Castopod

#ActivityPub #fediverse #lang-php #podcast #web 

Castopod is a free and open-source podcast hosting platform.

It forms one part of the Fediverse, an interconnected and decentralized network of independently operated servers.

Note

For this guide you should be familiar with the basic concepts of

License

Castopod is released under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0. All relevant information can be found in the LICENSE.md file in the repository of the project.

Prerequisites

We’re using PHP in the stable version 8.1:

[isabell@stardust ~]$ uberspace tools version show php
Using 'PHP' version: '8.1'
[isabell@stardust ~]$

You’ll need your MySQL credentials. Get them with my_print_defaults:

[isabell@stardust ~]$ my_print_defaults client
--default-character-set=utf8mb4
--user=isabell
--password=MySuperSecretPassword
[isabell@stardust ~]$

Setup a new MySQL database for Castopod:

[isabell@stardust ~]$ mysql -e "CREATE DATABASE ${USER}_castopod"
[isabell@stardust ~]$

Your castopod URL needs to be setup:

[isabell@stardust ~]$ uberspace web domain list
isabell.uber.space
[isabell@stardust ~]$

Note

Castopod should be installed in a domain of its own (or in a subdomain), not in a subdirectory of a domain.

Installation

Change to the parent directory of your DocumentRoot and download the latest version of castopod. At the time of writing, this is v1.3.5. You’ll find all releases on their gitlab instance. Please note that you need to download the “Castopod Package”, not just the source code. The latter is missing some needed files.

[isabell@stardust ~]$ cd /var/www/virtual/$USER
[isabell@stardust isabell]$ wget https://code.castopod.org/adaures/castopod/uploads/0071d5055a69176c706591649b1d725d/castopod-1.3.5.tar.gz
[isabell@stardust isabell]$

Configuration

Create a copy of the file .env.example and use .env as the new name.

[isabell@stardust ~]$ cd /var/www/virtual/$USER/castopod
[isabell@stardust castopod]$ cp .env.example .env
[isabell@stardust castopod]$

Open the file .env in an editor and change the default settings in the following lines to use your settings.

#--------------------------------------------------------------------
# Instance configuration
#--------------------------------------------------------------------
app.baseURL="https://isabell.uber.space/"
media.baseURL="https://isabell.uber.space/"
admin.gateway="cp-admin"
auth.gateway="cp-auth"

#--------------------------------------------------------------------
# Database configuration
#--------------------------------------------------------------------
database.default.hostname="localhost"
database.default.database="isabell_castopod"
database.default.username="isabell"
database.default.password="MySuperSecretPassword"
database.default.DBPrefix="cp_"

#--------------------------------------------------------------------
# Email configuration
#--------------------------------------------------------------------
email.fromEmail="isabell@uber.space"
email.SMTPHost="stardust.uberspace.de"
email.SMTPUser="isabell@uber.space"
email.SMTPPass="SuperSecretMailPassword"

Update .htaccess

Open the file .htaccess in the directory /var/www/virtual/$USER/html. The instruction “All” is not supported on Uberspace, so prepend the line with a hash (“#”) to disable it. Also, the unsupported instruction “FollowSymlinks” has to be replaced with “SymLinksIfOwnerMatch”.

# Disable directory browsing
# Options All -Indexes

# ----------------------------------------------------------------------
# Rewrite engine
# ----------------------------------------------------------------------

# Turning on the rewrite engine is necessary for the following rules and features.
# FollowSymLinks must be enabled for this to work.
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
        Options +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch
        RewriteEngine On

Finishing installation

Point your browser to your uberspace URL to finish the setup: https://isabell.uber.space/cp-install

Most settings should not need changing, as they are taken from the .env file. However, you have to create an admin user.

Cron jobs

Now set up some cron jobs for various background processes. Depending on your needs, the frequency of these cron jobs can be adjusted. For a small personal site, it’s probably enough to run them once per hour – or even daily or weekly.

Use crontab -e to edit your cronjobs.

For social features to work properly, this task is used to broadcast social activities to your followers on the fediverse. The example runs hourly.

0 * * * * cd /var/www/virtual/$USER/html && php index.php scheduled-activities

This task broadcasts your episodes on open hubs upon publication using WebSub. The example runs daily.

0 0 * * * cd /var/www/virtual/$USER/html && php index.php scheduled-websub-publish

This task creates video clips (you need FFmpeg for this). The example runs daily.

0 0 * * * cd /var/www/virtual/$USER/html && php index.php scheduled-video-clips

Redis

Optionally, you can enable Redis for better cache performance. If you do, edit the file .env in /var/www/virtual/$USER/castopod to use the Redis cache system.

Updates

If there is a new release available, move the file /var/www/virtual/$USER/castopod/.env and the directory /var/www/virtual/$USER/castopod/public/media outside the directory /var/www/virtual/$USER/castopod. Then delete all other files there. Follow the installation instructions from above. Move the files back to their original place.

Sometimes there are additional update instructions you have to follow. For example, .sql files containing migrations.

If you picked Redis as caching mechanism, clear the cache.

Enjoy your new version!

Note

Check the releases regularly to stay informed about the newest version.

Backup

This is a list of files you need to restore your castopod installation:

  • A dump of the database

  • Configuration file: /var/www/virtual/$USER/castopod/.env

  • Contents of the directory /var/www/virtual/$USER/castopod/public/media

Tested with Castopod v1.3.5, Uberspace 7.15.1

Written by: André Jaenisch <https://jaenis.ch>, Tobias Quathamer <t.quathamer@mailbox.org>