Hi everyone,
updating Pi-hole always meant opening an SSH session just to type pihole -up. I understand why there is no update button in the web interface: the web server runs as the unprivileged pihole user and should never get root rights. So me and Claude built a small add-on that keeps it that way:
- The Update available! link in the footer opens a new page with a Start update now button.
- The button only creates a request file. A separate systemd service (root) watches for that file and runs
pihole -up, which is the only thing it can do. Nothing from the web request is passed to it. - The page shows the update output live, survives the FTL restart and reports success or failure.
- The page uses the normal Pi-hole login, and the start request is protected by the session's CSRF token.
- Pi-hole updates overwrite the web interface, so a second systemd unit watches
footer.jsand re-applies the button right after every update, including a manualpihole -up. If a future version changes the footer, the link simply falls back to GitHub, and nothing breaks.
Requirements: Pi-hole v6, bare-metal install with systemd (not Docker).
Install:
curl -sSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mace-de/Pihole_WebUI_Update/main/install.sh | sudo bash
Uninstall (restores the original files):
sudo /opt/pihole-webupdate/uninstall.sh
Code and details: Github Link
This is unofficial and not supported by the Pi-hole team. Please report problems on GitHub, not here. Feedback is welcome, and so is a word from the devs if this approach (request file + root service) would be acceptable for an official button.
Oliver
