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PathcoreFlow User Manual

Configuration


After installing PathcoreFlow on your server or virtual machine host, some additional configuration may be required to work in your environment.

Restarting Components

At some points during configuration, one or more of the PathcoreFlow components will need to be restarted.

To restart changed components

At a command line for the system hosting PathcoreFlow:

  1. Change to the PathcoreFlow compose directory (e.g., /opt/pathcore/compose):

    cd /opt/pathcore/compose

  2. Use Docker Compose to restart any services which have changed:

    sudo docker compose up -d --force-recreate

Environment Variables

Most of the configuration of PathcoreFlow is accomplished by setting environment variables. This is accomplished by editing the .env file which is read by Docker Compose when starting PathcoreFlow services. The default location for this file is /opt/pathcore/compose/.env.

If you installed PathcoreFlow using the recommended install.sh script, most of these values have already been set appropriately. Typically, all that remains to configure are the mail server settings.

Variables

The variables defined in the .env file and their default values are shown below.

  • PCW_VERSION
    (default: flow-v4.1.0)
    The version of PathcoreFlow which is installed

  • PCW_POSTGRES_VERSION
    (default: 14)
    The database software version

  • PCW_HOST
    (default: )
    The hostname for accessing PathcoreFlow

  • PCW_INSTALL_DIR
    (default: /opt/pathcore)
    The directory where PathcoreFlow is installed

  • PCW_DB_USER
    (default: pathcore_web)
    The username for database access

  • PCW_DB_NAME
    (default: pathcore_web)
    The name of the database

  • PCW_DB_PASS
    (default: )
    The password for database access

  • PCW_DB_DIR
    (default: ${PCW_INSTALL_DIR:-/opt/pathcore}/postgres)
    The directory which will store database files

  • PCW_BACKUP_DIR
    (default: ${PCW_INSTALL_DIR:-/opt/pathcore}/backups)
    The directory for keeping backup files

  • PCW_BACKUP_DAYS
    (default: 30)
    The number of days to keep backups

  • PCW_IIS_DIR
    (default: ${PCW_INSTALL_DIR:-/opt/pathcore}/iis)
    The directory used by the Image Indexing Service for its files

  • PCW_FILES_DIR
    (default: ${PCW_INSTALL_DIR:-/opt/pathcore}/files)
    The directory where PathcoreFlow will store image and attachment files

  • PCW_SSL_DIR
    (default: ${PCW_INSTALL_DIR:-/opt/pathcore}/certs)
    The directory containing HTTPS certificate and key files, if enabled

  • PCW_STATIC_DIR
    (default: ${PCW_INSTALL_DIR:-/opt/pathcore}/nginx-webroot)
    Files placed in this directory can be accessed via HTTP under /.well-known/. This can be used by Let's Encrypt to automatically manage certificates. More information about setting up Let's Encrypt can be found on the HTTPS page

  • PCW_HTTP_ONLY
    (default: 1)
    When enabled, only serve content over HTTP. Set to 0 to enable HTTPS

  • PCW_SECURE_COOKIES
    (default: 0)
    Enable (set to 1) to only allow session cookies over HTTPS connection

  • PCW_ENABLE_CERTBOT
    (default: 0)
    Enable (set to 1) to activate certbot — a tool to maintain TLS certificates from Let's Encrypt

  • PCW_CERTBOT_EMAIL
    (default: )
    The email address to use with the Let's Encrypt service

  • PCW_SSL_CERT_NAME
    (default: fullchain.pem) The filename of the HTTPS certificate file

  • PCW_SSL_KEY_NAME
    (default: privkey.pem) The filename of the HTTPS certificate key file

  • PCW_SECRET_KEY
    (default: )
    The key used for encrypting secrets in PathcoreFlow. This is set automatically by the install.sh script

  • PCW_MAIL_HOST
    (default: )
    The hostname of the SMTP server

  • PCW_MAIL_PORT
    (default: 25)
    The port used for SMTP

  • PCW_MAIL_USER
    (default: )
    The username used for email authentication

  • PCW_MAIL_PASS
    (default: )
    The password used for email authentication

  • PCW_IMAGE_CACHE_DIR
    (default: ${PCW_INSTALL_DIR:-/opt/pathcore}/cache)
    The directory where the web cache files are stored

  • PCW_IMAGE_CACHE_MAX_SIZE
    (default: 10g)
    The maximum size of the web cache

  • PCW_FIGURE_MAKER_BASE_URL
    (default: *)
    The base URL used when generating Figures for export

  • GITLAB_REGISTRY_HOST
    (default: registry.gitlab.com)
    The hostname of the container image registry

  • GITLAB_REGISTRY_USER
    (default: )
    The username used for retrieving container images from the registry

  • GITLAB_REGISTRY_PASS
    (default: )
    The password used for retrieving container images from the registry

Docker Configuration

The recommended way to apply custom settings to the PathcoreFlow Docker Compose configuration is to create an override file. This allows you to make the changes needed without losing them when the base docker-compose.yml file is replaced in an update.

Any features in this manual that require modifying the base Docker Compose configuration will provide example override files.

To apply a custom a Docker Compose configuration
This will cause the PathcoreFlow services to be temporarily unavailable.

  1. Change to the directory containing the PathcoreFlow Docker Compose configuration. e.g., for the default install location of /opt/pathcore/compose:

    cd /opt/pathcore/compose

  2. Use your preferred text editor to create or edit the docker-compose.override.yml file:

    nano docker-compose.override.yml

  3. Apply the changes to the YAML as needed. The Compose file reference can be found in the official Docker documentation

  4. Restart the affected service components

You can find more information about how Docker Compose merges these configuration files on the official Docker documentation site.

Pathcore Support can also provide assistance with the changes necessary to enable PathcoreFlow features.

Further Configuration

You can refer to the following pages to configure additional features specific to hosting PathcoreFlow on premise.