How to Install Shynet on Windows 11

In this tutorial, we will guide you on how to install Shynet on Windows 11. Shynet is an open-source, self-hosted analytics service that provides a simple, lightweight, and privacy-friendly alternative to services like Google Analytics.

Prerequisites

Before we proceed with the installation, please make sure that you have the following:

A Windows 11 machine
Node.js and NPM installed
A MySQL server

Installation Steps

First, we need to clone the Shynet repository from GitHub. Open PowerShell or Command Prompt and execute the following command:
```
git clone https://github.com/milesmcc/shynet.git
```
This will clone the repository to your machine.
Change your directory to the Shynet folder:
```
cd shynet
```
Next, we need to install the required dependencies. Execute the following command:
```
npm install
```
Now, we need to create a .env file in the root directory of the Shynet folder. You can create this file using any text editor. Inside the .env file, we need to define the following variables:
```
MYSQL_HOST=localhost
MYSQL_PORT=3306
MYSQL_DATABASE=shynet
MYSQL_USER=username
MYSQL_PASSWORD=password
```
Replace username and password with your MySQL username and password respectively. You can also change the MYSQL_DATABASE variable if you want to use a different database name.
Once you have created the .env file, we need to create the Shynet database on your MySQL server. You can do this using any MySQL tool like MySQL Workbench or Sequel Pro. Create a new database with the name specified in the MYSQL_DATABASE variable.
After creating the database, we need to run the migrations to create the required tables in the database. Execute the following command:
```
npm run migrate-up
```
Next, we need to start the Shynet server. Execute the following command:
```
npm start
```
This will start the server on port 8080.
Finally, visit http://localhost:8080 on your web browser to access the Shynet dashboard. You can now start tracking your website analytics using Shynet.

Conclusion

That's it! You have successfully installed Shynet on your Windows 11 machine. With Shynet, you can now easily track website analytics without compromising on privacy.