Deploying Changedetection, an Open-Source Website Change Monitoring and Notification Tool, on ClawCloud

May 27, 2025

ClawCloud

ClawCloud (also known as “Claw Cloud” or “A Claw Cloud”) is an emerging cloud service provider that primarily offers cost-effective VPS (Virtual Private Server) and cloud-native application deployment platform ClawCloud Run. Their services cover multiple regions, including Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, Germany, and the United States. Recently, ClawCloud has offered a special promotion:

$5 monthly free credit for eligible GitHub users (GitHub accounts registered for more than 180 days)
If your GitHub account is less than 180 days old, as long as it’s over 7 days or you log in with a Google account, you’ll still receive $5 free credit for the first month

Official Website

Changedetection

Changedetection is an open-source website content change detection and notification tool designed to help users monitor website content changes in real-time and send notifications through various channels when changes are detected.

Core Features

Website Change Detection: Periodically fetches target website content and compares it with previous versions to identify any subtle changes, such as product price changes, news updates, etc.
Multiple Notification Methods: Supports sending real-time notifications through various channels including email, Slack, Discord, Telegram, and Webhook, ensuring users can promptly receive website update information.
Flexible Deployment Options: Supports deployment using Docker or Python environment, allowing users to choose the most suitable method based on their needs.
Dynamic Website Content Support: Utilizes Chrome browser to extract website content, enabling the capture of dynamically generated content via JavaScript, enhancing support for dynamic websites.

Use Cases

E-commerce Price Monitoring: Monitor product price changes in real-time to catch promotional offers.
News Update Tracking: Track content updates on news websites to stay informed.
Government Announcement Monitoring: Monitor changes in government website announcements to stay updated on policy information.
Website Tampering Detection: Monitor website content for abnormal changes to detect potential security issues.

Official Website

Deployment Method

Open the ClawCloud Registration Page

Log in using Github or Google account authorization
- Click to log in using Github or Google account authorization
- Click the green Authorize ClawCloud button to authorize
- After successful authorization, you’ll be redirected to the workspace creation page. Choose a region can be selected randomly (can be changed later). Enter a workspace name in Create Workspace, then click the black Start Deploying button
Deploy the Dockerfile image
- After ClawCloud launched its free service, some domestic “MJJ” users abused it, causing high load on Japanese and Singapore servers. Since we selected “Japan” when creating the workspace earlier, we’ll change it to “Germany” here, as it has the lowest load among ClawCloud’s five free regions
- Click App Launchpad
- Click Create App in the top right corner
  
  In Application, enter any name you can remember
  
  In Image Name, enter dgtlmoon/changedetection.io
  
  Under Usage, select 0.5 for CPU and 1G for Memory
  
  Under Network, enter 5000 for Container Port, check Public Access. If you need a custom domain, click Custom Domain, enter your custom domain, then set up a CNAME record pointing to the address provided by ClawCloud
  
  In Command, enter python3 /app/changedetection.py.
  
  For Local Storage, click the + add button, enter /data in the Mount Path field in the popup window, then click confirm
  
  After all settings are complete, it should look like this
- After completing the settings, scroll to the top of the page and click Deploy Application in the top right corner to create the application. Wait until the Creating status in the top left changes to Running, and our Docker image will be deployed
Access Changedetection

After the Docker image deployment is complete, scroll down to find Network and check the status of your custom domain in Public Address. Once the status changes from Pending to Available, your custom domain will be accessible