Getting started

Overview

NoVPS Document is a flexible, NoSQL, MongoDB-compatible document database built on FerretDB — an open-source, Apache-licensed alternative to MongoDB. FerretDB speaks the MongoDB wire protocol, so you keep using your existing MongoDB drivers, tools and queries without the licensing constraints of MongoDB. Provisioning, updates and routine maintenance are handled by the platform; you get the connection details on the database page and spend your time on the product.

Key Features

• MongoDB-compatible API — connect with the official MongoDB drivers and popular ODMs such as Mongoose, and use the familiar CRUD, aggregation and indexing commands. NoVPS Document runs FerretDB 2.x; see the FerretDB documentation for the exact list of supported commands and known differences from MongoDB.
• 1 to 3 nodes — start with a single node for development and grow to a 3-node cluster with replication and automatic failover for production. The node configuration can be scaled up and the number of nodes changed after creation.
• Automatic backups — backups are taken on a schedule and stored in external secure storage. You can also create a backup manually at any time from the Backups tab and restore any backup into a new database with the same configuration.
• Point-in-time recovery — restore the database to any moment between the oldest backup and a couple of minutes ago, not only to a backup. See Restoring a database from a backup.
• Databases and users — create additional databases and users from the Databases & Users tab and grant each user read-only or full access per database.
• Private by default — the database has no public address. It is reachable only from the applications in your project that you explicitly allow.

Connecting

Connection details (host, port, user, password and a ready-to-use mongodb:// connection string) are shown on the database page. Pass these values to your application as secrets rather than committing them to the repository.

To reach the database from your laptop, for example to import data with mongoimport or open a GUI client such as MongoDB Compass, forward the port with the NoVPS CLI (novps port-forward database). The database becomes available on localhost for the duration of the session and nothing is opened up permanently.

Common Use Cases

• Applications written against MongoDB that you want to run without a MongoDB license
• Content, catalog and user-profile data with a flexible, evolving schema
• Event and log storage where documents are appended and queried by a few fields

Client Compatibility

Any MongoDB driver works out of the box with NoVPS Document. Supported libraries include, but are not limited to:

• pymongo motor
• mongodb (Node.js driver) mongoose
• mongo-go-driver
• mongodb-driver-sync (Java) Spring Data MongoDB
• MongoDB.Driver (.NET)
• mongosh mongoimport mongodump