Initial Setup

The MM_TEAMSETTINGS_ENABLEOPENSERVER environment variable determines if users can register on your Mattermost pod. You should set it to true until registering the first admin user.

After the pod is created, open it via Open Pod and follow those steps to create an admin user and team:

  1. Choose View in browser to skip downloading an app
  2. Then Don’t have an account? to add the initial admin account
  3. Choose an email, username and password
  4. Then create a team

That’s it! You should now be in your team’s workspace. You can then go to the System Console or add more teams via the menus in the top-left.

Also be sure to disable open registrations, if appropriate, by setting the MM_TEAMSETTINGS_ENABLEOPENSERVER env var to false in your PikaPods control panel.

Sending emails

Mattermost doesn’t always require emails, but uses it for select features, like forgotten passwords. To enable sending email, add your SMTP details as described here. You can use your existing email service or a service recommended in our email section.

Using Custom Plugins

To enable integrations in Mattermost with custom plugins, follow these steps:

  1. Use SFTP to access your server. (Refer to this page for accessing pod files using SFTP.)
  2. Locate the config.json file inside the config folder.
  3. Manually set PluginSettings > EnableUploads to true in the config.json file. By default, this setting is false.
  4. Save the changes and restart your Mattermost server.

Enabling this configuration change allows you to upload custom plugins, expanding Mattermost’s functionality with external resources.

Troubleshooting

Server fails to start after update: archived channels error

After updating to newer Mattermost versions (e.g., 11.0.1), some pods may fail to start with an error similar to:

failed to load configuration: failed to create store: unable to load on store creation: invalid config: Config.IsValid: Hiding archived channels is no longer supported. Make these channels private and remove members instead.

To fix this, set ExperimentalViewArchivedChannels to true in your config.json.

Steps:

  1. Access your pod files via SFTP. (Refer to this page for accessing pod files using SFTP.)
  2. Open config/config.json.
  3. In the TeamSettings section, ensure ExperimentalViewArchivedChannels is set to true. If it’s missing, add it: 
    "TeamSettings": {
    ...
    "ExperimentalViewArchivedChannels": true,
    ...
}
  4. Save the file and restart the pod.

Reference: Mattermost issue #34084.