sure EVERWAS_NATS_PUBLIC_URL matches your domain:

Terminal window
EVERWAS_NATS_PUBLIC_URL=wss://nats-rmm.example.com

This URL is baked into each agent’s config at enrollment, so it is worth getting right before the first agent enrolls. Changing it later does not move agents that are already in the field.

2. Start the stack

Section titled “2. Start the stack”
Terminal window
make up

This builds and starts everything in the mode set by EVERWAS_MODE in .env. The default is dev, which gives you hot reload and a Mailpit instance at mail-rmm.example.com so alert emails land somewhere you can see them. Switch to prod when you mean it.

Apply the database migrations:

Terminal window
make migrate

3. Create your login

Section titled “3. Create your login”
Terminal window
make admin EMAIL=you@example.com

The command prompts for a password and creates (or updates) the admin user. Now open https://rmm.example.com and sign in.

You have a server and an empty fleet. The next step is enrolling your first agent.

If something is off

Section titled “If something is off”

make ps shows service health, and make logs SVC=everwas-api tails one service. The compose file gives PostgreSQL and NATS healthchecks, so a service stuck in starting usually means a missing .env value; the compose file fails fast with a message naming the variable.