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Northship Docs

Domains

Northship uses Caddy to route traffic and manage certificates once DNS resolves to the server.

Control Plane Domain

Section titled “Control Plane Domain”

The control plane domain serves Northship itself:

A     pilot.example.com     YOUR_SERVER_IPV4
AAAA  pilot.example.com     YOUR_SERVER_IPV6

Set or update this hostname during onboarding or in system settings.

Wildcard Root Domain

Section titled “Wildcard Root Domain”

Set a wildcard root domain to generate service hostnames automatically.

DNS record:

A     *.pilot.example.com     YOUR_SERVER_IPV4
AAAA  *.pilot.example.com     YOUR_SERVER_IPV6

With this configured, services can receive hostnames like:

api.pilot.example.com
web.pilot.example.com
worker.pilot.example.com

Database services can also receive generated public hostnames when database public access is enabled.

Custom Domains

Section titled “Custom Domains”

For a custom domain, point DNS at the same server:

A     app.example.com     YOUR_SERVER_IPV4
AAAA  app.example.com     YOUR_SERVER_IPV6

Then add the domain to the service in Northship. Caddy handles routing and certificates after DNS resolves.

Service Domain Tab

Section titled “Service Domain Tab”

The service Domains tab shows:

  • The hostname.
  • Whether the domain is active or pending.
  • The target A record.
  • The server IP to point at.
  • DNS provider actions when a provider is connected.
  • Refresh and verify action for propagation checks.

Local loopback domains such as localhost do not need public DNS records.

Caddy Behavior

Section titled “Caddy Behavior”

Caddy serves the Northship dashboard, app services, static sites, and custom domains. Northship rewrites and reloads Caddy configuration when domain settings change.

If Caddy reload fails, Northship surfaces the reload detail in the deployment or settings flow. Check Caddy logs from the server when DNS is correct but routing still fails.

DNS Checklist

Section titled “DNS Checklist”
  • The hostname resolves to the server.
  • Ports 80 and 443 are reachable.
  • No other process is bound to those public ports.
  • Caddy is running through the Northship Docker Compose stack.
  • The service is deployed and active.
  • The service internal port matches the app container’s listening port.
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