portabase

Portabase

Portabase is a self-hosted application for building internal knowledge bases, intranet sites, and documentation portals. It runs as a containerized web app backed by PostgreSQL for persistent storage.

How Portabase works

flowchart LR
    User([User]) -->|:8887| App[Portabase Web]
    App --> PG[(PostgreSQL)]

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1. The Portabase web app starts and serves HTTP traffic on port 80 inside the container.
2. A PostgreSQL database container stores application data, user accounts, and configuration.
3. The app container depends on the database container and checks database availability before starting.
4. Persistent data is stored in Docker volumes so your content survives container restarts.

Stack details in this repo

• App image: portabase/portabase:latest
• App container name: portabase-app-prod
• App web UI: http://<host-ip>:8887
• Database image: postgres:16-alpine
• Database port mapping: 5433:5432
• Persistent data volumes:
  • portabase-data:/data
  • postgres-data:/var/lib/postgresql/data
• Environment file:
  • .env

Environment variables

This compose setup uses a .env file for custom variables. By default, the database service includes:

• POSTGRES_DB=devdb
• POSTGRES_USER=devuser
• POSTGRES_PASSWORD=changeme

Update these values in .env or the compose config before deploying to a production environment.

How to run

From the repository root:

cd portabase
docker compose up -d

Open:

• http://localhost:8887

Useful commands:

docker compose ps          # check container status
docker compose logs -f     # stream logs
docker compose restart     # restart service
docker compose down        # stop and remove containers

Use Portabase effectively

• Use the web UI to create pages, collections, and internal documentation.
• Keep application data in portabase-data and database state in postgres-data.
• Use the .env file to manage credentials and environment settings.
• Ensure the database is healthy before relying on the web app startup.

Notes

• The app listens on 8887 externally and forwards to port 80 inside the container.
• PostgreSQL is exposed on 5433 only for local development.
• Do not commit sensitive values from .env to source control.
• The app container includes a healthcheck that verifies /api/health before marking the service healthy.