UniFi Controller
Introduction
This guide explains how to install the generic Unix UniFi Controller, as available from Ubiquity Networks. At the time of writing this, a native Alpine Linux package is not available.
Furthermore, this guide uses the incredibly reliable and efficient s6 supervision suite to start and control the UniFi Controller.
A summarised schematic of what will be installed on the filesystem.
The choice of /srv
for the UniFi Controller's root directory is based on the fact that it contains both run-time and configuration data, so installing to /usr/local
, /opt
or /home
didn't seem apt. Feel free to adjust the steps below, replacing /srv/unifi
with wherever you would prefer to install the UniFi Controller software.
/ `--etc |-- unifi | `-- log |-- srv | `-- unifi | |-- bin | |-- conf | |-- data | |-- dl | |-- lib | |-- logs | |-- run | `-- webapps |-- run | `-- openrc | `-- s6-scan | `-- unifi --> /etc/unifi `-- var `-- log `-- unifi
Prerequisite Packages
OpenJDK 8 JRE
Install openjdk8-jre
from the community repository.
Edit /etc/apk/repositories
and uncomment the appropriate community repository for your Alpine version:
http://host.name/alpine_version/community
Update the package cache.
apk update
Install the package.
apk add openjdk8-jre
MongoDB
Install MongoDB
apk add mongodb
s6
Install s6
apk add s6
which is a service supervision suite, for reliably and efficiently starting, stopping and keeping services running.
The below shows a schematic process tree of how the UniFi Controller will be started and supervised by s6. The controller is written in Java, hence the Java process and it in turn, launches a dedicated instance of MongoDB to store its configuration and run-time data.
init `-- s6-svscan `-- s6-supervise |-- s6-log `-- java `-- mongod
Install UniFi Controller
Create the unifi
user and group.
adduser -D -H -h /srv/unifi unifi
Change to the parent folder within which you wish to install the UniFi Controller.
cd /srv
Download the generic unix archive of the VERSION
you wish to install.
wget http://www.ubnt.com/downloads/unifi/VERSION/UniFi.unix.zip
Unpack the archive.
unzip UniFi.unix.zip
Rename the unpacked directory.
mv UniFi unifi
Change ownership.
chown -R unifi:unifi unifi
Lock down permissions.
chmod o-rwx unifi
Change into the UniFi bin directory.
cd /srv/unifi/bin
Remove the existing file.
rm mongod
Create a symlink to /usr/bin/mongod
ln -s /usr/bin/mongod
Configure Service Management
Create UniFi Service Directory and Files
Create an s6 service directory for UniFi.
mkdir -p /etc/unifi/log
Add the run
script, using your favourite editor.
vim /etc/unifi/run
Copy and paste the following into it.
#!/bin/ash user='unifi' group='unifi' exec 2>&1 base='/srv/unifi' if [ -d $base ]; then cd $base chown -R $user:$group . version=`head -1 webapps/ROOT/app-unifi/.version` echo "Starting UniFi Controller $version" exec s6-setuidgid $user java -jar lib/ace.jar start else echo "Missing $base ... aborting" touch down fi
Ensure that the run
script is executable:
chmod 755 /etc/unifi/run
Add the log/run
script, using your favourite editor.
vim /etc/unifi/log/run
Copy and paste the following into it.
#!/bin/ash log_user='log' exec s6-setuidgid $log_user s6-log -b n20 s1000000 t /var/log/unifi
Ensure that the log/run script is executable:
chmod 755 /etc/unifi/run
Create log User and Directory
Create the log
user and group.
adduser -D -H -h /var/log log
Create the /var/log/unifi
directory
mkdir -p /var/log/unifi
Update the directory ownership.
chown log:log /var/log/unifi
Lock down the permissions.
chmod 750 /var/log/unifi
Create the OpenRC Service Script
Open the script file using your favourite editor.
vim /etc/init.d/unifi
Paste the following into it.
#!/sbin/openrc-run name="unifi" supervisor=s6 s6_service_path="${RC_SVCDIR}/s6-scan/${name}" depend() { need net s6-svscan after firewall } start_pre() { if [ ! -L "${RC_SVCDIR}/s6-scan/${name}" ]; then ln -s "/etc/${name}" "${RC_SVCDIR}/s6-scan/${name}" fi }
Ensure that the script is executable.
chmod 755 /etc/init.d/unifi
Start the UniFi Controller Service
rc-service unifi start
Configure the UniFi Controller Service to start on boot
rc-update add unifi boot
Simple Backup Script
Create /usr/local/bin/unifi-backup
using your favourite editor.
Note: This script assumes the use of s6-svc to control unifi. I will modify it in time, to use rc-service instead.
Paste the following into the file.
#!/bin/ash conf_dir='/etc/unifi' backup_dir='/srv/backup/unifi' service_dir='/run/openrc/s6-scan/unifi' start_state='down' if s6-svok $service_dir; then if s6-svstat -o up,ready $service_dir | grep -q true; then echo 'Stopping the UniFi Controller' start_state='up' s6-svc -d $service_dir sleep 3 fi else echo 'Warning: The UniFi Controller is not supervised' exit 1 fi if s6-svstat -o up $service_dir | grep -q false; then echo 'Success: The UniFi Controller was stopped' else echo 'Error: The UniFi Controller is still running' exit 1 fi stamp=`date +%Y-%m-%d_%H%M%S` mkdir -p $backup_dir cd $backup_dir mkdir "data-$stamp" echo "Backing up to /srv/backup/unifi/data-$stamp.tar.gz" if rsync -az /srv/unifi/data/ "data-$stamp"; then echo '* rsync succeeded' if tar czf "data-$stamp.tar.gz" "data-$stamp"; then echo '* tar succeeded' rm -rf "data-$stamp" echo 'Backup succeeded' else echo 'Backup failed: tar failed' exit 1 fi fi if [ "$start_state" == 'up' ]; then echo 'Starting the UniFi Controller' s6-svc -u $service_dir sleep 5 s6-svstat $service_dir fi