inventree-docs/docs/start/deploy.md

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Deploy InvenTree

Deploying InvenTree

The development server provided by the Django ecosystem may be fine for a testing environment or small contained setups. However special consideration must be given when deploying InvenTree in a real-world environment.

Django apps provide multiple deployment methods - see the Django documentation.

There are also numerous online tutorials describing how to deploy a Django application either locally or on an online platform.

The following instructions provide a reasonably performant server, using gunicorn as a webserver, and supervisor as a process manager.

Initial Setup

Install System Packages

Install required system packages (as superuser).

First, install required system packages as per the OS requirements.

Then, install the supervisor process manager:

sudo apt-get install supervisor

Create InvenTree User

It is highly recommended that the InvenTree server is not run under root. Create a user account from which we will run the server:

sudo useradd --create-home inventree

InvenTree source code, log files, etc will be located under the /home/inventree/ directory.

Switch to the inventree user so commands are performed in the correct context:

sudo su inventree

Download Source Code

Download InvenTree source code, into the ./src directory:

cd /home/inventree
git clone https://github.com/inventree/inventree src

Create Virtual Environment

Create a python virtual environment for installting required Python packages and binaries:

python3 -m venv env
source ./env/bin/activate

The shell prompt should now display the (env) prefix.

Install Python Packages

pip3 install -U -r src/requirements.txt

This command will install all of the python binaries and library files required for the InvenTree installation.

Create Required Directories

mkdir log static media

This step creates directories required by InvenTree:

• log - Store InvenTree log files
• static - Location of static files for the web server
• media - Location of uploaded media files

Development Server

The InvenTree development server is useful for testing and configuration - and it may be wholly sufficient for a small-scale installation.

Running on a Local Machine

To run the development server on a local machine, run the command:

inv server -a 127.0.0.1:8000

Serving on the address 127.0.0.1 means that InvenTree will only be available on that computer. The server will be accessible from a web browser on the same computer, but not from any other computers on the local network.

Running on a Local Network

To enable access to the InvenTree server from other computers on a local network, you need to know the IP of the computer running the server. For example, if the server IP address is 192.168.120.1:

inv server -a 192.168.120.1:8000

!!! warning "Not For Production" It should be noted that the development server provided with django / InvenTree is probably not suitable for your production environment. Instead, use a proper web-server (such as Gunicorn, below).

Gunicorn

Following is a simple tutorial on serving InvenTree using Gunicorn. Gunicorn is a Python WSGI server which provides a multi-worker server which is well suited to handling multiple simultaneous requests. Gunicorn is a solid choice for a production server which is easy to configure and performs well in a multi-user environment.

Install Gunicorn

Gunicorn can be installed using PIP:

pip3 install gunicorn

!!! warning "Python Environment" Ensure that gunicorn is installed within the same python environment context as the InvenTree install - otherwise gunicorn will not be able to import the correct python modules.

Configure Static Directories

Directories for storing media files and static files should be specified in the config.yaml configuration file. These directories are the MEDIA_ROOT and STATIC_ROOT paths required by the Django app. Ensure that both of these directories are correctly configured for your setup.

Collect Static Files

The required static files must be collected into the specified STATIC_ROOT directory:

inv static

This command collects all of the required static files (including script and css files) into the specified directory ready to be served.

Configure Gunicorn

The Gunicorn server can be configured with a simple configuration file (e.g. python script). An example configuration file is provided in InvenTree/gunicorn.conf.py

{% include 'gunicorn.conf.py' %}

This file can be used to configure the Gunicorn server to match particular requirements.

Run Gunicorn

cd InvenTree
gunicorn -c gunicorn.conf.py InvenTree.wsgi