Public demo

A demo instance lets people try Holdall without creating an account. Run a separate Holdall, with its own data folder, and set:

DEMO_MODE=true
DEMO_RESET_MINUTES=60

How it behaves:

• Visitors land on /demo and get their own account, filled with made-up notes, tasks and events. Nobody sees another visitor’s data.
• Each demo account and its files are deleted DEMO_RESET_MINUTES after it was created (at least 5).
• Turned off on the server: video downloads, calendar connections and sync, plugin installs. Uploads are limited to 5 MB.
• There is no setup page and no admin account.
• At most 300 demo accounts exist at once, 30 can be opened per minute in total, and one address can open 5 every 10 minutes. Behind a proxy, set TRUST_PROXY=true so this limit applies to each visitor.

Danger

Never turn on DEMO_MODE on an instance that holds real data: the sign-in page is replaced by the demo page.

Free hosting on Render

A demo keeps nothing for long, so a free host without a disk is enough. The repository has a render.yaml file that sets everything up.

1. Create an account at https://render.com and connect your GitHub account.
2. New, Blueprint, then pick the Holdall repository. Render reads render.yaml and creates the holdall-demo web service, with a random APP_SECRET.
3. Change APP_URL in the service’s Environment if your address is not https://demo.holdall.site.
4. In Settings, Custom Domains, add your address. At your domain provider, add the CNAME record Render shows (for example demo pointing to holdall-demo.onrender.com).

Free Render services stop after 15 minutes without visits and take about a minute to start again. To keep the demo awake, create a free monitor at https://uptimerobot.com that opens https://demo.holdall.site/api/health every 5 minutes. One service running all month stays within Render’s free hours.

Render may restart a free service at any time. For a demo this only empties it earlier than planned.