Deploy to Ubuntu

OpenReplay stack can be installed on a single machine running Ubuntu. Here’s how to do it.

• Operating system must be Ubuntu Server 22.04 Focal Fossa.
• The minimum specs for the machine running OpenReplay are 2 vCPUs, 8 GB of RAM, 50 GB of storage, otherwise OpenReplay backend services won’t simply start. This should be enough for a low/moderate volume. If you’re expecting high traffic, you should scale from here.
• A public IP address pointing to your machine.

1. Make sure your machine is started then connect to it through SSH as root

2. Install OpenReplay by providing the domain on which it will be running (e.g. DOMAIN_NAME=openreplay.mycompany.com):

sudo wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/openreplay/openreplay/main/scripts/helmcharts/openreplay-cli -O /bin/openreplay 
sudo chmod +x /bin/openreplay
openreplay -i DOMAIN_NAME

OpenReplay deals with sensitive user data and therefore requires HTTPS to run. This is mandatory, otherwise the tracker simply wouldn’t start recording. Same thing for the dashboard, without HTTPS you won’t be able to replay user sessions.

You must therefore bring (or generate) your own SSL certificate.

1. First, go to your DNS service provider, edit your DNS zone and create an A Record. Use the domain you previously provided during the installation step and point it to the machine using its public IP.

2. If you’re bringing your own certificate, create an SSL secret using the following command: kubectl create secret tls openreplay-ssl -n app --key="private_key_file.pem" --cert="certificate.crt".

Note: If you don’t have a certificate, generate one, that auto-renews, for your subdomain (the one provided during installation) using Let’s Encrypt. Simply connect to OpenReplay machine, run cd /var/lib/openreplay/openreplay/scripts/helmcharts && bash certmanager.sh and follow the steps.

3. If you wish to enable http to https redirection (recommended), then uncomment the below block, under the ingress-nginx section, in /var/lib/openreplay/vars.yaml:

ingress-nginx: &ingress-nginx
  controller:
    config:
      ssl-redirect: true
      force-ssl-redirect: true

It’s worth mentioning that our ingress-nginx runs by default on ports 80|443, but this can be easily changed, if needed, in vars.yaml:

ingress-nginx: &ingress-nginx
  controller:
    service:
      ports:
        http: 80
        https: 443

4. Finally reinstall OpenReplay NGINX:

openreplay -R

You’re all set now, OpenReplay should be accessible on your subdomain. You can create an account by visiting the /signup page (i.e. openreplay.mycompany.com/signup).

If you encounter any issues, connect to our  Slack community and get help from our devs.