Deplo

Offer Deplo to your customers

Ship Deplo as a VPS template that installs itself on first boot and hands the customer a ready setup link.

The setup we recommend to every hosting provider: a clean base image, one command at first boot, and a link you can predict. No log to read, no key to copy.

Create the base template

Start from a clean, minimal image:

Requirement
OSUbuntu 24.04 LTS, 26.04 LTS · Debian 12, 13
Architecturex86-64 or arm64, with systemd
Ports80 and 443 open from the internet
Smallest plan2 cores, 4 GB of RAM, 30 GB of disk
Comfortable plan4 cores, 8 GB of RAM

More in what you need.

Run the installer on first boot

Chain the installer to your provisioning, right after the operating system install finishes. --public-setup drops the setup key, so the link is predictable and you never read the install log.

The command depends on the address the customer's panel starts on:

The panel starts on an automatic wildcard address, with no DNS to set up and nothing to ask the customer:

curl -fsSL https://deplo.build/install.sh | bash -s -- --public-setup --yes

By default that address is on deplo.site, Deplo's own wildcard domain. You can use yours instead: see Use your own wildcard domain.

deplo.site is wildcard DNS: a name that carries an IPv4 in hexadecimal resolves to that IP, with no DNS setup. So the panel address is predictable:

https://deplo-<ip-in-hex>.deplo.site/setup

Each octet becomes two hex digits. 203.0.113.10 gives cb00710a:

https://deplo-cb00710a.deplo.site/setup
IP=203.0.113.10
echo "https://deplo-$(printf '%02x' ${IP//./ }).deplo.site/setup"

With your own wildcard domain, replace deplo.site with it.

Send it

  • Where: in the welcome email or the VPS detail page, next to the IP and root password.
  • When: the install takes a few minutes after boot; until then the link does not answer.
  • Who: only the customer. Whoever opens it first becomes the Owner.

On a temporary domain, the customer can later move the panel to their own from Settings -> Deplo: see the panel's own address.

Use your own wildcard domain

deplo.site is optional. To put the panel under your brand, run wildcard DNS on a domain of yours and pass the hostname with --domain, filling in the VM's IP:

Use a dedicated domain

Keep the wildcard on a domain separate from your main one, the way Deplo keeps deplo.site apart from deplo.build. Customer servers answer on it, so abuse reports, blocklists and cookies stay away from your website and your billing panel.

curl -fsSL https://deplo.build/install.sh | bash -s -- \
  --public-setup --yes --domain deplo-cb00710a.example-vps.net

The link becomes https://deplo-cb00710a.example-vps.net/setup, with a Let's Encrypt certificate.

  • We recommend self-hosting nip.io: it resolves the hex form of the IP out of the box. Set it as the nameserver of example-vps.net at your registrar.
  • Even better, host it on Deplo itself when you can, on a server of yours: it is a DNS server, so that server needs port 53 open on UDP and TCP.
  • The generated deplo.site address stays on as a backup. The customer can turn it off from Settings -> Deplo.

A different setup in mind?

Our technical team is happy to review it: write to [email protected].

See also

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