Portainer Templates logo

Portainer Templates

Docker Compose maker Docker Compose maker

Stack

Tools

DCM (Docker Compose Maker) is a simple yet powerful tool that helps you create docker-compose.yaml files for your self-hosted applications.

Image details

Architecture: amd64, arm64, arm/v7
Image size: 62 MB
User: ajnart

Source details

Repo: ajnart/dcm
Stars: 1k
Forks: 54
Language: TypeScript
License: AGPL-3.0
Latest: v1 · 10 months ago
Updated: 3 months ago
Website: compose.ajnart.dev/

Configuration

Type
Compose
Platform
linux
Image
ghcr.io/ajnart/dcm
Ports
7576:7576
Restart
unless-stopped
Source
Repo

Template by xneo1·Source

Standalone Install

Select an install method, to see config/commands for deploying Docker Compose maker

Installation method

Install on Portainer

Import all app templates into your Portainer instance, for easy 1-click deploys

  1. Ensure both Docker and Portainer are installed, and up-to-date
  2. Log into your Portainer web UI
  3. Under Settings → App Templates, paste the below URL
  4. Head to Home → App Templates, and the list of apps will show up
  5. Select Docker Compose maker, fill in any config options, and hit Deploy

Template Import URL

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Lissy93/portainer-templates/main/templates.json
Show Me demo
Original stackfile

The compose file this template deploys, straight from its repo:

services:
  dcm:
    image: ghcr.io/ajnart/dcm
    container_name: dcm
    ports:
      - "7576:7576"
    restart: unless-stopped

Or deploy it directly from the source:

git clone https://github.com/xneo1/portainer_templates
cd portainer_templates
docker compose -f Template/Stack/dockercomposemaker.yml up -d

More install options in our documentation, or see ajnart/dcm for app-specific guidance.

DCM Logo

DCM - Docker Compose Maker


CI Status Docker Image 


<strong>Live Demo 🚀</strong>
• 
<strong>Install 💻</strong>
 • 
<strong>Contribute 🤝</strong>
 • 
<strong>Supported Tools 📦</strong>
 • 
<strong>Screenshots 📸</strong>

📋 About

!NOTE 🌟 Community-Driven Project: DCM started as a simple tool but aims to become the go-to resource for Docker Compose configurations, powered by the community. We believe everyone has their favorite self-hosted tools, and we'd love for you to share yours! Whether you're using a popular application or a hidden gem, your contribution helps others discover and easily deploy great software.

DCM (Docker Compose Maker) is a simple yet powerful tool that helps you create docker-compose.yaml files for your self-hosted applications. Select from a curated list of popular containers and generate a ready-to-use configuration file with just a few clicks.
No more copy-pasting from documentation or trying to remember the correct configuration options - this tool makes it easy to set up your Docker environment.
!TIP Most containers come pre-configured with best practices and sensible defaults, saving you hours of documentation reading and configuration tweaking.

💡 Share Your Stack: Using a great tool that's not listed here? We'd love to include it! Check out our contribution guide to help others discover and use your favorite containers.

🔧 How to Use DCM

Using Docker Compose Maker is simple and intuitive:
  1. Select containers - Browse the curated list of self-hosted applications and click to select the ones you want to include
  2. Use templates - Choose from predefined templates in the Template Gallery for common stacks like media servers
  3. Configure settings - Adjust environment variables, paths, and other common settings
  4. Generate your configuration - Click "Copy Compose" to view and customize your docker-compose.yaml
  5. Deploy your stack - Use one of the following methods to deploy your containers:

!IMPORTANT All containers are configured to use environment variables like ${PUID}, ${PGID}, and ${TZ}. Make sure to set these in your deployment to avoid permission issues.

Deployment Options

Once you have your docker-compose configuration, you have several ways to deploy it:

Copy & Paste

Simply copy the generated docker-compose.yaml and .env content, save them locally, and run docker-compose up -d to start your containers.

Download Files

Download the generated docker-compose.yaml and .env files directly from the interface, then use them with your preferred Docker management tool.
!NOTE The downloaded .env file contains all the environment variables referenced in your docker-compose.yaml. Keep both files in the same directory when deploying.

Portainer Stacks

If you're already using Portainer to manage your Docker environment, you can easily deploy your configuration as a stack:
  1. Navigate to your Portainer dashboard and select Stacks from the sidebar
  2. Click Add stack
  3. Give your stack a name
  4. Select Web editor and paste the generated docker-compose content
  5. (Optional) Add the environment variables from the .env file
  6. Click Deploy the stack

!CAUTION When using Portainer Stacks, you'll need to manually add the environment variables or upload the .env file, as Portainer doesn't automatically read the .env file in all configurations.

Using Portainer provides a user-friendly web interface to manage, update, and monitor your containers without needing command-line tools.

Other Docker Management Tools

The generated compose file works with any tool that supports docker-compose syntax, such as Docker Desktop, Rancher, Yacht, or command-line tools.

🚀 Quick Start

If you want to try DCM for yourself, there are several ways to get started:

🌐 Use the Online Version

Visit compose.ajnart.dev to use the tool immediately without installation.
!NOTE The online version includes analytics for usage tracking, while the self-hosted version does not.

🐳 Run with Docker

Run with a single command:
docker run -p 7576:7576 --name dcm --rm ghcr.io/ajnart/dcm

Then visit http://localhost:7576 in your browser.
The Docker image is available for multiple platforms:
  • linux/amd64
  • linux/arm64
  • linux/arm/v7

📦 Using Docker Compose

Create a docker-compose.yaml file:
services:
  dcm:
    image: ghcr.io/ajnart/dcm
    container_name: dcm
    ports:
      - "7576:7576"
    restart: unless-stopped

Then run:
docker-compose up -d

🛠️ Build from Source

  1. Clone the repository:
git clone https://github.com/ajnart/dcm.git
cd dcm

  1. Install dependencies:

First install Bun if you haven't already, then run: 
bun install

!WARNING Using npm instead of Bun may result in longer installation times and potential compatibility issues. We strongly recommend using Bun for development.

  1. Build and start:
bun run build
bun start

🧰 Supported Tools

DCM includes configuration for many popular self-hosted applications, including:
📺 Media Management: - Media Servers: Jellyfin, Plex, Emby - Media Automation: Sonarr, Radarr, Lidarr, Readarr, Prowlarr, Bazarr, Whisparr - Media Requests: Jellyseerr, Overseerr, Doplarr, Requestrr
🔍 Dashboards & Management: - Dashboards: Homarr, Heimdall - Container Management: Portainer - Media Analytics: Tautulli
📥 Download Management: - Torrent: qBittorrent - Usenet: NZBGet, NZBHydra 2 - Indexers: Jackett, Prowlarr
🗄️ Databases: - SQL: MariaDB, MySQL, PostgreSQL - NoSQL: MongoDB, Redis
📊 Monitoring & Automation: - Monitoring: Grafana, Prometheus - Updates: Watchtower - Home Automation: Home Assistant
🔐 Security: Vaultwarden
💾 Storage & Files: Nextcloud
Each tool includes a detailed description, GitHub star count, and pre-configured docker-compose settings.

🧪 Testing

DCM uses Bun for testing. To run the tests:
# Run all tests
bun test

# Run Docker Compose validation tests
bun test:compose

# Run container schema validation tests
bun test:containers

🔄 Template Gallery

DCM includes a Template Gallery that allows you to quickly add predefined stacks of containers based on common use cases:
  • Media Server Stacks: Complete media server setups with Jellyfin/Plex and related tools
  • Development Environments: Web development stacks with databases and web servers
  • Monitoring Solutions: Grafana, Prometheus, and other monitoring tools
  • Database Clusters: Various database engines with management tools
  • Security Tools: Password managers and security-related containers
  • And more!: Smart home hubs, personal cloud solutions, and other useful templates

To use the Template Gallery:
  1. Click the "Template Gallery" button at the top of the main page
  2. Browse or search for templates that match your needs
  3. Click "Use Template" to add all containers from that template to your selection
  4. Return to the main page to customize your selected containers

You can combine multiple templates to create your perfect self-hosted environment!

🖼️ Screenshots

User Interface

UI Screenshot

Generated docker compose file

Generated docker-compose file

🤝 Contributing

We welcome contributions to DCM! Whether you want to add new container definitions, improve documentation, or fix bugs, your help is appreciated.
Please check our CONTRIBUTING.md guide for detailed instructions on:
  • How to add new container definitions
  • Code style guidelines
  • Testing requirements
  • Pull request process

The easiest way to contribute is by adding new container definitions to our growing collection!

📜 License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

💖 Support

If you find this tool useful, consider supporting the project by:
  • ⭐ Starring the repository on GitHub
  • 🐦 Sharing it on social media
  • ☕ Buying me a coffee

📞 Contact

Made with ❤️ by ajnart

Serve Docker Compose maker on your own domain behind Caddy, Nginx or Traefik. Fill in your domain and copy the result. It's a starting point, some apps need their own base URL or extra headers set too.

Proxying docker-compose-maker.example.com to http://dcm:7576

Add this to your Caddyfile

docker-compose-maker.example.com {
	reverse_proxy http://dcm:7576
}

Check the logs first

Nine times out of ten the logs tell you exactly what went wrong.

  • In Portainer, go to Containers, click the container, then Logs. Or run docker logs <container>
  • Exit codes help too: 137 means killed, usually out of memory. 126 or 127 means the command inside the image is broken.

Port already in use

If deployment fails with "Bind for 0.0.0.0:7576 failed: port is already allocated", something else on your server is using that port.

  • Find what's using it: sudo ss -tlnp | grep :7576
  • Stop the other service, or pick a different host port. In 7576:7576 only the left number is yours to change, the right one belongs to the app.

Running but the page won't load

The container is up but nothing appears in your browser.

  • Use your server's real IP: http://your-server-ip:7576. The 0.0.0.0 link Portainer shows isn't a real address.
  • Give it a minute after first deploy, dcm can take a while to initialise.
  • Make sure your firewall allows the port, e.g. sudo ufw allow 7576

Image won't pull

Test the pull directly on the host: docker pull ghcr.io/ajnart/dcm

  • "manifest unknown" means the tag no longer exists. This template uses latest, so try pinning a specific version instead.
  • "toomanyrequests" is the Docker Hub rate limit. Log in with docker login to raise it.
  • "no space left on device" means a full disk. Reclaim space with docker system prune

"exec format error"

This means the image was built for a different CPU architecture than your server.

  • This image supports: amd64, arm64, arm/v7
  • Check yours with uname -m: x86_64 is amd64, aarch64 is arm64. Raspberry Pi and other ARM boards are the usual culprits.

Container keeps restarting

The unless-stopped restart policy relaunches the app after every crash, so the real error can scroll past.

  • Check the logs right after a restart, the last few lines before it died are the useful ones.
  • Get the exit code with docker inspect <container> --format '{{.State.ExitCode}}'
  • Still stuck? Redeploy once with the restart policy set to no so the failure stays visible.

Stack won't deploy

Compose stacks fail fast on small mistakes, and Portainer shows the reason just above the editor.

  • YAML only accepts spaces for indentation, a single tab breaks the whole file.

Raise an issue

Found something which isn't working as it should? Here's how to report it.

A Compose stack

Docker Compose maker is a Compose stack, a set of containers defined in one file and brought up together by Portainer, then started and stopped as a single app.

The app image

An image is the app packed up ready to go, everything Docker Compose maker needs bundled into one download. This template pulls ghcr.io/ajnart/dcm, which Docker fetches once (about 62 MB) and then starts your own copy from.

Where the image comes from

Docker pulls its images from registries, public libraries of ready-built apps. Docker Compose maker's comes from the GitHub Container Registry, published by ajnart.

Version tags

The bit after the colon in the image name is the version tag. Here it's latest, which always points at the newest build, so a redeploy can bump you to a newer release without you asking. Pin a specific tag if you would rather stay on one version.

Which machines it runs on

Every image is built for particular CPU types. This one ships for amd64, arm64, arm/v7, so it runs on both regular x86 servers and ARM boards like a Raspberry Pi.

Ports

A port is the door the app answers on. A mapping like 7576:7576 means it's reachable on port 7576 of your server, where the left number is yours to change and the right one belongs to the app. It opens:

  • 7576:7576

No stored data

This template doesn't mount any storage, so whatever Docker Compose maker writes stays inside the container and is wiped if it's recreated or updated. That's fine for something stateless, but add a volume before trusting it with anything you want to keep.

Restart policy

The restart policy here is unless-stopped, so Docker restarts Docker Compose maker after a crash or reboot, but leaves it off when you stop it on purpose. You can change this on the deploy screen. The choices are no (never restart), on-failure (only after a crash), unless-stopped (restart unless you stop it), and always (bring it back no matter what).

Networking

Nothing custom is set, so Docker Compose maker sits on Docker's default bridge network: its own private space that reaches the outside world only through the ports it publishes.

Container name

Once it's deployed, Portainer names the container dcm. That's what you'll spot in the containers list and use in commands like docker logs dcm.

Platform

The platform is linux, the kind of system the container is built to run on. Docker and Portainer handle this on a normal Linux server.

Open source license

Docker Compose maker is open source, released under the AGPL-3.0 license. In plain terms the code is out in the open, so you're free to run it and change it to fit what you need.

Portainer app templates

Zooming out, this whole page comes from a Portainer app template: a short recipe telling Portainer how to set Docker Compose maker up. Add the template list to Portainer once, then deploying Docker Compose maker is a click rather than a wall of config.