# Ghost: your first steps

> What the one-click install contains, your owner login, newsletters and how to update.

Source: https://veldhost.eu/docs/ghost-getting-started

Picked Ghost? Your site came with Ghost installed on the Node.js runtime — the publishing platform for blogs, newsletters and memberships.

## What gets installed

- **Ghost 6** from the official npm package (pinned; npm checks every file against the registry's published checksum), running as a systemd service on Node.js 22 with its own **MariaDB** database in your container.
- Your **owner account** (the email address on your veldhost account), the publication named after your site, the Casper theme, and `content/` for themes, images and files next to the code.
- Ghost's settings live in `config.production.json` in the site's code root (Files tab): the public address, the database and the mail transport.

## First login

1. Your site page in the portal shows the sign-in address (`/ghost/`), your login email and a generated password — we display it for 7 days, so save it now.
2. Sign in, then set your own password under **Settings → Staff → your profile**.
3. Write your first post; set the publication title, description and logo under **Settings → General**.
4. Newsletters and paid memberships need an email provider (Ghost uses Mailgun for bulk mail) and Stripe — connect both under **Settings → Email newsletter** and **Settings → Membership**. Transactional mail (invites, password resets) needs a `mail` transport in `config.production.json`.

## Updating

- Press **Back up now** on the Files tab first.
- Change the `ghost` version in `package.json` (Files tab) to the release you want, then run a deploy on the Deploy tab: it runs `npm install`, restarts the app, and Ghost migrates its database on start.
- Ghost majors need a matching Node.js major; the Node card on your site page switches it.

## Limits

- Ghost needs 1 GB of memory, so it is a Pro-or-higher app; the install itself briefly borrows more memory for `npm install`, which we arrange automatically.
- Ghost supports MySQL 8 officially; our container database is MariaDB, which Ghost runs on today (we exercise every release on it before we offer it), but a future Ghost release may drop it — we will say so here first.