Quick Start

The fastest way to try CompassDocs is the one-command Docker installer. It starts the app and a PostgreSQL database together, generates strong random passwords, and prints your admin login.

Prerequisites

• Docker with Docker Compose v2 (the docker compose command). Docker Desktop includes both.

Install

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mattny20/CompassDocs/main/install.sh | bash

This creates a ./compassdocs folder with a docker-compose.yml and a .env, pulls the latest image, and starts everything.

Open http://localhost:3000 to finish setup. (On a remote server, use http://<server-ip>:3000 and allow the port through your firewall, e.g. sudo ufw allow 3000/tcp — see Ports & firewall.)

Want your own domain with HTTPS from the start? Add COMPASSDOCS_TLS=1:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mattny20/CompassDocs/main/install.sh | COMPASSDOCS_TLS=1 bash

This bundles a Caddy reverse proxy on ports 80/443; you enter your domain and pick an HTTPS mode (automatic Let’s Encrypt, or self-signed for internal DNS) right in the setup wizard. See Custom domain & HTTPS.

Note

On first launch CompassDocs creates its own schema and seeds a few example spaces and documents — there are no manual migrations to run.

First-run setup

The first time you open a fresh install, CompassDocs shows a setup wizard where you create your admin account right in the browser — no generated password to look up. The wizard also optionally takes your company name, an Anthropic API key (enables AI answers), your domain + HTTPS mode (on COMPASSDOCS_TLS=1 installs), and — on Enterprise builds — your license key. Everything can also be set later from Settings. Once that’s done you’re signed in, and from Settings → Users you add everyone else.

Provisioning headlessly (CI/automation)? Set COMPASSDOCS_ADMIN_USER and COMPASSDOCS_ADMIN_PASSWORD and the admin is created on first launch instead, skipping the wizard — see Environment variables.

Your dashboard

Signing in lands you on a personal dashboard (redesigned in 1.17.0). At the top, a greeting with the date and the Ask bar run the full width of the page, with Edit dashboard beside the date. Under them, once your workspace tracks services on the Status page, a slim status strip shows how they are doing.

Then come the things waiting on you, which always stay at the top and can’t be hidden: announcements, newsletters, a Needs your attention card listing anything actually waiting on you (change requests to review, read confirmations, content reviews coming due, reader suggestions), and Pick up where you left off with your drafts and recently opened documents.

Below them, everything else is a tile. The left column holds what changed and what people read:

• Latest in your spaces: the eight most recently updated documents, with each one’s type, any Draft tag, its space, who updated it and when, leaving out what Pick up where you left off already shows. Following | Everything switches between the spaces you follow (the ones you subscribed to, plus any an admin subscribed one of your groups to that you haven’t muted) and every space you can read. Following is the default whenever you follow a space. The choice stays in the page’s address, so a reload keeps it, but it isn’t saved: the next visit starts from the default.
• Popular this week: the five documents read most in the last 7 days, among those you can read, with their view counts.
• Spaces: your eight most recently active spaces, in two columns when there is room, each with its document count and last update; the rest are in the sidebar. New space is offered if you can create spaces and manage their members.
• My training: your open training, where Training is licensed.
• Team compliance: for managers, how your direct reports stand on read confirmations, where read confirmations are licensed.

The right column holds the links and people that matter to you:

• Quick links: your pinned links, the ones your admin picked and the ones you use most. See Quick links on the dashboard.
• My team: who you report to, your team and your direct reports, from the directory.
• People this week: new starters, work anniversaries and birthdays, from the directory.

With the Wide or Full page width on a desktop screen the two columns sit side by side; at Normal, and on smaller screens, they stack, the right column’s tiles after the left’s. A tile with nothing for you (no training, nobody reporting to you, nothing read this week) isn’t shown at all, so a brand-new install starts pleasantly empty. Latest in your spaces, Spaces and Quick links always show, with a short note when they are empty.

Edit dashboard shows or hides each section for you alone, the status strip included; nobody else’s dashboard changes. A hidden section isn’t just out of sight: it isn’t loaded at all. The switches for My training and Team compliance appear only where those features are licensed.

Next steps

• Create users and assign roles
• Choose an approval workflow
• Bring your policies together in a handbook
• Brand your workspace (name, logo, timezone, theme)
• Enable AI-powered answers
• Serve it on your own domain with HTTPS
• Set up scheduled backups

Prefer not to use Docker?

You can run CompassDocs directly with Node.js and a PostgreSQL database — see Manual install.