Everything was good, great in fact. Everything was working, but my OCD weren’t okay with how a few services were set-up, so I cleaned up my yaml, commented my docker compose and felt cushty… right up until it was time to fix Immich.

I have minor beef with Immich and basically any larger project and the way they go about their Docker Compose. Basically I feel they make the assumption that they’re the only thing running.

^Disclaimer: I fully accept this is all just me being too stupid and not the Immich development team.

So first things first, let’s rename database to immich-database, redis to immich-redis and most importantly, let’s give it a port that’s not the default postgres port that everyone wants to use. Easy right? Nope.

First Immich said it couldn’t find the database, so I went in and added the IP as the DB_URL to the .env. But that didn’t really help, so I went back to the Docker Compose and added the path to the references to the env.

Second issue I stumble upon, is that despite the port being available as DB_PORT Immich decided it was a suggestion and not an instruction. No worries, I edit the database URL to include the port.

Okay, I’m on the home stretch now right. I mean this was working before I decided to mess around with it in the name of scalability or whatever I thought was genius at the time… except

[Nest] 7  - 04/05/2024, 6:10:23 PM   ERROR [ExceptionHandler] no PostgreSQL user name specified in startup packet

What does that even mean? Why won’t you work? So I do a web search and everything is saying that docker probably isn’t reading the username from the env file or the Docker Compose. I try adding single quotes and no joy, double quotes, no joy. I have no idea where I’ve gone wrong. I feel like my beautiful simple Docker Compose now looks like Frankenstein’s Monster. Help 🙏

ENV

# You can find documentation for all the supported env variables at https://immich.app/docs/install/environment-variables

# The location where your uploaded files are stored
#UPLOAD_LOCATION=immichlibrary

# The Immich version to use. You can pin this to a specific version like "v1.71.0"
IMMICH_VERSION=release

# Connection secret for postgres. You should change it to a random password
DB_PASSWORD="RANDOMLIES"
DB_URL=http://192.168.0.89:8765
DB_PORT=8765

# The values below this line do not need to be changed
###################################################################################
DB_HOSTNAME=immich_postgres
DB_USERNAME=postgres
DB_DATABASE_NAME=immich

REDIS_HOSTNAME=immich_redis

Docker Compose

version: "3.8"

#
# WARNING: Make sure to use the docker-compose.yml of the current release:
#
# https://github.com/immich-app/immich/releases/latest/download/docker-compose.yml
#
# The compose file on main may not be compatible with the latest release.
#

name: immich

services:
  immich-server:
    container_name: immich_server
    image: ghcr.io/immich-app/immich-server:${IMMICH_VERSION:-release}
    command: [ "start.sh", "immich" ]
    volumes:
      #- ${UPLOAD_LOCATION}:/usr/src/app/upload
      - immichlibrary:/usr/src/app/upload
      - /etc/localtime:/etc/localtime:ro
    env_file:
      - /opt/immich/.env
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: ${DB_USERNAME}
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: ${DB_PASSWORD}
      POSTGRES_DB: ${DB_DATABASE_NAME}
    ports:
      - 2283:3001
    depends_on:
      - immich-redis
      - immich-database
    restart: always

  immich-microservices:
    container_name: immich_microservices
    image: ghcr.io/immich-app/immich-server:${IMMICH_VERSION:-release}
    # extends:
    #   file: hwaccel.yml
    #   service: hwaccel
    command: [ "start.sh", "microservices" ]
    volumes:
      #- ${UPLOAD_LOCATION}:/usr/src/app/upload
      - immichlibrary:/usr/src/app/upload
      - /etc/localtime:/etc/localtime:ro
    env_file:
      - /opt/immich/.env
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: ${DB_USERNAME}
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: ${DB_PASSWORD}
      POSTGRES_DB: ${DB_DATABASE_NAME}
    depends_on:
      - immich-redis
      - immich-database
    restart: always

  immich-machine-learning:
    container_name: immich_machine_learning
    image: ghcr.io/immich-app/immich-machine-learning:${IMMICH_VERSION:-release}
    volumes:
      - model-cache:/cache
    env_file:
      - /opt/immich/.env
    restart: always

  immich-redis:
    container_name: immich_redis
    image: redis:6.2-alpine@sha256:c5a607fb6e1bb15d32bbcf14db22787d19e428d59e31a5da67511b49bb0f1ccc
    restart: always

  immich-database:
    container_name: immich_postgres
    image: tensorchord/pgvecto-rs:pg14-v0.2.0@sha256:90724186f0a3517cf6914295b5ab410db9ce23190a2d9d0b9dd6463e3fa298f0
    env_file:
      - /opt/immich/.env
    environment:
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: ${DB_PASSWORD}
      POSTGRES_USER: ${DB_USERNAME}
      POSTGRES_DB: ${DB_DATABASE_NAME}
    ports:
      - 8765:5432
    volumes:
      - /opt/immich/postgres:/var/lib/postgresql/data
    restart: always

volumes:
  model-cache:
    driver_opts:
      type: "nfs"
      o: "addr=192.168.0.245,nolock,soft,rw"
      device: ":/mnt/Shared Pictures/.Immich/cache"
  immichlibrary:
    driver_opts:
      type: "nfs"
      o: "addr=192.168.0.245,nolock,soft,rw"
      device: ":/mnt/Shared Pictures/.Immich"

Even if you read this and don’t feel you can help or have nothing to add, thanks for sharing your time with me 🥹

  • @foggyEnglish
    1•2 months ago

    I also asked a local instance of the Mixtral llm:

    Database URL Format: The DB_URL in the .env file is defined as http://192.168.0.89:8765, which is unusual for a PostgreSQL connection. PostgreSQL typically uses a connection string format, not a URL starting with http://. The correct format for a PostgreSQL connection string usually looks like: postgresql://username:password@hostname:port/database. Changing the DB_URL to match this format might resolve the issue of the application not recognizing the username.

    Environment Variable Consistency: Ensure that all references to the database, Redis, and other services within both the .env file and the Docker Compose file are consistent with the new names and ports. This includes checking that the DB_HOSTNAME and REDIS_HOSTNAME in the .env file match the container_name of the services in the Docker Compose file.

    PostgreSQL Connection String in Docker Compose: The environment variables for the Immich services in the Docker Compose file are focused on POSTGRES_USER, POSTGRES_PASSWORD, and POSTGRES_DB. If Immich constructs its own connection string internally using these components, ensure they’re correctly configured. However, it might be worth directly specifying a full connection string (if supported by Immich) that includes the username, password, host, and database in a single variable, to reduce the chance of misconfiguration.

    Network Configuration: Verify that Docker’s network configuration hasn’t been altered in a way that would prevent containers from communicating properly. Docker Compose services communicate over a default network, but if you’ve made network modifications, ensure that these don’t inadvertently block connections between services.