Uptime Kuma

What it's good for#

When you run a handful of apps, you don't want to find out one of them is down because someone in the house complains. Uptime Kuma checks each app every minute, draws you a history of when it was up and how quickly it answered, and can message you when something goes wrong. It's also handy for things that aren't on your server at all, like your router's admin page or a website you care about.

Signing in#

A new Uptime Kuma asks whoever opens it first to create the admin account. So while it installs, LibrePortal keeps it reachable from the server only, makes the account itself, checks the new login works, and only then lets anyone else in.

The account is called admin. Its password is in the Login Details shown when the install finishes; press Welcome on the app's page to see it again. Open Uptime Kuma with the Web Interface button on its page.

Your apps are already being watched#

This is the part LibrePortal adds. As soon as Uptime Kuma is running, it gets a monitor for every app you've installed that has a port to check, and from then on:

• Installing an app adds a monitor for it, as long as Monitor New Apps Automatically is on (it is to start with). Uninstalling one removes it.
• Moving an app to a new port or address updates its monitor in place, so its history is kept.
• Uptime Kuma catches up on its own. If it was stopped while you installed things, it sorts itself out the next time it starts.

Each monitor is named after the app and carries a blue LibrePortal tag, so you can tell them apart from your own. They check the app directly, container to container, rather than through your domain. That makes them a clean answer to "is the app itself up?", and it means they carry on working if your server's address changes.

Choosing which apps it watches#

Everything is managed from Uptime Kuma's Tools tab in LibrePortal.

• Manage Monitors shows a tick list of your installed apps. Untick the ones you don't care about and run it. Apps without a port to check are greyed out.
• Sync Monitors puts everything back in line with that list: it adds monitors that are missing, fixes any whose app has moved, and removes ones for apps you've unticked. Run it if you've deleted a LibrePortal monitor by mistake.

Two settings on the Config tab go with them. Monitor New Apps Automatically decides whether apps you install from now on are added for you. Check Interval (seconds) is how often new monitors check, from every 20 seconds up to once a day; monitors that already exist keep whatever they have.

Getting told when something goes down#

If you run ntfy on the same server, LibrePortal does this part for you. ntfy is offered beside Uptime Kuma under Also install, and whenever it's installed, Uptime Kuma gets a ready-made notification, LibrePortal → ntfy, attached to the monitors LibrePortal made, so an app going down pings the ntfy app on your phone with nothing to set up. Remove ntfy and the notification goes with it.

For any other way of being told, you add it yourself, because only you know where you want it: in Uptime Kuma, open Settings → Notifications, add a channel, and tick it on the monitors you care about. LibrePortal keeps it there.

Uptime Kuma can also publish a status page, a simple public page showing which of your services are up. That's all done inside Uptime Kuma, under Status Pages.

Changing the admin password#

Use the Set Admin Password tool rather than Uptime Kuma's own settings. It changes the password inside Uptime Kuma and in LibrePortal together, so the password LibrePortal shows you stays right, and so does the monitor sync, which signs in as admin to do its work. Leave the box empty to have a strong one made for you. Anyone signed in to Uptime Kuma is signed out when it changes.

If the two ever get out of step (say you changed the password inside Uptime Kuma), the sync notices, puts LibrePortal's password back, and tries again. You can do the same by hand with Repair Admin Login.

Good to know#

• LibrePortal runs the slim edition of Uptime Kuma 2. It's much smaller, but it leaves out the built-in browser that Uptime Kuma's "real browser" monitor type needs, so that one type isn't available.
• Updates are automatic within version 2. A move to a future version 3 will be a deliberate step, because a major version can change the database.
• There's one Uptime Kuma per server. One status board watching everything is the point.
• It runs on your server's timezone from 0.4.7. Installs made with 0.4.6 or earlier run on UTC, because the setting never reached the app. Press Update Configuration on its Config tab, without changing anything, to fix that: it rewrites the app's compose file, which an update leaves alone, and keeps your monitors. It also checks the admin login as an install does, so if LibrePortal can't sign in as admin (two-factor is on, say), Uptime Kuma comes back reachable from the server only. Restart it to open it up again.