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Beginner help
I'm trying to set up a gemini capsule on a raspberry pi. I have never hosted any kind of website before, and gemini seemed like a simple place to start.
I have a working agate server that I can access via localhost, and I purchased domain name, but I have no idea how to connect the two safely. I think I need to set up port-forwarding and a way to keep my ip address static? All the basic guides I can find online assume http. Could anyone offer a hand, point me to a guide, or a place to ask for help? Thanks!
2 years ago
The good news is it works, the bad news is I don't know why! Thanks again for all the help!
My best guess is that wiping the pi solved something. Or it's that I can't access the page from within my own network--but I think I checked that trap before.
Still not sure how to set up dynamic dns---I gave up on ddclient and am trying ddupdate with cloudflare. Once I work that out, I'll send kensanta my notes. · 2 years ago
If you can hit the server on your local network using its local IP address, then the problem's more likely your router settings rather than your Raspberry Pi configuration.
Also, I'm assuming there's only one router between you and the outside world. If there are more routers then naturally you'll have to set up port forwarding on each of them as well. · 2 years ago
Thanks for the tips!
My current theory is that it has to do with the router as visiting by ip address doesn't have any effect, and I also can't set up an nginx server on the raspberry pi that I can acccess from my domain name, something that was easy to do on the droplet.
I plan to wipe the pi and try again, in case my experiments made a mess, and if that doesn't work I'll grimly call Spectrum. · 2 years ago
Yeah, there's probably some setting in your router that will let you open up port 1965 and forward it. I don't have any experience with Spectrum routers, but I'd be surprised/dismayed if there wasn't some way to do that.
To distinguish between problems with your router and problems with your DNS settings, you can try visiting your gemsite by IP address instead of by domain name. E.g., gemini://95.179.156.69 versus gemini://lyk.so · 2 years ago
One thing to watch out for is whether your ISP has you behind their own router. One way to check is to see if your WAN IP address reported in your router settings matches up with the IP that you see if you use some online service to find your public IP. · 2 years ago
Thanks lysko and kensanta! I have it working from a digital ocean droplet, so I think this means something was wrong with the port forwarding(?) or the dynamic dns(?)
I can get online port forwarding checks to see an open port 80, but not 1965. Is there something special about that port that a spectrum router doesn't like? I also really struggled with whether or in what way I need ddclient to talk to cloudflare---it was at ddclient that I realised I was lost, so any pointers there would be welcome. · 2 years ago
… (cont) your notes by mail at alex@alexschroeder.ch and I'll post something to gemini://transjovian.org/gemini/page/System%20Administration · 2 years ago
If you get it up and running, I'd be interested in hosting a post with a how to for people doing it for the first time. In case you want to send me · 2 years ago
Connecting the domain name to your server should be the same as it'd be for setting up a website. Just set up an "A" record on the domain pointing to your server's IP address. If you're hosting off a residential connection, yeah, you'll want either a static IP address or to get set up with a "dynamic DNS" service, and you'll want to set up port forwarding on your router so that anything hitting port 1965 gets forwarded to your server.
Hope that's enough info to get you unstuck. It's really the same as hosting a website off your home connection, but with a Gemini server like Agate and port 1965 instead of, say, nginx and port 80. · 2 years ago