How to install Synapse (Matrix Server) on the Raspberry Pi

matrix-server-install.md

How to install Synapse (the Matrix server) on a Raspberry Pi

1. Install RustC: curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf https://sh.rustup.rs | sh

2. Install apt dependencies:

sudo apt install build-essential python3-dev libffi-dev \
  python3-pip python3-setuptools sqlite3 \
  libssl-dev virtualenv libjpeg-dev libxslt1-dev libicu-dev

3. Go to where you want to install the application. For me this is just making a folder where I am currently:

mkdir synapse
cd synapse

4. Create a python venv: python -m venv .
5. Enter the virtual environment (venv): source bin/activate
6. Upgrade pip and setuptools:

pip install --upgrade pip
pip install --upgrade setuptools

7. Install synapse: pip install matrix-synapse

8. Generate the homeserver.yaml file using the generator command (make sure to change <server name> to the domain you are hosting on):

python3 -m synapse.app.homeserver -c homeserver.yaml --generate-config --server-name=<server name> --report-stats=no

9. That's it. Now run it using synctl start

If you need to restart the server, just run synctl restart while your python virtual environment (venv) is active.