Setup and installation of 'NocoDB: Opensource License free alternative to Airtable' on GCP

This section describes how to provision and connect to ‘NocoDB: Opensource License free alternative to Airtable’ VM solution on GCP.

1. Open NocoDB: Opensource License free alternative to Airtable listing on GCP Marketplace.

2. The VM needs a Static IP to function correctly. Before deploying the instance, ensure that you’ve created a Static IP and attach it during the VM setup as explained in below steps.

To create a Static IP, follow these steps:

a. Open your GCP console and select the project where you plan to deploy the NocoDB instance. In the top search bar, search for IP address and select the IP addresses from the search result.

b. On the IP addresses page, click on RESERVE EXTERNAL STATIC IP ADDRESS link on top.

c. On reserve static ip page, provide the name, description. Provide the Network service tier and keep the IP version as IPv4.

d. On the same page, select the same region in which you want to deploy the NocoDB instance. So that your Static IP and your NocoDB instance will be in the same region. Keep Attached to option to None. We will attach this static ip during VM deployment as explained below. Once done click on Reserve. Now your Static IP is ready.

3. Go back to GCP marketplace page as shown in step1 of this guide. Click Get Started/Launch button.

It will ask you to enable the API’s if they are not enabled already for your account. Please click on enable as shown in the screenshot.

• It will take you to the agreement page. On this page, you can change the project from the project selector on top navigator bar as shown in the below screenshot.

• Accept the Terms and agreements by ticking the checkbox and clicking on the AGREE button.

• It will show you the successfully agreed popup page. Click on Deploy.

• On deployment page, give a name to your deployment.

• In Deployment Service Account section, click on Existing radio button and Choose a service account from the Select a Service Account dropdown.

• If you don't see any service account in dropdown, then change the radio button to New Account and create the new service account here.
• If after selecting New Account option, you get below permission error message then please reach out to your GCP admin to create service account by following Step by step guide to create GCP Service Account and then refresh this deployment page once the service account is created, it should be available in the dropdown.

You are missing resourcemanager.projects.setIamPolicy permission, which is needed to set the required roles on the created Service Account

• Select a zone where you want to launch the VM(such as us-east1-a). Make sure to keep this zone same as the zone you created the Static IP address in step2 above.
• Optionally change the number of cores and amount of memory. ( This defaults to 1 vCPUs and 3.75 GB RAM)
• Optionally change the boot disk type and size. (This defaults to ‘Standard Persistent Disk’ and 20 GB respectively)

• Expand the Networking option and select the static IP you created in step2, under the External IP dropdown. Be sure to expose ports 22 (for ssh), 3389 (for RDP) and 80 (for HTTP).

• Click Deploy when you are done.

• NocoDB: Opensource License free alternative to Airtable will begin deploying.

4. A summary page displays when the compute engine is successfully deployed. Click on the Instance link to go to the instance page .

5. On the instance page, click on the “SSH” button, select “Open in browser window”.

6. This will open SSH window in a browser. Switch to ubuntu user and navigate to ubuntu home directory.

sudo su ubuntu

cd /home/ubuntu/

7. Change the password for ubuntu user using below command

sudo passwd ubuntu

8. Now the password for ubuntu user is set, you can connect to the VM’s desktop environment from any local windows machine using RDP or linux machine using Remmina.

9. To connect using RDP via Windows machine, first note the external IP of the VM from VM details page as highlighted below

10. Then From your local windows machine, goto “start” menu, in the search box type and select “Remote desktop connection”

11. In the “Remote Desktop connection” wizard, paste the external ip and click connect

12. This will connect you to the VM’s desktop environment. Provide “ubuntu” as the userid and the password set in above step to authenticate. Click OK

13. Now you are connected to out of box NocoDB: Opensource License free alternative to Airtable VM’s desktop environment via Windows machines.

14. To connect using RDP via Linux machine, first note the external IP of the VM from VM details page,then from your local Linux machine, goto menu, in the search box type and select “Remmina”.

    Note: If you don’t have Remmina installed on your Linux machine, first Install Remmina as per your linux distribution.

15. In the “Remmina Remote Desktop Client” wizard, select the RDP option from dropdown and paste the external ip and click enter.

16. This will connect you to the VM’s desktop environment. Provide “ubuntu” as the userid and the password set in above step to authenticate. Click OK

17. Now you are connected to out of box NocoDB: Opensource License free alternative to Airtable VM’s desktop environment via Linux machine.

18. To connect to NocoDB UI, copy the Public IP of the VM from VM’s overview page and paste it in the browser in the format http://public_ip/. Make sure to use HTTP and not HTTPS.

19. Provide any email id and password to signup. This will create first user with Super Admin access.

20. You can also restrict the signup only using the invite url. To do so , go to Teams and Settings option from left pane of home page, select settings under User Management. Tick the checkbox to enable signup only using invite link.

For more information on how to use NocoDB, please visit NocoDB Official Documentation