Docker - QuestDB Container Setup

QuestDB is a high-performance, open-source SQL database. QuestDB’s stack is engineered from scratch, zero-GC Java and dependency-free. It includes endpoints for PostgreSQL wire protocol, high-throughput schema-agnostic InfluxDB Line Protocol, and a REST API for queries, bulk imports, and exports. QuestDB is an alternative to InfluxDB. You can read here about the differences between InfluxDB, TimescaleDB and QuestDB.

Personally, I really like the simple design of QuestDB. Maybe it’s time to get back to basics, because I couldn’t get used to the flux syntax and found the UI of InfluxDB nice but not pleasant to work with. QuestDB could be the perfect complement for time-series data next to the relational data I have in MariaDB.

The first thing I wanted to do with QuestDB is to save sensor data from my smartmeter using n8n. Since n8n has a QuestDB integration, I thought that would be a good test case for both QuestDB and n8n.

Installation

Here I describe the installation of the Docker QuestDB container. I run this Docker container on a Ubuntu VM that runs via [[ Proxmox VE ]]. I perform the following on the CLI.

Docker pull command:

docker pull questdb/questdb

Within my home folder I have created a Docker folder where I create a subfolder for each container:

cd ~
mkdir -p docker/questdb
cd docker/questdb

Also create folders where the data can be stored:

mkdir data

Now create a shell script with Nano:

sudo nano questdb_run.sh

With this shell script we are going to create the container. Copy the following into questdb_run.sh:

docker run -d \
 --name=questdb \
 --hostname=questdb \
 -p 9000:9000 \
 -p 8812:8812 \
 -p 9009:9009 \
 -v $PWD/data:/var/lib/questdb \
 -e TZ="Europe/Amsterdam" \
 -e QDB_TELEMETRY_ENABLED=false \
 --restart unless-stopped \
 questdb/questdb

If necessary, adjust the following:

-p 9000:9000
This is the web console and REST port. Choose a port that is still available. Check this with netstat

-p 8812:8812
This is the PostgreSQL port. Choose a port that is still available. Check this with netstat

-p 9009:9009
This is the InfluxDB Line Protocol port. Choose a port that is still available. Check this with netstat

-v $PWD/data:/data
Choose the location for the data. In this example it is the data map we created

-e TZ=Europe/Amsterdam
Pick the right timezone. This is the system timezone which controls what some scripts and commands return like $ date

-e QDB_TELEMETRY_ENABLED=false
QuestDB sends anonymous telemetry data with information about usage. Choose to enable or disable this

Exit Nano with CTRL-X and save the changes.

Start the container:

sudo sh questdb_run.sh

Check if the container is running properly.

Using QuestDB

The QuestDB Web Console can now be accessed via the following URL:

http://<IP DOCKER HOST>:9000/

See also my notes about updating containers with Portainer or via the CLI. With Synology’s Docker Application, updating a container is also very easy.

Read other notes