Collaboration Service available since version 4.2.17 On-Premises

Install instructions

To enable collaborative editing in your on-premises builder installation you need to install collaboration service (more information).

Requirements

• Linux OS with x86_64 CPU architecture
• Must be installed to the same server as builder installation
• root access to servers SSH

Collect information

Login to server where builder is installed through SSH as root.
Choose directory to install to (make sure this directory is not exposed to the internet), (for this example we will use /var/www/builder-collab).
Choose port for collaboration service (make sure it's not used for something else) (for this example we will use 8033).
Note builder installation user and group (for this example we will use www-data for both user and group).
Note builder installation host name (for this example we will use my-builder.com).
Note builder installation path (for this example we will use /var/www/builder).
Note builder installation database configuration (for this example we will use host: localhost, user: builder, password: secret-db-password, database: builder).

Prepare files

• Create that directory;
• download service executable;
• make sure it's named builder-collab-linux and has owner execute permission;
• create configuration file config.json;
• set user and group for all the files in this directory and directory it self (use the same user and group that builder installation is using);

These steps can be done by running these commands:
bashmkdir /var/www/builder-collab cd /var/www/builder-collab wget https://update.site.pro/assets/installer/builder-collab/builder-collab-linux -O /var/www/builder-collab/builder-collab-linux chmod u+x /var/www/builder-collab/builder-collab-linux echo '{}' > /var/www/builder-collab/config.json chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/builder-collab

Configure

Edit config.json file and set configuration in JSON format.
If your builder uses HTTPS then you will also need to configure certificate/private key pair otherwise you can skip those properties.
In this example we will assume that builder uses HTTPS, since service uses the same host name as builder we will use the same certificate/private key as builder installation. Certificate bundle and private key files must be in PEM format, certificate bundle file must be a concatenation of certificate and other intermediate certificates (if there are any) (in this example certificate bundle is saved to file /var/www/builder-collab/cert-bundle.pem and private key to file /var/www/builder-collab/private-key.pem). In configuration paths to certificate bundle and private key must be absolute. Also make sure that those files are readable by builder user and group configuration.

In our example configuration will look like this:
json{ "host": "my-builder.com", "port": 8033, "user": "www-data", "group": "www-data", "certBundlePath": "/var/www/builder-collab/cert-bundle.pem", "privateKeyPath": "/var/www/builder-collab/private-key.pem", "builderPath": "/var/www/builder", "db": [ { "id": "local", "driver": "mysql", "host": "localhost", "user": "builder", "password": "secret-db-password", "database": "builder" } ] }

Setup system service

While you can just run service executable /var/www/builder-collab/builder-collab-linux run (and stop it by clicking Ctrl+c), it's inconvenient, since if you restart a server you will also need to remember to go and run this executable. It would be more convenient if this happened automatically and for this we will need to setup it to run as system service.

Using systemd

If your server uses systemd, rsyslog and logrotate then system service can be setup in automatically by running command:
bash/var/www/builder-collab/builder-collab-linux register this command will set it up as systemd service (service name will be sitepro-builder-collab), enable that service and start it. It will also setup logging through syslog and log rotation through logrotate.
To later stop/start/restart or get status of this service you can use standard systemd commands:
bash# to stop service run systemctl stop sitepro-builder-collab # to start service run systemctl start sitepro-builder-collab # to restart service run systemctl restart sitepro-builder-collab # to get status of the service run systemctl status sitepro-builder-collab

Using something else

If your server don't use systemd then you will have to figure out how to configure your specific system on your own.

Configure builder

For your builder installation to know where to find this collaboration service, you will need to change your builder configuration file.
In this example builder configuration file is located in /var/www/builder/config.json.
For this you will have to set option collaboration in builder configuration.
In this example this option will look like this:
json"collaboration": { "ws": "wss://my-builder.com:8033" } the ws field of the option collaboration must have a string value that starts with ws:// (or wss:// if builder installation uses HTTPS) followed by host name (in this example my-builder.com) colon : and port (in this example 8033).

Setup automated update

Service has automated update function, this function can be run by this command:

bash/var/www/builder-collab/builder-collab-linux update this command will check for updates and if there is new version it will try to download it and restart the service.
If you don't want for service to be automatically restarted (for example when you are not using systemd) then you can alternatively run command:

bash/var/www/builder-collab/builder-collab-linux update-no-restart You can (and should) also setup CRON job to run this command regularly (ex. once a day), so that it could update it self whenever new version becomes available.

Usage after installation

If the installation of the collaboration service went successfully, then it can be checked like this:

• Open the builder for any website from the hosting panel (note: it is not going to work from public demo builder mode);
• Locate the new button "Share access" in the builder top toolbar and click it;
• Activate option "Enable link to share access for everyone" to let other clients join that builder project by the appeared link below;
• Copy the appeared link below and open it in a new tab (it can be the same browser);
• Now the collaboration mode is established between these two sessions, and you can see reflections of all changes in both places, which are being made in all opened sessions for that project.