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Installation

System requirements
  • NPM 7 or later.
  • Docker with Docker Compose version 1.27+.
  • macOS, Windows (including WSL), and Linux are supported. If you're using Apple Silicon, make sure to enable Use Rosetta for x86/amd64 emulation in your Docker Desktop settings/Features in development.

Pre-Requisite Knowledge​

While our documentation is designed with beginners in mind, we do assume a foundational knowledge base to keep our focus on Contember's features and capabilities. Rest assured, we'll provide links to appropriate resources whenever we introduce new concepts.

To get the most out of Contember, we will assume that you have a basic understanding of Docker, React and TypeScript. If you don't, we suggest following resources:

Create a new project with Contember​

We'll begin by creating a new Contember project using the @contember/create tool. Run the following command in your terminal:

npm exec "@contember/create@latest" quickstart

This command creates a new folder called "quickstart" that contains a basic Contember setup.

After the command completes, navigate to the newly created "quickstart" directory:

cd quickstart

Next, we'll install the project dependencies. These will install Contember Interface and other libraries it needs to run properly. Install them using npm:

npm install

Once the installation is complete, you're ready to start your Contember project. The npm start command will initiate Docker containers and get Contember up and running.

npm start

The npm start command executes two processes:

  • start-engine runs docker-compose up --detach to start the Docker containers, followed by npm run contember migrations:execute --yes to execute database migrations. (There's nothing in your model at the moment so no migration will be executed. We'll show you how to create your first model in a minute.)
  • start-admin runs the Vite server for Contember Interface on port 1480 and listens to all network interfaces.

At this point, you should be able to access your Contember Interface on your local machine at http://localhost:1480.

To stop your Contember project, just press ctrl+c to exit the process. This will stop the Contember interface (which is not running in Docker for faster development). You will also need to run docker-compose down to stop all the Docker containers as well.

Here's a summary of the services that are now running on your machine:

For advanced use-cases, there are also:

  • Adminer database management tool at http://localhost:1485 to access database created by Contember.
  • Minio local S3 provider at http://localhost:1483 (you can sign in with contember / contember credentials). Contember uses object storage to store files and images uploaded by your users.
  • Mailhog - tool for testing emails at http://localhost:1484.
  • And of course PostgreSQL database at localhost:1482 (you can sign in with contember / contember credentials).

Congratulations! You've successfully created your first Contember project. Now let's build something.

Build your first project with Contember→

Step-by-step guide to create your first model and user interface with Contember.