Skip to content

Instantly share code, notes, and snippets.

@jbhannah
Created May 23, 2011 03:51
Show Gist options
  • Save jbhannah/986199 to your computer and use it in GitHub Desktop.
Save jbhannah/986199 to your computer and use it in GitHub Desktop.
Dropbox setup on a headless Ubuntu Server (http://wp.me/pnbL6-5F)
#!/bin/sh
# Dropbox setup on a headless Ubuntu Server
# Script written by Jesse B. Hannah (http://jbhannah.net) <jesse@jbhannah.net>
# Based on http://wiki.dropbox.com/TipsAndTricks/UbuntuServerInstall
###
# Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
# of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
# in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
# to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
# copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
# furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
#
# The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in
# all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
#
# THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
# IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
# FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
# AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
# LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
# OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN
# THE SOFTWARE.
###
# All of the following commands are run as root, or run this script as root.
# Download and extract the Dropbox daemon itself into a system location
sudo mkdir -p /usr/local/dropbox
sudo wget -qO- http://www.dropbox.com/download/?plat=lnx.x86 | tar xz --strip 1 -C /usr/local/dropbox
sudo useradd -r -m -d /etc/dropbox -U -s /bin/false dropbox
sudo chown dropbox.dropbox /etc/dropbox
sudo chmod 700 /etc/dropbox
sudo su -l dropbox -s /bin/bash
umask 0027
/usr/local/dropbox/dropboxd
# Open the URL dropboxd gives you in a browser to link it to your account
# Exit dropboxd with C-c AFTER you've done this
exit
# If you're OCD, you can remove everything from /etc/dropbox except .dropbox and Dropbox now
# For Ubuntu 9.10 and later, this is an upstart script for starting and stopping dropbox with
# `start dropbox` and `stop dropbox`. Users of earlier Ubuntu or non-upstart distros, see
# http://wiki.dropbox.com/TipsAndTricks/TextBasedLinuxInstall for startup service configuration.
sudo cat <<EOF | sed -e "s,%,$,g" >/etc/init/dropbox.conf
# Dropbox upstart script
description "Dropbox"
author "Jesse B. Hannah <jesse@jbhannah.net>"
start on runlevel [2345]
stop on runlevel [!2345]
respawn
env HOME=/etc/dropbox
umask 0027
pre-start script
[ ! -e "$HOME/.dropbox/command_socket" ] || rm $HOME/.dropbox/command_socket
[ ! -e "$HOME/.dropbox/iface_socket" ] || rm $HOME/.dropbox/iface_socket
[ ! -e "$HOME/.dropbox/unlink.db" ] || rm $HOME/.dropbox/unlink.db
end script
script
export LANG=en_US.UTF-8
exec su -s /bin/sh -c /usr/local/dropbox/dropbox dropbox
end script
EOF
sudo start dropbox
# Dropbox upstart script
description "Dropbox"
author "Jesse B. Hannah <jesse@jbhannah.net>"
start on runlevel [2345]
stop on runlevel [!2345]
respawn
env HOME=/etc/dropbox
umask 0027
pre-start script
[ ! -e "$HOME/.dropbox/command_socket" ] || rm $HOME/.dropbox/command_socket
[ ! -e "$HOME/.dropbox/iface_socket" ] || rm $HOME/.dropbox/iface_socket
[ ! -e "$HOME/.dropbox/unlink.db" ] || rm $HOME/.dropbox/unlink.db
end script
script
export LANG=en_US.UTF-8
exec su -s /bin/sh -c /usr/local/dropbox/dropbox dropbox
end script
@DanielHeath
Copy link

http://www.dropbox.com/download?plat=lnx.x86_64 instead if you are on a 64-bit OS.

@DanielHeath
Copy link

Also, https would really be better given that it works on dropbox.com

@steverob
Copy link

👍

@TheRinger
Copy link

Nice script, except I am wanting to change permissions and change the dir, & need an upstart scripts. Will this cause any problems once I start rm'ing directorys ?

@nhed
Copy link

nhed commented Dec 29, 2015

curious why create/use a dropbox user and not your own user, don't you want to edit the files? Is that based on some recommendation, general distrust of the service or general paranoia?

Sign up for free to join this conversation on GitHub. Already have an account? Sign in to comment