Docker Compose (Local Development)

The fastest way to run jitsudo is with Docker Compose. The provided compose file starts jitsudod, PostgreSQL, and dex (a mock OIDC provider) so you can exercise the full workflow without any cloud credentials.

This setup is for local development and testing. For production deployment see Kubernetes (Helm) or Single-Server.

Prerequisites

• Docker (or Podman) with Compose support
• The jitsudo CLI — see Installation

Services

The compose stack at deploy/docker-compose.yaml starts three services:

Service	Image	Port	Purpose
postgres	postgres:16-alpine	5432	PostgreSQL database
dex	ghcr.io/dexidp/dex:v2.41.1	5556	Mock OIDC provider
jitsudod	Built from repo	8080 (HTTP), 8443 (gRPC)	Control plane

Quick Start

Clone the repo and start the stack:

git clone https://github.com/jitsudo-dev/jitsudo.git
cd jitsudo

# Start only the dependencies (recommended — run jitsudod on the host)
docker compose -f deploy/docker-compose.yaml up postgres dex -d

# Run jitsudod on the host (avoids OIDC issuer URL mismatch)
go run ./cmd/jitsudod

Why run jitsudod on the host?

dex issues tokens with iss=http://localhost:5556/dex. When jitsudod runs inside Docker it cannot resolve localhost:5556, causing token validation to fail. Running jitsudod on the host avoids this mismatch. If you need the full Docker stack, update JITSUDOD_OIDC_ISSUER in the compose file to use a hostname reachable from inside the container (e.g. host.docker.internal).

Alternatively, start the full stack (jitsudod included):

docker compose -f deploy/docker-compose.yaml up -d

Log In

# Point the CLI at the local dex OIDC issuer
jitsudo login \
  --provider http://localhost:5556/dex \
  --server http://localhost:8080

dex’s default static user credentials are:

Field	Value
Email	admin@example.com
Password	password

Submit a Request

The mock provider is registered by default in the local environment:

jitsudo request \
  --provider mock \
  --role admin \
  --scope test \
  --duration 1h \
  --reason "Testing the local dev environment"

Approve and Execute

# In another terminal (or the same), approve the request
jitsudo approve <request-id>

# Execute a command with the mock credentials
jitsudo exec <request-id> -- env | grep MOCK_

Useful Make Targets

The repo Makefile provides convenience targets:

make docker-up    # Start all services (full Docker stack)
make docker-down  # Stop all services and remove containers
make docker-logs  # Tail logs from all services
make dev-deps     # Start only postgres + dex (use with make dev-server)
make dev-server   # Run jitsudod on the host

Environment Variables

The compose file sets these environment variables for jitsudod:

Variable	Value
JITSUDOD_HTTP_ADDR	:8080
JITSUDOD_GRPC_ADDR	:8443
JITSUDOD_DATABASE_URL	postgres://jitsudo:jitsudo@postgres:5432/jitsudo?sslmode=disable
JITSUDOD_OIDC_ISSUER	http://dex:5556/dex
JITSUDOD_OIDC_CLIENT_ID	jitsudo-server

Stopping

docker compose -f deploy/docker-compose.yaml down
# To also remove the postgres volume:
docker compose -f deploy/docker-compose.yaml down -v