The Hardware
The device I used in this video is a Barracuda Networks BFS200a I picked up used for about $25. It sports a 2 core/4 thread Intel Atom D525 @ 1.80 GHz. I upgraded the 1GB of DDR3 to 4GB and replaced the 250 GB HDD with a 32GB SATA SSD.
Things You Will Need
- A USB flash drive, at least 8 GB https://amzn.to/3wkR5ju | https://amzn.to/3qkrJ1p | https://amzn.to/3Nhu9b9
Preparing the Installation Media
- Download the Debian .iso file Download
- Download the Ventoy installer Download
- Extract the downloaded .zip file
- Run Ventoy2Disk.exe
- Plug in a USB flash drive at least 4 GB in size
- Click the refresh icon
- Select the flash drive from the device dropdown
- Click the Install button
- After the installation completes, copy the downloaded Debian .iso to the Ventoy partition
- Safely remove the USB flash drive
- Plug the flash drive into the target Barracuda Networks device
Installation and Setup
- Power on the Barracuda Networks device and start pressing Delete
- When prompted, enter BCNDK1 as the BIOS password
- In the BIOS, reset the settings to defaults > Save and exit
- Boot to the flash drive
- When the install dialog displays press Enter to select Graphical Install
- Select a language > Click Continue
- Select a Location > Click Continue
- Select a keyboard layout > Click Continue
- Enter a hostname for the VM > Click Continue
- Enter a Domain name or leave it empty > Click Continue
- Enter and confirm a root password > Click Continue
- Enter the full name for the new user > Click Continue
- Enter the username for the new user > Click Continue
- Enter and confirm a password for the new user > Click Continue
- Select a timezone > Click Continue
- Select Guided - user entire disk > Click Continue
- Select the target disk > Click Continue
- Select All files in one partition > Click Continue
- Select Finish partitioning and write changes to disk > Click Continue
- Select Yes to confirm writing the changes > Click Continue
- Wait for Debian to copy and install files
- When prompted, select Yes to enable a network apt mirror > Click Continue
- Select a country to use for the apt mirror > Click Continue
- Select a mirror from the list > Click Continue
- Setup a HTTP proxy if necessary > Click Continue
- Select No to participating in package survey > Click Continue
- Select the software to install > Click Continue
- Select Yes to install GRUB > Click Continue
- Select /dev/sda for the boot loader location > Click Continue
- After the bootloader is installed select reboot to finish the installation
- Welcome to Debian 11
Installing Docker
- Run the following commands in the terminal
# install prerequisites
sudo apt install apt-transport-https ca-certificates curl software-properties-common gnupg-agent -y
# add docker gpg key
curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/$(awk -F'=' '/^ID=/{ print $NF }' /etc/os-release)/gpg | sudo apt-key add -
# add docker software repository
sudo add-apt-repository "deb [arch=$(dpkg --print-architecture)] https://download.docker.com/linux/$(awk -F'=' '/^ID=/{ print $NF }' /etc/os-release) $(lsb_release -cs) stable"
# install docker
sudo apt install docker-ce docker-compose containerd.io -y
# enable and start docker service
sudo systemctl enable docker && sudo systemctl start docker
# add the current user to the docker group
sudo usermod -aG docker $USER
# reauthenticate for the new group membership to take effect
su - $USER
Running Portainer
- Now that Docker is installed, run the following commands to setup the Portainer Docker container and run it
# create working directories
mkdir ~/docker/portainer -p
# run the portainer docker container
docker run -d -p 8000:8000 -p 9000:9000 --name=portainer --restart=always -v /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock -v ~/docker/portainer:/data portainer/portainer-ce - Once the Portainer container is downloaded and running, open a web browser and navigate to http://DNSorIP:9000
- Set an administrator username and password > Click Create user
- Click the Docker - Manage the local Docker environment option > Click Connect