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Quick Start

Get your first LocalCloud project running in 5 minutes. We’ll create a simple AI chat application that runs entirely on your local machine.
Make sure you’ve installed LocalCloud before starting this guide.

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Create Your First Project

1

Initialize the project

# Create a new directory and initialize
mkdir my-ai-app
cd my-ai-app
lc setup
This creates a .localcloud directory with your project configuration.
2

Configure services

# Run interactive setup
lc setup
Select the services you want:
  • AI Model: Choose a model (e.g., llama2, mistral, qwen2.5)
  • Database: PostgreSQL for data storage
  • Cache: Redis for performance
  • Storage: MinIO for file storage
3

Start services

# Start all configured services
lc start
LocalCloud will:
  • Download required Docker images
  • Start all services
  • Configure networking
  • Show connection details

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Verify Everything is Running

Check the status of your services: 
lc status
You should see output like: 
LocalCloud Status
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Project: my-ai-app
Status: Running

Services:
✓ AI (Ollama)       http://localhost:11434    [Running]
✓ Database          localhost:5432            [Running]
✓ Cache             localhost:6379            [Running]
✓ Storage           http://localhost:9000     [Running]

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Test the AI Service

Let’s test that the AI model is working: 
curl http://localhost:11434/api/generate -d '{
"model": "llama2",
"prompt": "Hello! What is LocalCloud?",
"stream": false
}'

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Connect to Services

Each service is now accessible locally:

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AI Model (Ollama)

  • API: http://localhost:11434
  • Models endpoint: http://localhost:11434/api/tags
  • Compatible with OpenAI API format

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PostgreSQL Database

  • Host: localhost
  • Port: 5432
  • Username: localcloud
  • Password: localcloud
  • Database: localcloud
Connection string: 
postgresql://localcloud:localcloud@localhost:5432/localcloud

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Redis Cache

  • Host: localhost
  • Port: 6379
  • No authentication by default

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MinIO Storage

  • API: http://localhost:9000
  • Console: http://localhost:9001
  • Access Key: minioadmin
  • Secret Key: minioadmin

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Build a Simple Chat Application

Let’s create a basic chat application using the services:
  • Python
  • Node.js
Create app.py:
import requests
from flask import Flask, request, jsonify
import redis
import psycopg2

app = Flask(__name__)

# Connect to services
redis_client = redis.Redis(host='localhost', port=6379)
db = psycopg2.connect(
"postgresql://localcloud:localcloud@localhost:5432/localcloud"
)

@app.route('/chat', methods=['POST'])
def chat():
message = request.json['message']

# Check cache first
cached = redis_client.get(f"response:{message}")
if cached:
return jsonify({'response': cached.decode()})

# Call AI model
response = requests.post('http://localhost:11434/api/generate',
json={
'model': 'llama2',
'prompt': message,
'stream': False
}
)

ai_response = response.json()['response']

# Cache the response
redis_client.setex(f"response:{message}", 3600, ai_response)

# Store in database
with db.cursor() as cur:
cur.execute(
"INSERT INTO chats (message, response) VALUES (%s, %s)",
(message, ai_response)
)
db.commit()

return jsonify({'response': ai_response})

if __name__ == '__main__':
# Create table if not exists
with db.cursor() as cur:
cur.execute("""
CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS chats (
id SERIAL PRIMARY KEY,
message TEXT,
response TEXT,
created_at TIMESTAMP DEFAULT CURRENT_TIMESTAMP
)
""")
db.commit()

app.run(port=5000)
Run the app:
pip install flask requests redis psycopg2-binary
python app.py
Test your chat application: 
curl -X POST http://localhost:5000/chat \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"message": "What is the capital of France?"}'

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Managing Your Project

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View logs

# All services
lc logs

# Specific service
lc logs ai

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Stop services

# Stop all services
lc stop

# Stop specific service
lc stop postgres

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Add more models

# List available models
lc models list

# Pull a new model
lc models pull mistral

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Check resource usage

lc info

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What’s Next?

Congratulations! You now have a fully functional local AI development environment. Here’s what you can explore next:

CLI Commands

Master all LocalCloud commands

Service Configuration

Customize your services

AI Models

Explore available AI models

Examples

See more example applications

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Tips

Model Performance: Smaller models like qwen2.5:3b or phi3 run faster on modest hardware. Start with these if you have limited resources.
First Start: The initial lc start may take several minutes as Docker images are downloaded. Subsequent starts will be much faster.
Data Persistence: All your data is stored in Docker volumes. Use lc reset --hard only if you want to completely remove all data.
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