> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.edux.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Quickstart

> How to deploy Danswer on your local machine

## Requirements

* git
* Docker with compose (docker version >= 1.13.0)
* System requirements found [here](https://docs.danswer.dev/resourcing)

## Setup

<Warning>
  The most common source of issues is under-resourcing. Before beginning, check
  the system requirements [here](https://docs.danswer.dev/resourcing).
</Warning>

1. Clone the [Danswer](https://github.com/danswer-ai/danswer) repo:

```bash
git clone https://github.com/danswer-ai/danswer.git
```

2. Navigate to **danswer/deployment/docker\_compose**

```bash
cd danswer/deployment/docker_compose
```

3. (Optional) [configure Danswer](/configuration_guide)

4. Bring up your docker engine and run:
   * To pull images from DockerHub and run Danswer:
   ```bash
   docker compose -f docker-compose.dev.yml -p danswer-stack up -d --pull always --force-recreate
   ```
   * Alternatively, to build the containers from source and start Danswer, run:
   ```bash
   docker compose -f docker-compose.dev.yml -p danswer-stack up -d --build --force-recreate
   ```
   * This may take 15+ minutes depending on your internet speed.
     * Additionally, once the images have been pulled / built, the initial startup of the `api_server`
       may take some time (we download embedding models from HuggingFace to power the search). If you see
       `This site can’t be reached` in your browser despite all containers being up and running,
       check the `api_server` logs and make sure you see `Application startup complete`.
     * If you see `Killed` in the logs, you may need to increase the amount of memory given to Docker.
       For recommendations, check the system requirements [here](https://docs.danswer.dev/resourcing).

<Info>
  These commands are also used to redeploy if any **.env** variables are updated
</Info>

5. Danswer will now be running on [http://localhost:3000](http://localhost:3000).

## Generative AI API Key

**Note:** On the initial visit, Danswer will prompt for an OpenAI API key.

You can get an OpenAI API key at:
[https://platform.openai.com/account/api-keys](https://platform.openai.com/account/api-keys)

<Info>
  You can also replace OpenAI with a model provider of your choice, see
  [here](https://docs.danswer.dev/gen_ai_configs/overview) for more info
</Info>

## Indexing Documents

**This quickstart guide will index a publicly accessible website as this requires no additional authorization setup**

1. Navigate to the top right of Danswer's home screen and select **Admin Panel**
   ![AdminPanel](https://mintlify.s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/edux/images/quickstart/AdminPanel.png)

2. In the Web Connector dashboard, pick any base URL to index.
   * This will index all pages under that base URL that is reachable from hyperlinks.
   * You can check the indexing status page to monitor the progress.

![DanswerWebConnector](https://mintlify.s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/edux/images/quickstart/DanswerWebConnector.png)

3. After the pages are indexed, you can now navigate back to the homepage and start asking questions and getting
   answers! 🥳

![DanswerSampleQA](https://mintlify.s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/edux/images/quickstart/DanswerSampleQA.png)

## Shutting Down

```bash
docker compose -f docker-compose.dev.yml -p danswer-stack down
```

<Info>
  add `-v` at the end to additionally delete the volumes (containing users and indexed
  documents){" "}
</Info>