milvus Installation Guide Installation Guide

milvus is a free and open-source vector database for AI applications. Milvus is designed to store, index, and search embedding vectors for AI applications, serving as an open-source alternative to Pinecone or Weaviate cloud

Hardware Requirements:

CPU: 4+ cores recommended

RAM: 8GB minimum (16GB+ recommended)

Storage: 10GB+ for vectors

Network: gRPC and HTTP access

Operating System:

Linux: Any modern distribution (RHEL, Debian, Ubuntu, CentOS, Fedora, Arch, Alpine, openSUSE)

macOS: 10.14+ (Mojave or newer)

Windows: Windows Server 2016+ or Windows 10

FreeBSD: 11.0+

Network Requirements:

Port 19530 (default milvus port)

Port 9091 for metrics

Dependencies:

See official documentation for specific requirements

System Access: root or sudo privileges required

This guide supports installation on:

RHEL 8/9 and derivatives (CentOS Stream, Rocky Linux, AlmaLinux)

Debian 11/12

Ubuntu 20.04/22.04/24.04 LTS

Arch Linux (rolling release)

Alpine Linux 3.18+

openSUSE Leap 15.5+ / Tumbleweed

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) 15+

macOS 12+ (Monterey and later)

FreeBSD 13+

Windows 10/11/Server 2019+ (where applicable)

bash

# Install EPEL repository if needed
sudo dnf install -y epel-release

# Install milvus
sudo dnf install -y milvus

# Enable and start service
sudo systemctl enable --now milvus

# Configure firewall
sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-port=19530/tcp
sudo firewall-cmd --reload

# Verify installation
milvus --version

bash

# Update package index
sudo apt update

# Install milvus
sudo apt install -y milvus

# Enable and start service
sudo systemctl enable --now milvus

# Configure firewall
sudo ufw allow 19530

# Verify installation
milvus --version

bash

# Install milvus
sudo pacman -S milvus

# Enable and start service
sudo systemctl enable --now milvus

# Verify installation
milvus --version

bash

# Install milvus
apk add --no-cache milvus

# Enable and start service
rc-update add milvus default
rc-service milvus start

# Verify installation
milvus --version

bash

# Install milvus
sudo zypper install -y milvus

# Enable and start service
sudo systemctl enable --now milvus

# Configure firewall
sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-port=19530/tcp
sudo firewall-cmd --reload

# Verify installation
milvus --version

bash

# Using Homebrew
brew install milvus

# Start service
brew services start milvus

# Verify installation
milvus --version

bash

# Using pkg
pkg install milvus

# Enable in rc.conf
echo 'milvus_enable="YES"' >> /etc/rc.conf

# Start service
service milvus start

# Verify installation
milvus --version

bash

# Using Chocolatey
choco install milvus

# Or using Scoop
scoop install milvus

# Verify installation
milvus --version

bash

# Create configuration directory
sudo mkdir -p /etc/milvus

# Set up basic configuration
# See official documentation for detailed configuration options

# Test configuration
milvus --version

bash

# Enable service
sudo systemctl enable milvus

# Start service
sudo systemctl start milvus

# Stop service
sudo systemctl stop milvus

# Restart service
sudo systemctl restart milvus

# Check status
sudo systemctl status milvus

# View logs
sudo journalctl -u milvus -f

bash

# Enable service
rc-update add milvus default

# Start service
rc-service milvus start

# Stop service
rc-service milvus stop

# Restart service
rc-service milvus restart

# Check status
rc-service milvus status

bash

# Enable in /etc/rc.conf
echo 'milvus_enable="YES"' >> /etc/rc.conf

# Start service
service milvus start

# Stop service
service milvus stop

# Restart service
service milvus restart

# Check status
service milvus status

bash

# Using Homebrew services
brew services start milvus
brew services stop milvus
brew services restart milvus

# Check status
brew services list | grep milvus

powershell

# Start service
net start milvus

# Stop service
net stop milvus

# Using PowerShell
Start-Service milvus
Stop-Service milvus
Restart-Service milvus

# Check status
Get-Service milvus

See the official documentation for advanced configuration options.

nginx

upstream milvus_backend {
    server 127.0.0.1:19530;
}

server {
    listen 80;
    server_name milvus.example.com;
    return 301 https://$server_name$request_uri;
}

server {
    listen 443 ssl http2;
    server_name milvus.example.com;

    ssl_certificate /etc/ssl/certs/milvus.example.com.crt;
    ssl_certificate_key /etc/ssl/private/milvus.example.com.key;

    location / {
        proxy_pass http://milvus_backend;
        proxy_set_header Host $host;
        proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
    }
}

apache

<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerName milvus.example.com
    Redirect permanent / https://milvus.example.com/
</VirtualHost>

<VirtualHost *:443>
    ServerName milvus.example.com
    
    SSLEngine on
    SSLCertificateFile /etc/ssl/certs/milvus.example.com.crt
    SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/ssl/private/milvus.example.com.key
    
    ProxyRequests Off
    ProxyPreserveHost On
    
    ProxyPass / http://127.0.0.1:19530/
    ProxyPassReverse / http://127.0.0.1:19530/
</VirtualHost>

haproxy

frontend milvus_frontend
    bind *:80
    bind *:443 ssl crt /etc/ssl/certs/milvus.pem
    redirect scheme https if !{ ssl_fc }
    default_backend milvus_backend

backend milvus_backend
    balance roundrobin
    server milvus1 127.0.0.1:19530 check

bash

# Set appropriate permissions
sudo chown -R milvus:milvus /etc/milvus
sudo chmod 750 /etc/milvus

# Configure firewall
sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-port=19530/tcp
sudo firewall-cmd --reload

# Enable SELinux policies (if applicable)
sudo setsebool -P httpd_can_network_connect on

See official documentation for database configuration requirements.

bash

# Basic system tuning
echo 'net.core.somaxconn = 65535' | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf
echo 'net.ipv4.tcp_max_syn_backlog = 65535' | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf
sudo sysctl -p

bash

# Check service status
sudo systemctl status milvus

# View logs
sudo journalctl -u milvus -f

# Monitor resource usage
top -p $(pgrep milvus)

bash

#!/bin/bash
# Basic backup script
BACKUP_DIR="/backup/milvus"
DATE=$(date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S)

mkdir -p "$BACKUP_DIR"
tar -czf "$BACKUP_DIR/milvus-backup-$DATE.tar.gz" /etc/milvus /var/lib/milvus

echo "Backup completed: $BACKUP_DIR/milvus-backup-$DATE.tar.gz"

bash

# Stop service
sudo systemctl stop milvus

# Restore from backup
tar -xzf /backup/milvus/milvus-backup-*.tar.gz -C /

# Start service
sudo systemctl start milvus

1. Service won't start:

bash

# Check logs
sudo journalctl -u milvus -n 100
sudo tail -f /var/log/milvus/milvus.log

# Check configuration
milvus --version

# Check permissions
ls -la /etc/milvus

2. Connection issues:

bash

# Check if service is listening
sudo ss -tlnp | grep 19530

# Test connectivity
telnet localhost 19530

# Check firewall
sudo firewall-cmd --list-all

3. Performance issues:

bash

# Check resource usage
top -p $(pgrep milvus)

# Check disk I/O
iotop -p $(pgrep milvus)

# Check connections
ss -an | grep 19530

yaml

version: '3.8'
services:
  milvus:
    image: milvus:latest
    ports:
      - "19530:19530"
    volumes:
      - ./config:/etc/milvus
      - ./data:/var/lib/milvus
    restart: unless-stopped

Maintenance

bash

# RHEL/CentOS/Rocky/AlmaLinux
sudo dnf update milvus

# Debian/Ubuntu
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade milvus

# Arch Linux
sudo pacman -Syu milvus

# Alpine Linux
apk update && apk upgrade milvus

# openSUSE
sudo zypper update milvus

# FreeBSD
pkg update && pkg upgrade milvus

# Always backup before updates
tar -czf /backup/milvus-pre-update-$(date +%Y%m%d).tar.gz /etc/milvus

# Restart after updates
sudo systemctl restart milvus

Regular Maintenance

bash

# Log rotation
sudo logrotate -f /etc/logrotate.d/milvus

# Clean old logs
find /var/log/milvus -name "*.log" -mtime +30 -delete

# Check disk usage
du -sh /var/lib/milvus

Official Documentation: https://docs.milvus.org/

GitHub Repository: https://github.com/milvus/milvus

Community Forum: https://forum.milvus.org/

Best Practices Guide: https://docs.milvus.org/best-practices

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Note: This guide is part of the HowToMgr collection. Always refer to official documentation for the most up-to-date information.

1. Prerequisites

2. Supported Operating Systems

3. Installation

RHEL/CentOS/Rocky Linux/AlmaLinux

Debian/Ubuntu

Arch Linux

Alpine Linux

openSUSE/SLES

macOS

FreeBSD

Windows

Initial Configuration

Basic Configuration

5. Service Management

systemd (RHEL, Debian, Ubuntu, Arch, openSUSE)

OpenRC (Alpine Linux)

rc.d (FreeBSD)

launchd (macOS)

Windows Service Manager

Advanced Configuration

Reverse Proxy Setup

nginx Configuration

Apache Configuration

HAProxy Configuration

Security Configuration

Basic Security Setup

Database Setup

Performance Optimization

System Tuning

Monitoring

Basic Monitoring

9. Backup and Restore

Backup Script

Restore Procedure

6. Troubleshooting

Common Issues

Integration Examples

Docker Compose Example

Maintenance

Update Procedures

Regular Maintenance

Additional Resources

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