Self-Hosted Dify: Perfect AI App Builder

Welcome to the guide on setting up and using Dify, a powerful open-source platform for building AI applications. This document will walk you through the process of self-hosting Dify on a Google Cloud VM using Docker and Docker Compose, and how to trigger workflows using APIs.

Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yH2CjCnWz1I

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Prerequisites
• Installation Steps
  • Install Required Packages
  • Add Docker's Official GPG Key
  • Set Up the Stable Repository
  • Update Package Index
  • Install Docker
  • Install Nginx and Set Up SSL
  • Install Dify and Reconfigure Nginx
• Upgrading Dify
• Accessing Dify
• Triggering Workflows via API

Introduction

Dify is an open-source platform designed to make building large language model (LLM) applications easy and accessible. With its intuitive interface and powerful features, Dify allows developers and non-technical users alike to create AI applications without writing complex code.

Prerequisites

Before starting, ensure you have:

• A virtual machine (VM) instance running Debian or Ubuntu
• Access to your VM via SSH
• A domain name pointing to your server's public IP

Installation Steps

Install Required Packages

Update your package list and install the necessary packages:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install apt-transport-https ca-certificates curl software-properties-common

Add Docker's Official GPG Key

Add Docker's official GPG key to your system:

curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/debian/gpg | sudo apt-key add -

Set Up the Stable Repository

Add the Docker repository to your package sources. Replace debian with ubuntu if you're using Ubuntu:

echo "deb [arch=amd64] https://download.docker.com/linux/debian $(lsb_release -cs) stable" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/docker.list > /dev/null

For Ubuntu, replace debian with ubuntu.

Update your package index and install Docker:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io

Install Nginx and Set Up SSL

First, install Nginx:

sudo apt-get install nginx

After installation, visit your server's public IP address in a browser to see the Nginx welcome page.

Next, install Certbot for SSL certificate management:

sudo apt install certbot python3-certbot-nginx

Ensure you have a domain name with a DNS record pointing to your server's public IP. Then, run Certbot to obtain and install the SSL certificate:

sudo certbot --nginx

Provide your email, agree to the terms, and specify your domain(s). After completion, your site should be accessible via HTTPS with a valid SSL certificate.

Install Dify and Reconfigure Nginx

Clone the Dify repository:

git clone https://github.com/langgenius/dify.git

Navigate to the Dify directory and set up the environment:

cd dify/docker
cp .env.example .env

Modify the .env file to change the Nginx ports:

# Original ports
# EXPOSE_NGINX_PORT=80
# EXPOSE_NGINX_SSL_PORT=443

# New ports
EXPOSE_NGINX_PORT=8080
EXPOSE_NGINX_SSL_PORT=8443

Reconfigure Nginx to forward traffic to Dify. First, back up the existing configuration:

cd /etc/nginx/sites-available
sudo cp default default.bkp

Open the default file and comment out the following sections:

root /var/www/html;
index index.html index.htm index.nginx-debian.html;
location / {
     try_files $uri $uri/ =404;
}

Why do we need to comment these? root /var/www/html;: This directive sets the root directory from which Nginx will serve files. When active, it tells Nginx to look for files in /var/www/html to serve in response to requests.

index index.html index.htm index.nginx-debian.html;: This specifies the default file to serve if a directory is requested. For example, if someone visits http://your_domain.com/, Nginx will look for an index.html or similar file in the root directory specified above.

location / { try_files $uri $uri/ =404; }: This block instructs Nginx to attempt to serve a file corresponding to the requested URI. If no such file is found, it tries to serve a directory or returns a 404 error if neither is available.

Add a new location block to forward traffic to Dify:

location / {
    proxy_pass http://localhost:8080;
    proxy_set_header Host $host;
    proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
    proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
    proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
    proxy_redirect off;
    proxy_buffering off;
    proxy_request_buffering off;
    client_max_body_size 0;
}

Check the Nginx configuration for errors:

sudo nginx -t

If successful, restart Nginx:

sudo systemctl restart nginx

If you visit your site and see a "bad gateway" error, this is expected until Dify is running.

Get Dify Running

From the dify/docker directory, run:

cd ~/dify/docker
docker compose up -d

Check Deployment Results

Verify that all containers are running successfully:

docker compose ps

This includes 3 core services: api / worker / web, and 6 dependent components: weaviate / db / redis / nginx / ssrf_proxy / sandbox .

NAME                  IMAGE                              COMMAND                   SERVICE      CREATED              STATUS                        PORTS
docker-api-1          langgenius/dify-api:0.6.13         "/bin/bash /entrypoi…"   api          About a minute ago   Up About a minute             5001/tcp
docker-db-1           postgres:15-alpine                 "docker-entrypoint.s…"   db           About a minute ago   Up About a minute (healthy)   5432/tcp
docker-nginx-1        nginx:latest                       "sh -c 'cp /docker-e…"   nginx        About a minute ago   Up About a minute             0.0.0.0:80->80/tcp, :::80->80/tcp, 0.0.0.0:443->443/tcp, :::443->443/tcp
docker-redis-1        redis:6-alpine                     "docker-entrypoint.s…"   redis        About a minute ago   Up About a minute (healthy)   6379/tcp
docker-sandbox-1      langgenius/dify-sandbox:0.2.1      "/main"                   sandbox      About a minute ago   Up About a minute             
docker-ssrf_proxy-1   ubuntu/squid:latest                "sh -c 'cp /docker-e…"   ssrf_proxy   About a minute ago   Up About a minute             3128/tcp
docker-weaviate-1     semitechnologies/weaviate:1.19.0   "/bin/weaviate --hos…"   weaviate     About a minute ago   Up About a minute             
docker-web-1          langgenius/dify-web:0.6.13         "/bin/sh ./entrypoin…"   web          About a minute ago   Up About a minute             3000/tcp
docker-worker-1       langgenius/dify-api:0.6.13         "/bin/bash /entrypoi…"   worker       About a minute ago   Up About a minute             5001/tcp

Accessing Dify

Access Dify by navigating to http:// in your web browser.

Triggering Workflows via API

Once Dify is set up, you can trigger workflows using the API. Here's an example curl command to trigger a workflow:

curl -X POST 'https://api.dify.ai/v1/workflows/run' \
--header 'Authorization: Bearer <YOUR_AUTH_TOKEN>' \
--header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
--data-raw '{
    "inputs": {},
    "response_mode": "streaming",
    "user": "abc-123"
}'

Upgrading Dify

Enter the docker directory of the dify source code and execute the following commands:

cd dify/docker
docker compose down
git pull origin main
docker compose pull
docker compose up -d

Conclusion

Congratulations! You've successfully set up Dify on your Google Cloud VM and learned how to trigger workflows using the API. Enjoy building powerful AI applications with Dify!