Ployer

A lightweight, self-hosted PaaS — deploy your apps from Git with automatic SSL, health checks, and webhooks. Built with Rust + SvelteKit, targeting <50MB RAM idle.

Think Coolify, but leaner.

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Features

• One-command deploy — push to Git, Ployer builds and deploys automatically
• Automatic SSL — via Caddy + Let's Encrypt, zero config
• Webhooks — GitHub and GitLab push events trigger auto-deploys
• Health checks — HTTP polling with auto-restart on failure
• Container stats — CPU, memory, and network I/O monitoring
• Real-time logs — WebSocket streaming for build and runtime logs
• Multi-server — manage apps across multiple servers
• Encrypted secrets — environment variables encrypted at rest (AES-256-GCM)

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Requirements

	Minimum	Recommended
OS	Ubuntu 22.04 / Debian 12	Ubuntu 24.04 LTS
RAM	1 GB	2 GB+
CPU	1 vCPU	2 vCPU
Disk	20 GB	40 GB+
Arch	x86_64	x86_64 / arm64

Important: Install on a fresh, dedicated server. Ployer owns ports 80 and 443 via Caddy. It will conflict with Nginx, Apache, Coolify, or any other reverse proxy already running on those ports.

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Quick Install

Point your domain's DNS A record to your server IP first, then run:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nusendra/ployer/main/install.sh | sudo bash

Note: curl | bash runs in non-interactive mode and will auto-detect your server IP. To use a custom domain with HTTPS, download and run the script directly instead:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nusendra/ployer/main/install.sh -o install.sh
sudo bash install.sh

The installer will:

1. Detect your OS and install Docker if needed
2. Ask for your domain (or use server IP for quick testing)
3. Generate a secure JWT secret automatically
4. Build and start all services
5. Print the dashboard URL when ready

That's it. HTTPS is provisioned automatically when you use a domain.

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Manual Installation

If you prefer to set things up yourself:

1. Install Docker

curl -fsSL https://get.docker.com | bash

2. Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/nusendra/ployer.git /data/ployer
cd /data/ployer

3. Configure environment

cp .env.example .env
nano .env

Set at minimum:

PLOYER_JWT_SECRET=your-long-random-secret-here
PLOYER_BASE_DOMAIN=ployer.yourdomain.com
PLOYER_PUBLIC_URL=https://ployer.yourdomain.com
PLOYER_ALLOWED_ORIGINS=https://ployer.yourdomain.com

4. Configure Caddy

Edit Caddyfile and replace your-staging-domain.com with your actual domain:

ployer.yourdomain.com {
    reverse_proxy ployer:3001
}

5. Start services

docker compose up -d --build

6. Open the dashboard

Navigate to https://ployer.yourdomain.com — you'll be prompted to create the first admin account.

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Upgrading

Re-run the install script — it detects an existing installation, pulls the latest code, and restarts:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nusendra/ployer/main/install.sh | sudo bash

Or manually:

cd /data/ployer
git pull
docker compose up -d --build

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Configuration

All configuration is via environment variables in /data/ployer/.env:

Variable	Default	Description
PLOYER_JWT_SECRET	(required)	Secret key for signing JWT tokens. Use a long random string.
PLOYER_BASE_DOMAIN	localhost	Base domain for auto-generated app subdomains
PLOYER_PUBLIC_URL	http://localhost	Full public URL of the Ployer dashboard
PLOYER_ALLOWED_ORIGINS	*	CORS allowed origins. Lock down in production.
PLOYER_DATABASE_URL	sqlite:///data/ployer.db	SQLite database path
PLOYER_PORT	3001	Internal API port
PLOYER_CADDY_URL	http://caddy:2019	Caddy Admin API URL
PLOYER_DOCKER_SOCKET	/var/run/docker.sock	Docker socket path
LOG_FORMAT	(plain text)	Set to json for structured JSON logging

After editing .env, restart:

docker compose -f /data/ployer/docker-compose.yml up -d

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Resetting a Password

If you get locked out:

docker compose -f /data/ployer/docker-compose.yml exec ployer \
  ./ployer reset-password --email you@example.com --password newpassword123

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Common Commands

# View live logs
docker compose -f /data/ployer/docker-compose.yml logs -f

# View only API logs
docker compose -f /data/ployer/docker-compose.yml logs -f ployer

# Stop Ployer
docker compose -f /data/ployer/docker-compose.yml down

# Restart Ployer
docker compose -f /data/ployer/docker-compose.yml restart ployer

# Open a shell inside the container
docker compose -f /data/ployer/docker-compose.yml exec ployer sh

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Deploying an App Through Ployer

1. Add a server — Ployer auto-registers the local server on first start
2. Create an application — provide a Git URL, branch, and build strategy
3. Add the deploy key — copy the public key from Ployer into your repository's deploy keys
4. Deploy — click Deploy or push to the configured branch via webhook

Build strategies

Strategy	Description
Dockerfile	Builds using a Dockerfile in your repo root
Nixpacks	Auto-detects language and builds without a Dockerfile
Docker Compose	Deploys using a docker-compose.yml in your repo

Setting up webhooks (auto-deploy on push)

1. Go to your application → Webhooks → Configure
2. Select your Git provider (GitHub or GitLab)
3. Copy the webhook URL and secret
4. Add it to your repository's webhook settings
5. Push to your configured branch — Ployer deploys automatically

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Architecture

Internet
    │
    ▼
 Caddy (80/443)          ← TLS termination, auto SSL
    │
    ▼
 Ployer (3001)           ← Rust/Axum API + SvelteKit frontend
    │
    ├── SQLite (/data)   ← Persistent database
    ├── Docker socket    ← Container management
    └── Caddy Admin API  ← Dynamic reverse proxy routes

• Backend — Rust (Axum), SQLite via sqlx, bollard for Docker
• Frontend — SvelteKit (static build, served by the Rust binary)
• Proxy — Caddy 2 (automatic HTTPS, dynamic routing)
• Database — SQLite with WAL mode (no separate database server needed)

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Troubleshooting

Dashboard not loading after install

docker compose -f /data/ployer/docker-compose.yml logs caddy
docker compose -f /data/ployer/docker-compose.yml logs ployer

SSL certificate not issued

• Make sure your domain's DNS A record points to the server before running the installer
• Port 80 must be open on your firewall (ufw allow 80 and ufw allow 443)

Cannot connect to Docker

ls -la /var/run/docker.sock   # should exist
systemctl status docker        # should be active

Database errors on startup

• The /data volume is created automatically. If permissions are wrong:

docker compose -f /data/ployer/docker-compose.yml down
docker volume rm ployer_ployer-data
docker compose -f /data/ployer/docker-compose.yml up -d

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License

MIT — see LICENSE