openBalena Getting Started Guide

This guide will walk you through the steps of deploying an openBalena server, that together with the balena CLI, will enable you to create and manage a fleet of devices running on your own infrastructure, on premises or in the cloud. The openBalena servers must be reachable by the devices, which is easiest to achieve with cloud providers like AWS, Google Cloud, Digital Ocean and others.

This guide assumes a setup with two separate machines:

A server, running Linux with at least 2GB of memory. These instructions were tested with Ubuntu 20.04, 22.04 and 24.04 x64 servers. The server must have a working installation of Docker Engine and you must have root permissions.
A local machine, running Linux, Windows or macOS where the balena CLI runs (as a client to the openBalena server). The local machine must also have a working installation of Docker so that application images can be built and deployed to your device. It is also possible to use balenaEngine on a balenaOS device instead of Docker.

Additionally, a device type and compatible flash media supported by balenaOS (e.g. Raspberry Pi) are required to complete the provisioning demo. Ensure the correct power supply is available to power this device.

Domain Configuration

The following DNS records must be configured to point to the openBalena server prior to configuration:

api.mydomain.com
ca.mydomain.com
cloudlink.mydomain.com
logs.mydomain.com
ocsp.mydomain.com
registry2.mydomain.com
s3.mydomain.com
tunnel.mydomain.com

Alternatively you may consider adding a single wildcard DNS record *.mydomain.com.

Check with your Internet domain name registrar for instructions on how to obtain a domain name and configure records.

Install openBalena on the server

First Change cgroup version to v1 for compatibility with systemd in containers on modern Linux distributions, where cgroups v2 are enabled by default:

source /etc/default/grub
sudo sed -i '/GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX/d' /etc/default/grub
echo GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=$(printf '\"%s systemd.unified_cgroup_hierarchy=0\"\n' "${GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX}") \
  | sudo tee -a /etc/default/grub
sudo update-grub
sudo reboot

Ensure cgroups v2 is disabled

if [ ! -f /sys/fs/cgroup/cgroup.controllers ]; then
    echo "cgroups v2 is disabled"
else
    echo "cgroups v2 is enabled"
fi

Now, install or update essential software:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install -y make openssl git jq

Install Docker Engine

which docker || curl -fsSL https://get.docker.com | sh -

Create a new user with appropriate permissions:

sudo useradd -s /bin/bash -m -G docker,sudo balena
echo 'balena ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL' | sudo tee /etc/sudoers.d/balena

Switch user:
```
sudo su balena
```

Clone the openBalena repository and change directory:

git clone https://github.com/balena-io/open-balena.git ~/open-balena
cd ~/open-balena

Start the server on your domain name:
```
export DNS_TLD=mydomain.com
make up
```
Note down SUPERUSER_EMAIL and SUPERUSER_PASSWORD values to be used later.
Tail the logs of the containers with:
```
docker compose logs -f api
```
Replace api with the name of any one of the services from the composition.
The server can be stopped with:

make down

The server can also be restarted using make restart.

To update openBalena, run:

make update

Test the openBalena server

To confirm that everything is running correctly, try a simple request from the local machine to the server after registering its CA certificate(s) with the host:

make self-signed
make verify

Note, if you've previously stopped the server with make down, run make up again first.

Congratulations! The openBalena server is up and running. The next step is to setup your local machine to use this server, provision a device and deploy a small project.

Install self-signed certificates on the local machine.

The installation of the openBalena server produces a self-signed certificate by default, which must be trusted by all devices communicating with it. This type of configuration is not recommended for production deployments, skip to SSL Configuration instead.

The root CA bundle can be found at .balena/ca-${DNS_TLD}.pem on the server. Follow the steps below for your specific local machine platform after manually copying it across.

Linux:

sudo cp ca.pem /usr/local/share/ca-certificates/
sudo update-ca-certificates
sudo systemctl restart docker

macOS:

sudo security add-trusted-cert -d \
  -r trustRoot \
  -k /Library/Keychains/System.keychain \
  ca.pem

curl http://localhost/engine/restart \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{"openContainerView": true}' \
  --unix-socket ~/Library/Containers/com.docker.docker/Data/backend.sock

Windows:

certutil -addstore -f "ROOT" ca.pem
Stop-Service -Name Docker
Start-Service -Name Docker

SSL Configuration

opeBalena server now uses automatic SSL configuration via ACME DNS-01 challenge¹. Support for the following DNS providers is currently implemented:

Cloudflare
Gandi

Cloudflare

Obtain a Cloudflare API token with write access to your openBalena domain name records:

export ACME_EMAIL=acme@mydomain.com
export CLOUDFLARE_API_TOKEN={{token}}

Gandi

Obtain a Gandi API token with write access to your openBalena domain name records:

export ACME_EMAIL=acme@mydomain.com
export GANDI_API_TOKEN={{token}}

Re-configure and test the server

make auto-pki
make verify

Custom SSL

openBalena server also supports custom/manual TLS configuration. You must supply your own SSL certificate, private key and a full certificate signing chain. A wildcard SSL certificate covering the whole domain is recommended.

After obtaining your certificate, run the following commands on openBalena server:

export HAPROXY_CRT="{{ base64 encoded server certificate }}"
export ROOT_CA="{{ .. intermediate certificates }}"
export HAPROXY_KEY="{{ .. private key }}"

Pipe the plaintext via .. | openssl base64 -A to encode.

Re-configure and test the server:

make pki-custom
make verify

Install the balena CLI on the local machine

Follow the balena CLI installation instructions to install the balena CLI on the local machine.

By default, the CLI targets the balenaCloud servers at balena-cloud.com, and needs to be configured to target the openBalena server instead. Add the following line to the CLI's configuration file, replacing "mydomain.com" with the domain name of the openBalena server:

balenaUrl: 'mydomain.com'

The CLI configuration file can be found at:

On Linux or macOS: ~/.balenarc.yml
On Windows: %UserProfile%\_balenarc.yml

If the file does not already exist, just create it. Alternatively, BALENARC_BALENA_URL environment variable can be set to point to "mydomain.com".

Wrapping up the CLI installation, set an environment variable that points to the root certificate copied previously on the local machine. This step is to ensure the CLI can securely interact with the openBalena server when running self-signed PKI. This step can be skipped if the server is operating with publicly trusted PKI.

Shell	Command
bash	`export NODE_EXTRA_CA_CERTS='/path/to/ca.pem'`
Windows cmd.exe	`set NODE_EXTRA_CA_CERTS=C:\path\to\ca.pem`
Windows PowerShell	`$Env:NODE_EXTRA_CA_CERTS="C:\path\to\ca.pem"`

Deploy an application

The commands below should be run on a terminal on the local machine (where the balena CLI is installed). Ensure that the NODE_EXTRA_CA_CERTS environment variable is set, as discussed above.

Run balena login, select Credentials and use SUPERUSER_EMAIL and SUPERUSER_PASSWORD generated during make up step to login to the openBalena server. At any time, balena whoami command may be used to check which server the CLI is authenticated with.

Create an application

Create a new application with balena fleet create myApp. Select the application's default device type with the interactive prompt. The examples in this guide assume a Raspberry Pi 3.

An application contains devices that share the same architecture (such as ARM or Intel), and also contains code releases that are deployed to the devices. When a device is provisioned, it is added to an application, but can be migrated to another application at any time. There is no limit to the number of applications that can be created or to the number of devices that can be provisioned.

At any time, the server can be queried for all the applications it knows about with the following command:

balena fleets
 Id App name Slug        Device type  Device count Online devices
 ── ──────── ─────────── ──────────── ──────────── ──────────────
 1  myApp    admin/myapp raspberrypi3 0            0

Provision a new device

Once we have an application, it’s time to start provisioning devices. To do this, first download a balenaOS image for your device. For this example we are using a Raspberry Pi 3.

Unzip the downloaded image and use the balena CLI to configure it:

balena os configure --dev --fleet myApp ~/Downloads/raspberrypi3-5.2.8-v16.1.10.img

Flash the configured image to an SD card using Etcher or balena CLI:

sudo balena local flash ~/Downloads/raspberrypi3-5.2.8-v16.1.10.img

Insert the SD card into the device and power it on. The device will register with the openBalena server and after about two minutes will be inspectable:

balena devices
ID UUID    DEVICE NAME DEVICE TYPE  FLEET       STATUS IS ONLINE SUPERVISOR VERSION OS VERSION
1  560dcc2 quiet-rock  raspberrypi3 admin/myapp Idle   true      16.1.10            balenaOS 5.2.8

balena device 560dcc2
== WANDERING RAIN
ID:                    1
DEVICE TYPE:           raspberrypi3
STATUS:                idle
IS ONLINE:             true
IP ADDRESS:            192.168.1.42
MAC ADDRESS:           B8:27:DE:AD:BE:EF
FLEET:                 admin/myapp
LAST SEEN:             1977-08-20T14:29:00.042Z
UUID:                  560dcc24b221c8a264d5bd981284801f
COMMIT:                N/a
SUPERVISOR VERSION:    16.1.10
IS WEB ACCESSIBLE:     false
OS VERSION:            balenaOS 5.2.8
DASHBOARD URL:         https://dashboard.mydomain.com/devices/560dcc24b221c8a264d5bd981284801f/summary
CPU USAGE PERCENT:     2
CPU TEMP C:            39
CPU ID:                00000000335956af
MEMORY USAGE MB:       140
MEMORY TOTAL MB:       971
MEMORY USAGE PERCENT:  14
STORAGE BLOCK DEVICE:  /dev/mmcblk0p6
STORAGE USAGE MB:      76
STORAGE TOTAL MB:      14121
STORAGE USAGE PERCENT: 1

Note, even though the dashboard URL is populated, there is no dashboard service in openBalena.

It's time to deploy code to the device.

Deploy a project

Application release images are built on the local machine using the balena CLI. Ensure the root certificate has been correctly installed on the local machine, as discussed above.

Let's create a trivial project that logs "Idling...". On an empty directory, create a new file named Dockerfile.template with the following contents:

FROM balenalib/%%BALENA_MACHINE_NAME%%-alpine

CMD [ "balena-idle" ]

Then build and deploy the project with:

balena deploy --noparent-check myApp

The project will have been successfully built when a friendly unicorn appears in the terminal:

[Info]    No "docker-compose.yml" file found at "~/open-balena/balena-idle"
[Info]    Creating default composition with source: "~/open-balena/balena-idle"
[Info]    Everything is up to date (use --build to force a rebuild)
[Info]    Creating release...
[Info]    Pushing images to registry...
[Info]    Saving release...
[Success] Deploy succeeded!
[Success] Release: 50be7bdb0ea6819c91a5dd7bcd7635ad

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                            _.-(6'  \
                           (=___._/` \
                                )  \ |
                               /   / |
                              /    > /
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                         \ r=._\        `.
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                                      ||    .'
                                       \\  (
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                                    ,.-' >.'
                                   <.'_.''
                                     <'

This command packages up the local directory, creates a new Docker image from it and pushes it to the openBalena server. In turn, the server will deploy it to all provisioned devices and within a couple of minutes, they will all run the new release. Logs can be viewed with:

balena logs --tail 560dcc2
[Logs]    [2024-05-02T15:59:31.383Z] Supervisor starting
[Logs]    [2024-05-02T15:59:37.552Z] Applying configuration change {"SUPERVISOR_VPN_CONTROL":"true"}
[Logs]    [2024-05-02T15:59:37.599Z] Applied configuration change {"SUPERVISOR_VPN_CONTROL":"true"}
[Logs]    [2024-05-02T15:59:40.331Z] Creating network 'default'
[Logs]    [2024-05-02T16:11:15.331Z] Supervisor starting
[Logs]    [2024-05-02T16:44:08.199Z] Creating volume 'resin-data'
[Logs]    [2024-05-02T16:44:08.572Z] Downloading image 'registry2.mydomain.com/v2/…
…
[Logs]    [2024-05-02T16:44:37.200Z] [main] Idling...
[Logs]    [2024-05-02T16:44:37.200Z] [main] Idling...

Enjoy Balenafying All the Things!

Next steps

Try out local mode, which allows you to build and sync code to your device locally for rapid development.
Develop an application with multiple containers to provide a more modular approach to application management.
Manage your device fleet with the use of configuration and environment variables.
Explore our example projects to give you an idea of more things you can do with balena.
If you find yourself stuck or confused, help is just a click away.
Pin selected devices to selected code releases using sample scripts.
To change the superuser password after setting the credentials, follow this forum post

If DNS validation is not an option, acme.sh or certbot can be used to manually issue a certificate, which can then be set using the custom SSL workflow. ↩

Domain Configuration​

Install openBalena on the server​

Test the openBalena server​

Install self-signed certificates on the local machine.​

Linux:​

macOS:​

Windows:​

SSL Configuration​

Cloudflare​

Gandi​

Re-configure and test the server​

Custom SSL​

Install the balena CLI on the local machine​

Deploy an application​

Login to openBalena​

Create an application​

Provision a new device​

Deploy a project​

Next steps​

Footnotes​