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Install a custom plugin in Netbox

How to install a custom plugin in netbox?

Well, you want to install a custom plugin in your netbox service becouse what it provides isn't enough for you? If it is your case this is the right guide for you. So lets dig down e follow these steps.

Activate the Virtual Environment

First of all activate your virtual environment, you have to search for it, but if you followed the instructions provided by the official guide it should be located at /opt/netbox/venv, so type /opt/netbox and copy and paste this command line to activate it:

source venv/bin/activate

Have you done it? Hell yeah, now in your editor, prompt, console or whatever you are using your virtual environment activated should appear like this:

(venv) root@netbox:/opt/netbox#

Install the plugin

We need to know if the custom plugin is free to use in the general pypi package manager or is a private package. If it is a general free pypi package you just need to install it from it by this simple command:

pip install your-package-netbox-plugin

If it is a private package you need to have the access to it, then you should have something like this:

pip install your-package-netbox-custom-plugin --index-url https://__token__:<your_personal_token>@gitlab.eagleprojects.cloud/api/v4/projects/830/packages/pypi/simple

In Gitlab, when you push a package in the package registry you could found the right command line following these simple steps: Go to your project and in the sidebar search for Deploy and Package registry.

Then get the latest version of your package and open it (the latest one should be located as first in the list)

Now go to the install button in the top-right corner and copy the command line it provides.

As it says you will need a personal token to install the package, if you don't have one just follow the instructions provided by the guide linked to personal access token phrase.

Now that you have installed the package you need to go to the netbox configuration file and add your plugin/s.

The file could be found at this path: /opt/netbox/netbox/netbox/configuration.py then edit it and search for this keyword: PLUGINS if it is missing just add it and make is as a list, insert your plugin name and it's done.

At this point you should have activated your virtual environment, installed your plugin,plugin and added it to your netbox configurationconfiguration.

Lets start the migrations and run the service with your new plugin working by reloading it. Go to /opt/netbox/netbox and type:

python3 manage.py makemigrations your-package-netbox-plugin
python3 manage.py migrate netbox_licenses
systemctl restart netbox netbox-rq

Now the service and your plugins should be fully working!

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