Install SonarQube Using Docker Compose

This article is for those looking for a detailed and straightforward guide on installing SonarQube using Docker Compose.

SonarQube is an open-source platform developed by SonarSource. It offers continuous inspection of code quality, using static analysis to detect bugs and code smells. Currently, it supports 29 programming languages.

TIP

Architecture Context

Choose self-hosted SonarQube when you need on-premises code quality and security scanning with custom quality gates and full control over scan data. SonarCloud provides a managed alternative with zero infrastructure overhead and native CI/CD integration. Self-hosting is justified when compliance requires on-premises code analysis or when repository volume makes SaaS pricing impractical.

💾 You can find the repository used in this guide on GitHub.

NOTE

We’ll use Traefik as our reverse proxy. It’ll handle obtaining cryptographic certificates from Let’s Encrypt for your domain names and route requests to the corresponding services based on those domains.

CAUTION

To obtain cryptographic certificates, you will need A-type records in the external DNS zone, which point to the IP address of your server where Traefik is installed. If you have created these records recently, you should wait before starting the installation of the services. Full replication of these records between DNS servers can take from a few minutes to 48 hours or even longer in rare cases.

IMPORTANT

Docker Engine and Docker Compose must be installed on the server.

For a step-by-step guide on installing Docker Engine on Ubuntu Server, see Install Docker Engine and Docker Compose on Ubuntu Server

IMPORTANT

OpenSSH must be installed on the server, and port 22 must be open in order to be able to connect to the server using the SSH protocol.

To install OpenSSH on the server you can use the command:

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sudo apt install openssh-server

NOTE

To connect to the server from a Windows system, you can use tools like PuTTY or MobaXterm.

NOTE

This guide walks you through connecting to a server with the iTerm2 terminal emulator on macOS.

CAUTION

You will need to open the following TCP ports for access to the services:

• TCP port 80 - to obtain a free cryptographic certificate through the Let’s Encrypt certification center.
• TCP port 443 - to access the SonarQube web interface.

We connect to the server on which SonarQube is planned to be installed.

Now it is necessary to create networks for your services.

We create a network for Traefik using the command:

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docker network create traefik-network

We create a network for SonarQube using the command:

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docker network create sonarqube-network

Adjust the vm.max_map_count using the commands:

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sudo sysctl -w vm.max_map_count=262144

Next, you need to clone the repository that contains the configuration files, which include all the necessary conditions for SonarQube to work.

You can clone the repository using the command:

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git clone https://github.com/heyvaldemar/sonarqube-traefik-letsencrypt-docker-compose.git

Navigate to the directory with the repository using the command:

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cd sonarqube-traefik-letsencrypt-docker-compose

Next, you need to change the variables in the .env file according to your requirements.

IMPORTANT

The .env file should be in the same directory as sonarqube-traefik-letsencrypt-docker-compose.yml.

Now let’s start SonarQube with the command:

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docker compose -f sonarqube-traefik-letsencrypt-docker-compose.yml -p sonarqube up -d

To access the SonarQube management panel, go to https://sonarqube.heyvaldemar.net from your workstation, where sonarqube.heyvaldemar.net is the domain name of my service. Accordingly, you need to specify your domain name that points to the IP address of your server with the installed Traefik service, which will redirect the request to SonarQube.

NOTE

You need to specify the domain name of the service, previously defined in the .env file.

Enter the username and password that you previously set in the .env file, and click the “Log In” button.

Welcome to the SonarQube control panel.

To access the Traefik control panel, go to https://traefik.sonarqube.heyvaldemar.net from your workstation, where traefik.sonarqube.heyvaldemar.net is the domain name of my service. Accordingly, you need to specify your domain name that points to the IP address of your server with the installed Traefik.

NOTE

You need to specify the domain name of the service, previously defined in the .env file.

Enter the username and password previously set in the .env file, and click the “OK” button.

Welcome to the Traefik control panel.