Dasher 🏠

A simple, dark-themed home lab dashboard for managing links to your self-hosted services. This was inspired by my need for a lightweight, customizable dashboard to quickly access my various home lab services. If you need a more feature-rich solution, consider Heimdall or Dashy.

Features

• 🎨 Dark mode UI inspired by GitHub's design
• 📱 Responsive grid layout
• ➕ Add/edit/delete services through the UI
• 🔍 Search and filter services
• 📂 Automatic grouping by categories
• 💾 Persistent storage via JSON file
• 🐳 Docker Compose deployment
• 🔐 Optional basic authentication

Quick Start

Using Docker Compose (Recommended)

Clone the repository and navigate to the project directory:

# Start the dashboard
docker compose up -d

# View logs
docker compose logs -f

# Stop the dashboard
docker compose down

Access the dashboard at http://localhost:3000

Development Mode (optional)

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Start development server
npm run dev

Note: npm install is only needed for local development. Docker builds install dependencies inside the image.

Configuration

Services are stored in data/services.json. The file is automatically created on first run with sample data.

Service Schema

{
  "id": "unique-id",
  "name": "Service Name",
  "url": "http://service.local",
  "category": "Category Name",
  "icon": "🎬",
  "description": "Optional description"
}

Authentication

To enable basic authentication, you can either use environment variables in docker-compose.yml or use a .env file (recommended for keeping secrets out of version control).

Using .env file (Recommended)

1. Copy .env.example to .env:

   cp .env.example .env

2. Edit .env and set your credentials. Important: Escape the $ symbols in your bcrypt hash with backslashes:

   AUTH_ENABLED=true
   AUTH_USERNAME=yourusername
   AUTH_PASSWORD_HASH="\$2b\$10\$your-bcrypt-hash-here"
   SESSION_SECRET=your-random-secret-key

Using docker-compose.yml directly

Alternatively, set these environment variables directly in docker-compose.yml:

environment:
  - AUTH_ENABLED=true
  - AUTH_USERNAME=yourusername
  - AUTH_PASSWORD_HASH=$2a$10$your-bcrypt-hash-here
  - SESSION_SECRET=your-random-secret-key

Generate a bcrypt hash for your password:

node -e "console.log(require('bcryptjs').hashSync('yourpassword', 10))"

If you don’t have Node installed locally, use Docker instead:

docker run --rm node:18-alpine sh -lc "npm -s i bcryptjs --prefix /tmp/bc >/dev/null 2>&1 && NODE_PATH=/tmp/bc/node_modules node -e 'console.log(require(\"bcryptjs\").hashSync(\"yourpassword\", 10))'"

Default credentials when AUTH_ENABLED=true without custom hash: admin / admin

Usage

1. Add a Service: Click the "+ Add Service" button in the top right
   1. A modal will appear where you can enter service details and the category
2. Edit a Service: Click the ✏️ icon on any service card
3. Delete a Service: Click the 🗑️ icon on any service card
4. Search: Use the search bar to filter services by name, category, or description
5. Quick Access: Click any service card to open the service in a new tab

Customization

Icons

You can use:

• Emojis: 🎬, ☁️, 📊
• Image URLs: https://example.com/icon.png
• Local images: Place in public/assets/ and reference as /assets/icon.png

Styling

Edit public/style.css to customize colors, spacing, or layout. CSS variables are defined at the top for easy theming.

Port Configuration

To change the default port (3000), update:

• docker-compose.yml: Change the port mapping
• server.js: Set the PORT environment variable

Data Persistence

Service data is stored in the ./data directory, which is mounted as a volume in Docker. This ensures your services persist across container restarts.

Security Considerations

Rate Limiting

Dasher does not include application-level rate limiting to maintain compatibility with reverse proxies. If you expose Dasher publicly, you must configure rate limiting on your reverse proxy to protect against brute force attacks and abuse.

Recommended reverse proxy options:

• HAProxy - Use stick-table for rate limiting
• Nginx - Use limit_req_zone and limit_req directives
• Traefik - Use rate limiting middleware
• Cloudflare - Provides rate limiting at the edge

Example nginx rate limiting:

http {
    limit_req_zone $binary_remote_addr zone=login:10m rate=5r/m;
    
    server {
        location /api/login {
            limit_req zone=login burst=2 nodelay;
            proxy_pass http://dasher:3000;
        }
    }
}

Authentication

• Always use strong passwords and bcrypt hashing
• Set a random SESSION_SECRET in production
• Keep .env files out of version control
• Use HTTPS through your reverse proxy for production deployments

ScreenShots