eLabFTW

eLabFTW is an open-source electronic lab notebook (ELN): experiments with versioning and timestamps, a database for chemicals, samples and equipment, teams, templates, an integrated chemical structure editor (Ketcher) with substructure search, scheduler for equipment booking, and exports as PDF, ZIP or ELN archives. Widely used at universities and in research labs.

The eLabFTW app announcement TBA

eLabFTW is a community application from the tebbiworld repository. Documentation and source can be found on Github

one pod with the official elabftw/elabimg image (nginx + php-fpm) and MySQL 8.4, published on one host name through Traefik with Let's Encrypt
Active Directory / LDAP login configured from the module settings — written into eLabFTW's own configuration, bind password encrypted like the sysadmin page does it
database schema installed on first start and migrated on module updates
NS8 backup with a consistent SQL dump plus uploads and exports; restore rebuilds the database from the dump
the TSA module of the same repository can serve as RFC 3161 timestamp authority for eLabFTW's experiment timestamping

Container	Image	Purpose
`elabftw-app`	`docker.io/elabftw/elabimg` (pinned)	web application, internal port 8080 → node loopback → Traefik
`elabftw-db`	`docker.io/library/mysql:8.4`	database, 127.0.0.1 inside the pod

Volume	Purpose	Backup
`elabftw-uploads`	attachments	yes
`elabftw-exports`	generated archives and PDFs	yes
`elabftw-cache`	PHP/Twig cache	no
`elabftw-db`	MySQL data	no — SQL dump at backup time, imported on restore

On the NethServer 8 cluster leader:

add-module ghcr.io/tebbiworld/elabftw:1.0.0 1

Configure it, replacing the host name:

api-cli run module/elabftw1/configure-module --data '{
  "host": "eln.example.org",
  "lets_encrypt": true,
  "http2https": true,
  "timezone": "Europe/Berlin",
  "max_upload_mb": 100
}'

Then open https://eln.example.org/register.php — the first account created becomes the system administrator. Teams, timestamping, mail and all other application settings are managed in eLabFTW's sysadmin panel.

Setting	Description
Host name	FQDN under which eLabFTW is published; also its `SITE_URL`.
Let's Encrypt certificate	Requests a certificate for the host name. Requires that ports 80 and 443 of this name reach this node.
HTTP to HTTPS redirection	Redirects HTTP to HTTPS.
Timezone	Timezone of PHP and the database.
Maximum upload size	Largest attachment a user may upload.

Optional. When enabled, users log in with their directory account on the normal login page and pick their team on first login; the account is created on the fly (name and e-mail from the directory). The very first account of the instance — registered locally or created by an LDAP login — becomes the system administrator; every later account waits for validation by an admin (eLabFTW default).

Setting	Description
LDAP URL	`ldaps://ad.example.org:636` or `ldap://ad.example.org:389`. Self-signed certificates (Samba AD, internal CA) are accepted.
Search base DN	e.g. `DC=ad,DC=example,DC=org`
Bind DN and bind password	Read-only service account for the directory search. The password is stored encrypted with the instance's `SECRET_KEY`.
Login attribute	Attribute matched against the login name: `sAMAccountName` for Active Directory, `uid` for OpenLDAP; several attributes may be separated by commas.
Mail attribute	eLabFTW requires an e-mail address per user. On Active Directory where `mail` is empty use `userPrincipalName`.
First / last name attribute	`givenName` / `sn` by default.
Validate LDAPS certificate	Off by default — Samba AD and internal CAs present self-signed certificates. On = `TLS_REQCERT demand`.

If the directory server is the node itself (NS8 Samba account provider), the module lets the container reach it through host.containers.internal automatically.

Before every NS8 backup the module dumps the database with mysqldump –single-transaction into its state directory; the backup contains that dump, the module settings and secrets, uploads and exports. A restore imports the dump into a fresh database volume, carries the original SECRET_KEY over (eLabFTW encrypted stored passwords with it) and re-applies the configuration.

Unofficial, community-built package, not affiliated with or endorsed by the eLabFTW project or Deltablot. “eLabFTW” is a trademark of its owners and is used here only to identify the packaged software; the module logo is the official project logo, used unmodified.

eLabFTW is licensed AGPL-3.0; the official images are pulled at runtime and not redistributed. The module's own code is licensed GPL-3.0-or-later.