FreeNAS: Install Tautulli

Installing Tautulli on your FreeNAS server alongside Plex is a great way to be able to monitor Plex’s playback activity and track various statistics. Tautulli is third party software which allows you to see a number of Plex statistics including what has been watched, who watched it, when and where they watched it, and how it was watched. All statistics are presented in a nice and clean interface with many tables and graphs, which makes it to see how your server is being utilized. Tautulli can also be integrated with Grafna, which is an open source analytics and monitoring program which can display data in an exceptionally professional and sleek way. I have not yet got around to playing with Grafna too much, but I will one day.

This article will show you how to install Tautulli to a new iocage jail or an existing iocage jail on your FreeNAS system. This method of install also allows for easy update of your Tautaulli install, unlike other methods.

This article is part of my series of FreeNas setup, configuration and install articles.

Installing Tautulli

First you will need to either create a new jail for Tautulli or choose to install it within an existing jail such as the jail in which you’ve installed Plex Media Server. Once you’re done that go to the jail’s command line and make sure the prerequisits are installed by running the following command:

pkg install python2 py27-setuptools py27-sqlite3 py27-openssl py27-pycryptodome security/ca_root_nss git-lite

We will want to install Tautulli in the /usr/local/share/Tautulli directory, so lets change to the right directory and then intsall using git:

cd /usr/local/share/
git clone https://github.com/Tautulli/Tautulli.git

We will now need to set the appropriate permissions for Tautulli. You can allow all users to run, which is probably safe within a jail, using the following command:

chmod -R 777 Tautulli

OR you can allow one specific user to run it using the following command (and replacing user and group with the appropriate values):

chown -R user:group Tautulli

That’s it! Tautulli is installed. Now lets run it and configure it to run automatically.

Run Tautulli

Now that Tautulli is installed it is time to start it up and check that all is working. From the command line interface in the jail, run the following:

python2 /usr/local/share/Tautulli/Tautulli.py

Now you should be able to access Tautulli from a computer on the same network by going to http://JAIL-IP:8181. You can find the jail’s IP address using the ifconfig command at the command line interface. If everything is running, we’re now ready to ensure that Tautulli starts when the system boots.

Automate Tautulli Startup

Tautulli comes with an init script that we will have run when the jail starts up. First we will need to ensure Tautulli is shut down, so from the web interface go to Settings > Shutdown. Now we will run the following commands at the command line interface:

Ensure user permissions are correct:
chown -R root:wheel /usr/local/share/Tautulli
Copy init script:
cp /usr/local/share/Tautulli/init-scripts/init.freenas /usr/local/etc/rc.d/tautulli
Set user to run Tautulli:
sysrc tautulli_user="root"
OR edit:
/usr/local/etc/rc.d/tautulli and changed the user in there.
Enable the service to run at boot:
sysrc tautulli_enable="YES"
Create a link to the python directory:
ln -s /usr/local/bin/python2 /usr/local/bin/python
Start the service:
service tautulli start

You can use service tautulli [start | stop | restart | status] to start/stop/restart or check the status of the Tautulli service.

As and alternate install method you can doe the following which works, but won’t update from the WebUI:

pkg install tautulli
sysrc "tautulli_enable=YES"

That’s it! Tautulli is up and running! Happy Tautulling!

~Raze