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I think I misunderstood what Nextcloud is. Hopefully this question can be answered quickly and I won’t take up any more of anyone’s time. I see these posts, “Bare metal Nextcloud and Docker containers,” which, as I understand bare metal, is an oxymoron. Nextcloud is not an OS, is it? It’s not, say, OMV or Proxmox or even TrueNAS? I guess I thought it was similar to TrueNAS or Synology’s OS.
I apologize for the total noob question. I keep running into links to GitHub projects when attempting to just acquire the Nextcloud software so, again, I think I misunderstood what it is.
Evidently it’s some type of software server that needs Linux or some other OS infrastructure to even be installed, then several tools (such as databases) to run and only THEN can one use the various Nextcloud tools. Is that correct? That seems like a lot of overhead! But, again, maybe I’m misunderstanding. Please advise!
Nextcloud is not an operating system like OMV, TrueNAS, or Synology OS. It is an application (server software) that runs on top of an existing operating system – most commonly Linux.
OMV, TrueNAS, and Synology provide a complete package with a web interface and various services available right after installation. In comparison, Nextcloud is a single application that requires:
an operating system (e.g., Ubuntu Server),
a web server (Apache or Nginx),
a database (MariaDB or PostgreSQL),
PHP.
It is important to know what device you plan to install Nextcloud on, since the recommended deployment method depends on the hardware. The options include a direct installation on the OS (bare metal) or using Docker with Nextcloud AIO (All-In-One), which automates much of the setup.
This way, you ensure the solution runs stably and is adapted to your specific hardware.
It can be installed from an Archive (tar.gz/zip) package into a supported Linux distro.
It can also be installed in a variety of other ways. There are multiple Docker based deployments, Snap (for Ubuntu), VMs, etc.
There are also distro/OS specific packages such as FreeBSD Ports, ArchLinux packages, Nix packages, etc.
Technically there are also some “OS” based ones in the sense that they come with the OS, but it’s just Linux underneath and provided as a convenience to streamline the deployment.
I agree, I can’t stand people using “bare metal” either. I installed Nextcloud on FreeBSD almost a decade ago (upgrading from ownCloud).
I’d warn against docker, though. It’s an extra layer of complexity you don’t need. About 90% of the posts in the Nextcloud subreddit are people having issues with docker.
Just use your OSes method of installing Nextcloud. I used ports on FreeBSD, use apt or whatever your linux distro uses. That’s not “bare metal”, but it beats “non-native bubble that doesn’t communicate as expected”.
It’s an additional layer some people need to learn before they get it right, but the upsides are often that it solves other real problems for these same people. Part of the reason there are so many Docker/container related problem reports is also because it’s probably the prevalent install method at this point (at least among Linux users).
Don’t get me wrong, I like having Archive modes + FreeBSD Ports + and all the others.
I agree, I can’t stand people using “bare metal” either.
You’re right. The “bare metal” term is a bit of a misnomer here. The Archive-based install (tar.gz/zip/bz2 based) is intended to go onto an underlying host OS that has been set up according to the Nextcloud prerequisites. Typically that would be an OS on bare metal or a VM. It could even be a base generic OS/distro container image that meets the specs (not the same as using using one of the Nextcloud specific images).
