Administration

The admin page

/admin asks for the administrator password (there is no username) and shows the server’s settings:

• its public address, and link or accounts mode;
• password sign-in and sign-up;
• email (SMTP);
• Google and OpenID Connect sign-in;
• Android app links;
• maps and the privacy notice;
• plans and payments, when turned on;
• accounts, which the administrator can find and delete.

Changes apply at once, on every server process that shares the database. Nothing in the app links to /admin: open it by typing the address.

Settings from the environment

Every setting can also be an environment variable in .env. A variable that is set wins: /admin shows its value but marks it as fixed. Leave a variable out to manage that setting from /admin instead. .env.example marks with [admin] which settings /admin can change.

Lost the administrator password

Run:

docker compose exec balnana /balnana reset-admin

It signs everyone out of /admin and prints a new setup code. Open /admin and choose a new password with that code.

Backups

The PostgreSQL database holds everything: groups, expenses, receipts, accounts, the settings made at /admin and the key that signs push notifications. Only your .env lives outside it, so keep a copy of that too. Back the database up regularly:

docker compose exec -T db pg_dump -U balnana -Fc balnana > balnana.dump

To bring a copy back, on this server or on a new one set up with the same .env:

docker compose stop balnana
docker compose exec -T db pg_restore -U balnana -d balnana --clean --if-exists --no-owner < balnana.dump
docker compose up -d

Caution

A backup holds everyone’s data and password hashes, so keep it as private as the server. If the push key is lost, phones get no notifications until they subscribe again.

Running more than one server

Run one. Several servers can share a database, but each keeps its own count of requests, password guesses, tries at claiming a payment and live connections, so with N servers those limits are N times what is set.