Installing Ubuntu, Docker and Portainer
With Ubuntu, there seem to be a lot of people that stick with Ubuntu 22.04 LTS server edition and few videos praising the newer Ubuntu 24.04 LTS server edition. I didn't see any real reason to use the older 22.04, so I went for the 24.04.
The two video guides I went for, that were easy to follow, are from Britec09 and TechHut as linked below:
This Mini PC is Perfect Home Server for Beginners
Portainer Setup is EASY - Installing on a Mini PC
This is what I did:
- From Windows, I downloaded the Ubuntu Server ISO.
- Downloaded Balena Etcher and flashed the ISO image on to a USB flash drive. I think I used a 32GB USB flash drive, but I could have got away with a 4GB USB flash drive. I could have also used Rufus instead of Balena Etcher.
- I then connected my minipc to the TV using a spare HDMI cable. I connected a mouse and keyboard and a LAN ethernet cable.
- Connected the flashed USB stick to the minipc and booted to the BIOS (repeatedly hitting one of the 'F' buttons). I then changed the boot order so the USB flash drive was first.
- I installed the full blown Ubuntu Server as per the Britec09 video linked above.
- On my Router, I fixed the IP address of the minipc (I could identify it quite easily and simply fixed it the same way I fixed both the Synology NAS).
- I now disconnected the USB flash drive (I changed the boot order priority back to the hard disk, rather than the USB), the HDMI cable, keyboard and mouse. The only connection was/is the LAN ethernet cable (and power cable, of course).
- On my Windows PC, I opened a Powershell terminal and SSH'ed into the minipc (ssh username@<ip_address>).
- With the SSH session logged in, the next step was to install the Docker Engine, using the video guide from Britec09 and using the commands from the link below:
Install Docker Engine on Ubuntu
- Finally I installed Portainer CE.
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