Installing Jellyfin

As usual, I've come to appreciate the Docker route a little more. The instruction list for Docker installation is detailed in the official Jellyfin installation page, and reproduced here:

docker pull jellyfin/jellyfin
mkdir -p /srv/jellyfin/config
mkdir -p /srv/jellyfin/cache
docker run -d -v /srv/jellyfin/config:/config -v /srv/jellyfin/cache:/cache -v /media:/media --net=host jellyfin/jellyfin:latest

A quick refresher on the Docker command:

-d runs the docker command in the background (detached mode)
-v creates a bind mount, i.e. /srv/jellyfin/config on the host machine is mounted in the Jellyfin container at /config
- The /media bind mount is required to expose media files on the host system. Ensure that read access is available for the docker user.
- External servers can be mounted on the filesystem by editing the /etc/fstab file.
--net=host uses the host network for the container, i.e. the Jellyfin container exposes port 8096 for HTTP traffic on the host machine directly.

Quick refresher for FSTAB mount

To mount an external webdav folder, add to /etc/fstab, in this case for QNAP:

//[LOCAL_IP]/homes/[USER_FOLDER] /media/[HOST_FOLDER] cifs credentials=/home/[USER]/.credentials,uid=33,gid=33,iocharset=utf8,sec=ntlmssp,vers=3.0 0 0

Noting that the credentials need to be stored at /home/[USER]/.credentials in the format:

username=[USERNAME]
password=[PASSWORD]

Create the specified folder /media/[HOST_FOLDER] using mkdir, then reload the fstab file with sudo mount -a.

Next is the configuration itself, by accessing the web GUI at http://LOCAL_IP:8096.

Cannot access the web GUI?

Check if the port is exposed on your firewall.
- If using UFW, sudo ufw allow 8096/tcp and sudo ufw reload will pretty much do the trick.
Check if the port is exposed in the first place on the local machine:
- Check if container is running: docker ps
- Check if port is exposed: netstat -pnltu | grep -i "8096"
- Retrieve the web GUI page: wget 127.0.0.1:8096