GETTING STARTED
Local and multi-server modes
Whether DockBoard runs your containers itself or drives a fleet of remote servers through an agent.
DockBoard runs in one of two modes, set in Settings → Infrastructure. The mode decides where your containers actually run — and nothing else about the product changes with it.
| Mode | What it does | When to use it |
|---|---|---|
| Local | Everything runs on this single server. The Servers page is hidden. | One server, one set of projects — the simplest possible setup. |
| Multi-server | This server plus any number of others, each connected through the DockBoard agent. A project can be placed on any registered server. | Several servers, several regions, or workloads you want kept apart. |
Switching between modes
- Local → Multi-server
- Settings → Infrastructure → Multi-server → confirm. You land on the Servers page to register your first remote machine.
- Multi-server → Local
- Same path. Applications already running on remote servers keep running — they simply disappear from the dashboard until you switch back.
Nothing is deleted when you switch to Local. If you want those applications gone, or moved onto this server, do it before switching — see moving a project.
Which one do you want?
Start Local. It is one machine to reason about, one place where the logs are, and one firewall to get right. Move to multi-server when you have an actual second server — because the second machine is in another region, because a noisy workload deserves its own hardware, or because you want a cluster.
The switch is not a one-way door and it is not a migration: your projects are untouched by it.
What stays per-server
- A project lives on one server. Its applications and databases are placed together, so they share a private network — see service networking.
- The project network is one host’s bridge. To spread a single application across machines you need a cluster, which gives it a real overlay network.
- Domains, certificates and the reverse proxy are configured per server, and DockBoard regenerates them whenever a project moves.