Provision With DigitalOcean

Servestead can create one Ubuntu DigitalOcean Droplet, wait for its public IPv4 address, and save it as a local profile. Provisioning and server setup are separate actions: the new Droplet is not bootstrapped or hardened until you review and run setup.

Provisioning is billable

Submitting a provisioning action calls the DigitalOcean API and creates a real Droplet. The browser form does not load live prices or add a separate confirmation screen. Use the guided Terminal UI when you want catalog details and an explicit typed confirmation before creation.

Choose the Right Provisioning Path

Path	Best when	Guardrails
Profiles → New DigitalOcean profile	You already know the region, size, image slugs, and SSH key identifier.	Concise form; submission creates the Droplet immediately.
servestead setup Terminal UI	You want guided catalog selection.	Loads regions, sizes, Ubuntu images, SSH keys, hourly/monthly prices, and requires an exact confirmation phrase.

The Provision a new DigitalOcean VPS card in the browser Setup Workbench currently directs you to the existing Terminal UI path. Browser provisioning itself is under Profiles.

Browser Path

Open New DigitalOcean profile from Profiles when you already know the exact provider slugs and SSH key identifier.

1. Launch Servestead Web and open Profiles.
2. Expand New DigitalOcean profile.
3. Enter a short-lived API token, Droplet name, region slug, size slug, image slug, and SSH key ID or fingerprint.
4. Verify every value before selecting Provision profile. Submission creates the billable Droplet.
5. Wait for the new profile to appear, then select Setup and complete the profile, GitOps, and review steps.

Defaults shown by the browser form are:

Setting	Value
Region	nyc3
Size	s-1vcpu-1gb
Image	ubuntu-24-04-x64

Expected Result

The profile appears with DigitalOcean cloud metadata and a public IPv4 address. Setup remains incomplete until you explicitly review and run it.

Guided Terminal UI Path

./bin/servestead setup

Choose Provision a new DigitalOcean VPS. The Terminal UI loads live provider choices and prices, offers to upload the local public key when needed, and requires the exact displayed confirmation phrase.

You can provide the token for the current session through a masked prompt or the environment:

export DIGITALOCEAN_ACCESS_TOKEN='...'
./bin/servestead setup

The token is not saved in the profile metadata or profile secrets.

Restart or Destroy

Open the selected profile, choose Cloud, and provide a DigitalOcean token for the action.

• Restart requests a Droplet reboot.
• Destroy requires the exact displayed phrase and permanently deletes the remote Droplet.
• Destroy keeps the local profile, secrets, state, and logs; the profile is marked as destroyed.

Delete unused Droplets in DigitalOcean when testing is complete.