open-vault/website/source/docs/install/install.html.md

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install Install Vault docs-install-install Learn how to install Vault.

Install Vault

Installing Vault is simple. There are two approaches to installing Vault: downloading a precompiled binary for your system, or installing from source.

Downloading a precompiled binary is easiest, and we provide downloads over TLS along with SHA256 sums to verify the binary is what we say it is. We also distribute a PGP signature with the SHA256 sums that can be verified. However, we use a 3rd party storage host, and some people feel that due to the importance of security with Vault, they'd rather compile it from source.

For this reason, we also document on this page how to compile Vault from source, from the same versions of all dependent libraries that we used for the official builds.

Precompiled Binaries

To install the precompiled binary, download the appropriate package for your system. Vault is currently packaged as a zip file. We don't have any near term plans to provide system packages.

Once the zip is downloaded, unzip it into any directory. The vault binary inside is all that is necessary to run Vault (or vault.exe for Windows). Any additional files, if any, aren't required to run Vault.

Copy the binary to anywhere on your system. If you intend to access it from the command-line, make sure to place it somewhere on your PATH.

Compiling from Source

To compile from source, you'll need Go installed and configured properly. You'll also need Git.

  1. Clone the Vault repository into your GOPATH: https://github.com/hashicorp/vault

  2. Verify that the file $GOPATH/src/github.com/hashicorp/vault/main.go exists. If it doesn't, then you didn't clone Vault into the proper path.

  3. Run make dev. This will build Vault for your current system and put the binary in bin (relative to the git checkout).

~> Note: All the dependencies of Vault are vendored and the command above will use these vendored binaries. This is to avoid malicious upstream dependencies if possible.

Verifying the Installation

To verify Vault is properly installed, execute the vault binary on your system. You should see help output. If you are executing it from the command line, make sure it is on your PATH or you may get an error about vault not being found.