IT-Tools: an essential web toolkit for IT pros

1.Introduction
IT-Tools is a very practical toolbox for all “techies” and IT professionals: a single web interface groups dozens and dozens of ready-to-use tools. The icing on the cake: it is an open source project that can be self-hosted on a workstation, a server or a NAS.

We will start with a presentation of this toolkit before talking about its quick installation with Docker. In the same spirit as IT-Tools, we can cite another toolbox mentioned in a previous article: CyberChef.

2.What is IT-Tools?
IT-Tools is an open source project created by Corentin Thomasset, a Frenchman (from Lyon), and which contains many tools organized in several categories. The project is available on GitHub https://github.com/CorentinTh/it-tools and there is also an online version accessible at it-tools.tech.

• Tools for the network
  • Calculate an IP subnet.
  • Convert an IP address (in binary, for example).
  • Get information about a MAC address.
  • Generate a new MAC address.
  • Generate your own local IP addresses in IPV6, non-routable, for your network (RFC4193 compliant).
  • Etc…

• Convert data from one format to another
  • Convert the date and time, for example, a timestamp to ISO 8601 format or UTC format.
  • Convert a color code to hexadecimal format, RGB format, etc… from a selector.
  • Transform the case of a string of characters to different formats.
  • Convert Markdown text to HTML and allow printing (in PDF).
  • Convert YAML code to JSON format.
  • Etc…

• Perform cryptographic operations
  • Generate a token
  • Get the hash of a text (MD5, SHA1, SHA256, SHA512, etc.).
  • Hash and compare a text string using bcrypt.
  • Generate UUIDs or ulids.
  • Encrypt a clear text and decrypt a ciphertext using cryptographic algorithms such as AES, TripleDES, Rabbit or RC4.
  • Generate a new private and public RSA key pair.
  • Analyze the strength of a password.
  • Verify the signature of a PDF document
  • Etc…

• Perform web-related actions
  • Encode a text in URL format.
  • Parse a URL (parsing).
  • Get information about the local machine (resolution, browser, etc.).
  • Analyze and decode your JSON Web token (jwt) and display its contents.
  • Detect and analyze user-agent chains.
  • Getting information about an HTTP code
  • Decode Outlook SafeLink links
  • Etc…

• Tools around images and videos
  • Generate personalized QR codes.
  • Generate QR codes to share a Wi-Fi network.
  • Perform a video recording from the browser.
  • Etc…

• Tools for developers
  • Convert a docker run command to a Docker Compose file (great!)
  • Crontab generator
  • Minifying JSON code
  • Formatting SQL queries
  • Evaluate a regular expression
  • Etc…

In addition, there are other tools to check the format of an IBAN, obtain statistics on a text (number of words, number of characters, etc.), or even transform a text into ASCII Art.

3.Deploy IT-Tool with Docker

To deploy IT-Tools (an open-source collection of browser-based developer tools) using Docker, follow these steps:

✅ Prerequisites

• Docker installed on your system
• Git installed (optional but recommended)

🚀 Deployment Steps

1. Clone the Repository (Optional)

If you want to build from the source:

bashCopierModifiergit clone https://github.com/CorentinTh/it-tools.git
cd it-tools

2. Use the Prebuilt Docker Image (Recommended)

You can pull and run the official Docker image directly:

bashCopierModifierdocker run -d \
  --name it-tools \
  -p 8080:80 \
  ghcr.io/corentinth/it-tools:latest

This runs IT-Tools on port 8080 (http://localhost:8080).

🔧 Optional: Build Your Own Docker Image

If you want to customize or self-host from source:

bashCopierModifier# Inside the cloned repo
docker build -t my-it-tools .

docker run -d \
  --name it-tools \
  -p 8080:80 \
  my-it-tools

📦 Dockerfile (If building manually)

If needed, here’s a basic Dockerfile:

DockerfileCopierModifierFROM node:18 as builder

WORKDIR /app
COPY . .
RUN npm install && npm run build

FROM nginx:alpine
COPY --from=builder /app/dist /usr/share/nginx/html
EXPOSE 80
CMD ["nginx", "-g", "daemon off;"]

🔄 Updating

To update, just pull the latest image:

bashCopierModifierdocker pull ghcr.io/corentinth/it-tools:latest
docker stop it-tools && docker rm it-tools
docker run -d --name it-tools -p 8080:80 ghcr.io/corentinth/it-tools:latest

yamlCopierModifierversion: '3'

services:
  it-tools:
    image: ghcr.io/corentinth/it-tools:latest
    container_name: it-tools
    ports:
      - "8080:80"
    restart: unless-stopped

bashCopierModifierdocker-compose up -d

vbnetCopierModifier┌────────────────────┐
│  User's Web Browser│
└─────────┬──────────┘
          │ HTTP
          ▼
┌────────────────────┐
│    Host Machine     │
│                    │
│  ┌────────────────┐│
│  │  Docker Engine ││
│  └──────┬─────────┘│
│         ▼          │
│  ┌────────────────┐│
│  │ IT-Tools Image ││
│  │  (Nginx + App) ││
│  └────────────────┘│
│     Listens on 80   │
└─────────┬───────────┘
          │
          ▼
      Exposed to Host
     via port 8080:80

bashCopierModifierssh root@your-vps-ip

bashCopierModifier# Install Docker
curl -fsSL https://get.docker.com -o get-docker.sh
sh get-docker.sh

# Install Docker Compose
sudo curl -L "https://github.com/docker/compose/releases/latest/download/docker-compose-$(uname -s)-$(uname -m)" -o /usr/local/bin/docker-compose
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/docker-compose

bashCopierModifiermkdir -p /opt/it-tools
cd /opt/it-tools

bashCopierModifiernano docker-compose.yml

yamlCopierModifierversion: '3'

services:
  it-tools:
    image: ghcr.io/corentinth/it-tools:latest
    container_name: it-tools
    ports:
      - "80:80"
    restart: unless-stopped

bashCopierModifierdocker-compose up -d