Raspberry Pi Setup (Crow OS)

Turn a Raspberry Pi into a dedicated Crow appliance. No SSH required after initial setup — everything is configured through a web browser.

Hardware Requirements

	Minimum	Recommended
Board	Raspberry Pi 4 (4 GB)	Raspberry Pi 5 (8 GB)
Storage	32 GB microSD	NVMe SSD via HAT
Network	Ethernet or Wi-Fi	Ethernet
Power	Official PSU	Official PSU

Resource usage: Gateway ~100 MB RAM, SQLite negligible, Docker ~200 MB base. Each bundle add-on varies (Ollama needs 2-4 GB for models, Nextcloud ~500 MB).

Step 1: Flash Raspberry Pi OS

1. Download Raspberry Pi Imager
2. Select Raspberry Pi OS Lite (64-bit) — the desktop environment is not needed
3. Click the gear icon to pre-configure:
   • Enable SSH with password authentication
   • Set username and password (e.g., crow / your-password)
   • Configure Wi-Fi if not using Ethernet
   • Set hostname to crow
4. Flash to your SD card or SSD

Step 2: First Boot and Connect

1. Insert the SD card, connect Ethernet (if using), power on
2. Wait ~2 minutes for first boot
3. Find your Pi on the network:

   # From another computer on the same network
   ping crow.local
   # Or check your router's DHCP client list

4. SSH in:

   ssh crow@crow.local

Step 3: Run the Installer

One command installs everything:

curl -sSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/kh0pper/crow/main/scripts/crow-install.sh | bash

Prefer to inspect first?

curl -sSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/kh0pper/crow/main/scripts/crow-install.sh -o crow-install.sh
less crow-install.sh   # Review the script
bash crow-install.sh   # Run it

The installer takes 5-10 minutes and sets up:

• Node.js 20, Docker, Caddy, Avahi (mDNS)
• Crow platform with SQLite database
• Cryptographic identity (Crow ID)
• systemd service for auto-start
• HTTPS via self-signed certificate
• Firewall (UFW) + fail2ban

Step 4: Open the Setup Wizard

From any device on your network, open:

https://crow.local/setup

Browser Warning

You'll see a certificate warning because the self-signed cert isn't trusted by browsers. This is normal for local network access. Click "Advanced" → "Proceed" to continue. For valid certificates, set up Tailscale or add a domain.

The setup wizard walks you through:

1. Set Crow's Nest password — required before accessing the Crow's Nest
2. View your Crow ID — your cryptographic identity for P2P sharing
3. Configure integrations — add API keys for GitHub, Gmail, etc.

Want your blog accessible from the internet?

Your blog is available on your local network at https://crow.local/blog. To make it publicly accessible, see Making Your Blog Public in the Tailscale section below.

Step 5: Connect Your AI Platform

Your Crow instance is now running. Connect it from any AI platform:

Claude Web/Mobile: Settings → Integrations → Add Custom → https://crow.local/memory/mcp

ChatGPT: Settings → Apps → Create → https://crow.local/memory/sse

Claude Code: Add to ~/.claude/mcp.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "crow-memory": {
      "url": "https://crow.local/memory/mcp"
    }
  }
}

See the Platforms guide for all supported AI clients.

Managing Your Crow

Useful Commands

# Platform status
crow status

# View gateway logs
sudo journalctl -u crow-gateway -f

# Restart gateway
sudo systemctl restart crow-gateway

# Install a bundle add-on
crow bundle install ollama
crow bundle start ollama

# Update Crow
bash ~/.crow/app/scripts/crow-update.sh

Crow's Nest

Access the Crow's Nest at https://crow.local/dashboard — manage messages, blog posts, files, and settings from your browser.

Installing Add-ons

Install self-hosted services as bundle add-ons:

crow bundle install ollama      # Local AI models
crow bundle install nextcloud   # File sync
crow bundle install immich      # Photo library

Or ask your AI: "Install the Ollama add-on."

Optional: Remote Access with Tailscale

Access your Crow from anywhere with Tailscale (free for personal use):

# Install Tailscale
curl -fsSL https://tailscale.com/install.sh | sh
sudo tailscale up

# Get your Tailscale hostname
tailscale status

Then update Caddy for automatic valid HTTPS certificates:

sudo tee /etc/caddy/Caddyfile > /dev/null << EOF
crow.your-tailnet.ts.net {
    reverse_proxy localhost:3001
}
EOF
sudo systemctl restart caddy

See the Tailscale Setup Guide for detailed instructions.

Chain with a cloud instance

Your Pi can sync with an always-free cloud instance for redundancy. If the Pi goes offline, your data is still accessible from the cloud. Set up Oracle Cloud or Google Cloud, then chain them — memories sync automatically when the Pi comes back online.

Making Your Blog Public

Once Tailscale is installed, you can use Tailscale Funnel to make your blog accessible from the public internet — no port forwarding or domain registration needed.

# Enable Funnel in your Tailscale admin console first:
# https://login.tailscale.com/admin/dns → Enable Funnel

# Expose your gateway publicly
tailscale funnel --bg --https=443 http://localhost:3001

Your blog is now at https://<hostname>.your-tailnet.ts.net/blog. The Crow's Nest remains private — public IPs get a 403 response, so only the blog is effectively visible.

To set the public URL for correct RSS/social preview links:

# Add to your .env
CROW_GATEWAY_URL=https://<hostname>.your-tailnet.ts.net

Optional: Custom Domain

If you have a domain, point it at your Pi's IP and update the Caddyfile:

sudo tee /etc/caddy/Caddyfile > /dev/null << EOF
crow.yourdomain.com {
    reverse_proxy localhost:3001
}
EOF
sudo systemctl restart caddy

Caddy automatically provisions Let's Encrypt certificates.

Troubleshooting

Can't find crow.local

• Make sure Avahi is running: sudo systemctl status avahi-daemon
• mDNS may not work across VLANs — use the IP address directly
• On Windows, install Bonjour Print Services for mDNS support

Gateway won't start

sudo systemctl status crow-gateway
sudo journalctl -u crow-gateway --no-pager -n 50

Out of disk space

# Check disk usage
df -h

# Clean Docker images
docker system prune -a

# Check Crow data size
du -sh ~/.crow/data/

Performance

• Use an NVMe SSD instead of microSD for dramatically better I/O performance
• The Pi 5 is ~2-3x faster than the Pi 4 for Node.js workloads
• If running Ollama, use the smallest models (llama3.2:1b, phi3:mini) — larger models will be very slow on ARM