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Server Installation Guide

Server Installation Guide

This document covers the system requirements and step-by-step installation instructions for PowerFolder Server. Please review all requirements carefully before starting the installation.

Contents

  1. System Requirements

    1. Hardware Requirements

    2. Network Requirements

    3. Software Requirements

  2. Installation Guide

    1. Installation on Linux

    2. Installation on Windows

1   System Requirements

This section describes the hardware, network, and software requirements for PowerFolder Server. Please check these requirements thoroughly to avoid problems during installation or in production use.

1.1   Hardware Requirements

There is no single hardware recommendation for PowerFolder Server, as requirements depend heavily on the number of folders and files being managed.

For an installation managing approximately 1,000,000 files the following is recommended:

  • Dual- or Quad-Core CPU, > 2 GHz

  • 4–8 GB RAM

  • ~100 MB disk space for the application itself (data storage must be scaled separately)

If you experience startup problems related to memory, or need to increase the JVM heap size, please refer to the Server – Memory Configuration article.

1.2   Network Requirements

PowerFolder Server requires the following ports to be open:

Protocol / Port

Purpose

Protocol / Port

Purpose

TCP 443

Web Interface (HTTPS)

TCP 80

HTTP Tunnel – data exchange for clients behind firewalls

TCP 1337

Direct data exchange between clients and server

Changing Port Numbers

All ports listed above can be changed via the Web Interface (Administrator settings) or directly in the Server Configuration File.

Exchanging Data via the HTTP Tunnel

When a client is behind a firewall that blocks all ports except port 80, the client encrypts its data using the PowerFolder-internal transfer protocol and sends it via HTTP POST to the server's non-SSL URL. Routing traffic through the SSL-protected URL in this scenario would result in double encryption, unnecessarily slowing down the transfer.

Serving the Web Interface on Linux

On Linux-based systems, non-root users cannot bind to ports below 1024. To run PowerFolder Server without root privileges, either:

  • Recommended: Place a reverse proxy (Apache or Nginx) in front of PowerFolder Server, or

  • Configure PowerFolder to use ports above 1024.

1.3   Software Requirements

Support Policy: PowerFolder can only provide support for software versions that are still under active support from their respective vendors. Once a version reaches end-of-life (EOL), the PowerFolder support team is unable to assist with issues specific to that version.

Operating Systems

Microsoft Windows

Edition

Supported Versions

Edition

Supported Versions

Server

✔ 2016   ✔ 2019   ✔ 2022   ✔ 2025

Desktop

✔ 10   ✔ 11

Linux / Unix / Solaris

Distribution

Status

Distribution

Status

Debian, Ubuntu LTS, RHEL / Rocky Linux, SLES

✔ Supported

Due to the large number of Linux distributions, full support and testing is limited to Debian and Ubuntu LTS.

Databases

Database

Supported Versions

Database

Supported Versions

Microsoft SQL Server

✔ 2016   ✔ 2017   ✔ 2019   ✔ 2022

MySQL

✔ 8.0   ✔ 8.4 LTS

MariaDB

✔ 10.6 LTS   ✔ 10.11 LTS   ✔ 11.4 LTS

PostgreSQL

✔ 14   ✔ 15   ✔ 16   ✔ 17

Browsers

Browser

Status

Browser

Status

Microsoft Edge (Chromium-based)

✔ 80 and higher

Mozilla Firefox

✔ 90 and higher

Google Chrome

✔ 90 and higher

Apple Safari

✔ 14 and higher

Internet Explorer

✘ Not supported (EOL)

2   Installation Guide

Follow the steps below for your operating system to install PowerFolder Server.

🐧 2.1   Installation on Linux

1

Download and Extract the Installation Package

Download the .tar.gz distribution from our server release notes page and place it in the home directory of the dedicated PowerFolder Server user.

We recommend extracting into a subdirectory, e.g. /home/<username>/powerfolder:

tar zxvf PowerFolder-Server-Latest.tar.gz

2

Using an External Database (Recommended)

For evaluation and small to mid-sized installations, the bundled internal database works out of the box with no additional setup. For larger or growing installations, an external database is strongly recommended — see our Database Setup Guide.

Migration from the internal to an external database is currently not supported. Make this decision before going live.

3

Start PowerFolder Server

Navigate to the installation directory and run:

./PowerFolder-Server.sh start

If the script is not executable, set permissions first:

chmod u+x PowerFolder-Server.sh

If the web console is not immediately available, wait up to five minutes and try again.

4

Start PowerFolder Server with systemd

Create /etc/systemd/system/PowerFolder.service:

PowerFolder.service
[Unit] Description=PowerFolder-Server # Optional: Wants=mysql.service [Service] Type=forking User=<OS-username> PIDFile=/home/<OS-username>/.PowerFolder/PowerFolder-Server.pid ExecStart=/home/<OS-username>/PowerFolder-Server/PowerFolder-Server.sh start ExecReload=/home/<OS-username>/PowerFolder-Server/PowerFolder-Server.sh reload ExecStop=/home/<OS-username>/PowerFolder-Server/PowerFolder-Server.sh stop TasksMax=31000 LimitNOFILE=512000 LimitMEMLOCK=infinity [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target

Register the service:

sudo systemctl enable PowerFolder.service sudo systemctl daemon-reload

Add Wants=mysql.service (or the relevant DB service) to [Unit] if the database runs on the same host. Use Requires= for a strict dependency.

The service must not run as root. Set SERVER_INSTALL inside PowerFolder-Server.sh to the correct installation path, e.g. SERVER_INSTALL=/home/<OS-username>/PowerFolder-Server.

Command

Description

Command

Description

systemctl start PowerFolder

Start the server

systemctl stop PowerFolder

Shut down the server

systemctl restart PowerFolder

Stop and start the server

systemctl reload PowerFolder

Reload configuration (some parameters require a full restart)

systemctl status PowerFolder

Show current service status

These commands only work if the server was started via systemd.

5

Configure PowerFolder Server

Installation is complete. Continue with our Configuration Guide to set up the server and add the first users.

🪟 2.2   Installation on Windows

1

Install Using the Installation Wizard

Download the Windows Installer from our download site and run it to launch the setup wizard.

If UAC prompts you to allow changes to your computer, select Yes. Declining will abort the installation.

  1. Read and accept the license agreement.

  2. Select a destination folder and click Install.

  3. The wizard installs PowerFolder Server and automatically starts it as a Windows service.

  4. On the final page, you can open the web console directly in your default browser.

By default, PowerFolder Server runs under the SYSTEM account. If you change this, ensure the chosen account has access to all relevant storage locations.

2

Using an External Database (Optional)

The bundled internal database works out of the box for evaluation and smaller installations. For larger or growing environments, an external database is recommended — see our Database Setup Guide.

Migration from the internal to an external database is currently not supported. Make this decision before going live.

3

Using LDAP Authentication (Optional)

PowerFolder Server can connect to an existing LDAP directory to authenticate users.

LDAP can also be configured later via the web console. See our LDAP Authentication Setup Guide for details.

4

Configure PowerFolder Server

Installation is complete. Continue with our Configuration Guide to set up the server and add the first users.