OpenFaaS Cloud installation guide

Installing OpenFaaS Cloud (aka OFC) requires some initial setup with GitHub or GitLab and a working installation of OpenFaaS (aka OF). If you'd like help please see below for how to join the Slack workspace.

Pre-reqs

Kubernetes or Docker Swarm (Docker cannot be running with XFS as a backing file-system due to buildkit restrictions)
Registry account - Docker Hub account or private registry with TLS
OpenFaaS deployed with authentication enabled
Extended timeouts for the queue-worker, gateway and the backend provider

For the queue-worker, set the ack_wait field to 15m to allow for a Docker build of up to 15 minutes total.

Moving parts

You will create/deploy:

A GitHub App
A number of secrets
A stack of OpenFaaS functions via stack.yml
Customise limits for your functions
Setup a container image builder
(K8s only) Network Policies for openfaas and openfaas-fn namespaces

Optionally to enable Login to the dashboard

Create a GitHub OAuth 2.0 App
Create secrets for the "auth" service and enable login to the dashboard with GitHub
Add a number of /etc/host file entries or live DNS entries

Before you begin

You must enable basic auth to prevent user-functions from accessing the admin API of the gateway
A list of valid users is defined in the CUSTOMERS file in this GitHub repo, this acts as an ACL, but you can define your own
Swarm offers no isolation between functions (they can call each other)
For Kubernetes isolation can be applied through NetworkPolicy

Steps

Create your GitHub App

Create a GitHub app from your GitHub profile page.

Select these OAuth permissions:

"Repository contents" read-only
"Commit statuses" read and write
"Checks" read and write

Now select only the "push" event.
Where can this GitHub App be installed?

Any account

Save the new app.
Now download the private key for your GitHub App which we will use later in the guide for allowing OpenFaaS Cloud to write to Checks or Commit statuses when a build passes or fails.

The GitHub app will deliver webhooks to your OpenFaaS Cloud instance every time code is pushed in a user's function repository. Make sure you provide the public URL for your OpenFaaS gateway to the GitHub app:

With the router configured the URL should be like: http://system.openfaas.cloud/github-event
If you don't have the router configured remove the system- prefix from system-github-event in stack.yml and set the URL like: http://my.openfaas.cloud/functions/github-event

Create an internal trust secret

This secret will be used by each OpenFaaS Cloud function to validate requests and to sign calls it needs to make to other functions.

PAYLOAD_SECRET=$(head -c 12 /dev/urandom | shasum| cut -d' ' -f1)

Kubernetes:

Note: The secret is needed in both namespaces due to the of-builder service using this to validate requests.

kubectl create secret generic -n openfaas-fn payload-secret --from-literal payload-secret="$PAYLOAD_SECRET"
kubectl create secret generic -n openfaas payload-secret --from-literal payload-secret="$PAYLOAD_SECRET"

Swarm:

echo -n "$PAYLOAD_SECRET" | docker secret create payload-secret -

Set your GitHub App config

Set the App ID

Edit github.yml and populate with your GitHub App ID:

environment:
    github_app_id: "<app_id>"

Create a secret for the HMAC / webhook value:

Kubernetes:

WEBHOOK_SECRET="Long-Password-Phrase-Goes-Here"

kubectl create secret generic -n openfaas-fn github-webhook-secret --from-literal github-webhook-secret="$WEBHOOK_SECRET"

Swarm:

WEBHOOK_SECRET="Long-Password-Phrase-Goes-Here"
echo -n "$WEBHOOK_SECRET" | docker secret create github-webhook-secret -

Create a secret for your GitHub App's private key

Download the .pem file from the GitHub App page, then save it as a file named private-key with no extension.

Kubernetes

kubectl create secret generic private-key \
 --from-file=private-key -n openfaas-fn

Docker Swarm

docker secret create private-key private-key

Note: The default private key secret name is private-key. If needed different name can be specified by setting private_key_filename value in github.yml

private_key_filename: my-private-key

Setup your customer access control list (ACL)

Edit customers_url in gateway_config.yml.

Enter a list of GitHub usernames for your customers, these are case-sensitive.

Customize for Kubernetes or Swarm

By default all settings are prepared for Kubernetes, so if you're using Swarm do the following:

Edit hostnames

In gateway_config.yml and ./dashboard/stack.yml remove the suffix .openfaas where you see it.

Set limits

You can edit buildshiprun_limits.yml to set the memory limit for your functions.

Deploy your container builder

You need to generate the ~/.docker/config.json using the docker login command.

If you are not on Linux, i.e. you are on Mac or Windows, docker stores credentials in credentials store by default and your docker config.json file will look like this:

{
  "credSstore" : "osxkeychain",
  "auths" : {
    "https://index.docker.io/v1/" : {

    }
  },
  "HttpHeaders" : {
    "User-Agent" : "Docker-Client/18.06.0-ce (darwin)"
  }
}

Run docker login to generate the config.json (if you haven't already) and edit it by removing the "credSstore" property:

{
  "auths" : {
    "https://index.docker.io/v1/" : {

    }
  },
  "HttpHeaders" : {
    "User-Agent" : "Docker-Client/18.06.0-ce (darwin)"
  }
}

Log into your registry or the Docker hub

docker login

Expect to see WARNING! Your password will be stored unencrypted in ~/.docker/config.json in the output.

This populates ~/.docker/config.json which is used in the builder:

{
	"auths": {
		"https://index.docker.io/v1/": {
			"auth": "asdf12djs37ASfs732sFa3fdsw=="
		}
	},
	"HttpHeaders": {
		"User-Agent": "Docker-Client/18.06.0-ce (darwin)"
	}
}

Note: the auth string above is using an example value and is not a real authentication string.

For Kubernetes

Create the secret for your registry

kubectl create secret generic \
  --namespace openfaas \
  registry-secret --from-file=$HOME/.docker/config.json

Create of-builder, of-buildkit:

kubectl apply -f ./yaml/core

(Optional) Deploy NetworkPolicy. These policies set the following rules:

Pods in the openfaas-fn namespace only accept traffic from namespaces and pods that have the label role: openfaas-system
Pods in the openfaas namespace only accept traffic from all pods in namespaces with the label role: openfaas-system, pods that have the label role: openfaas-system in the openfaas-fn namespace and finally pods from any namespace that have the label app: nginx-ingress(this is to allow traffic from the nginx ingress controller).

kubectl apply -f ./yaml/network-policy

If you don't have Ingress Controller installed in cluster. Read this

For Swarm

Create the secret for your registry

cat $HOME/.docker/config.json | docker secret create registry-secret -

Create of-builder and of-buildkit:

./of-builder/deploy_swarm.sh

Configure push repository, gateway URL and build branch

In gateway_config.yml

environment:
  gateway_url: http://gateway.openfaas:8080/
  gateway_public_url: http://of-cloud.public-facing-url.com:8080/
  audit_url: http://gateway.openfaas:8080/function/audit-event
  repository_url: docker.io/ofcommunity/
  push_repository_url: docker.io/ofcommunity/
  build_branch: master

Replace "ofcommunity" with your Docker Hub account i.e. alexellis2/cloud/ or replace the whole string with the address of your private registry reg.my-domain.xyz.

Now set your gateway's public URL in the gateway_public_url field.

Set the branch you want ofc to use in the build_branch field.

Configure pull secret

This is only needed if your registry uses authentication to pull images. The Docker Hub allows image to be pulled without a pull secret.

Swarm

Uncomment the swarm-pull-secret secret in stack.yml
Create the swarm-pull-secret pull secret:

Use the username and password from docker login

echo -n username:password | base64 | docker secret create swarm-pull-secret -

Kubernetes

Configure your service account with a pull secret as per OpenFaaS docs. Pick the openfaas-fn namespace.

Create basic-auth secrets for the functions

The functions will need to use basic authentication to access the gateway's administrative endpoints.

Use the credentials you got when you set up OpenFaaS.

Swarm

echo "admin" > basic-auth-user
echo "admin" > basic-auth-password
docker secret create basic-auth-user basic-auth-user
docker secret create basic-auth-password basic-auth-password

Kubernetes

Create secrets in the openfaas-fn namespace:

echo "username" > basic-auth-user
echo "password" > basic-auth-password
kubectl create secret generic basic-auth-user \
 --from-file=basic-auth-user=./basic-auth-user -n openfaas-fn
kubectl create secret generic basic-auth-password \
 --from-file=basic-auth-password=./basic-auth-password -n openfaas-fn

Log storage with Minio/S3

Logs from the container builder are stored in S3. This can be Minio which is S3-compatible, or AWS S3.

You can disable Log storage by commenting out the pipeline-log function from stack.yml.

Generate secrets for Minio

SECRET_KEY=$(head -c 12 /dev/urandom | shasum| cut -d' ' -f1)
ACCESS_KEY=$(head -c 12 /dev/urandom | shasum| cut -d' ' -f1)

If you'd prefer to use an S3 Bucket hosted on AWS

Generate an access key by using the security credentials page. Expand the Access Keys section, and then Create New Root Key.

Generate an secret key by opening the IAM console. Choose Users in the Details pane, pick the IAM user which will use the keys, and then Create Access Key on the Security Credentials tab.

SECRET_KEY=access_key_here
ACCESS_KEY=secret_key_here

Kubernetes

Store the secrets in Kubernetes

kubectl create secret generic -n openfaas-fn \
 s3-secret-key --from-literal s3-secret-key="$SECRET_KEY"
kubectl create secret generic -n openfaas-fn \
 s3-access-key --from-literal s3-access-key="$ACCESS_KEY"

Install Minio with helm

helm install --name cloud-minio --namespace openfaas \
   --set accessKey=$ACCESS_KEY,secretKey=$SECRET_KEY,replicas=1,persistence.enabled=false,service.port=9000,service.type=NodePort \
  stable/minio

The value of the --name flag should be the name of the service we want to create and in our case the name is cloud-minio

The URL is formatted like so:

<service_name>.<namespace>.svc.cluster.local:<port>

and in our case minio can be accessed with this URL:

cloud-minio.openfaas.svc.cluster.local:9000

Enter the value of the DNS above into s3_url in gateway_config.yml adding the port at the end:

  s3_url: cloud-minio.openfaas.svc.cluster.local:9000

Note: minio uses port 9000

Swarm

Store the secrets

echo -n "$SECRET_KEY" | docker secret create s3-secret-key -
echo -n "$ACCESS_KEY" | docker secret create s3-access-key -

Deploy Minio

docker service rm minio

docker service create --constraint="node.role==manager" \
 --name minio \
 --detach=true --network func_functions \
 --secret s3-access-key \
 --secret s3-secret-key \
 --env MINIO_SECRET_KEY_FILE=s3-secret-key \
 --env MINIO_ACCESS_KEY_FILE=s3-access-key \
minio/minio:latest server /export

Minio:

Enter the value of the DNS above into s3_url in gateway_config.yml adding the port at the end:minio:9000

Note: For debugging and testing. You can expose the port of Minio with docker service update minio --publish-add 9000:9000, but this is not recommended on the public internet.

AWS S3:

Enter the value of the DNS s3.amazonaws.com into s3_url in gateway_config.yml
In the same file set s3_tls: true and s3_bucket to the bucket you created in S3 like s3_bucket: example-bucket
Update the s3_region value such as : s3_region: us-east-1

See https://docs.minio.io/docs/minio-quickstart-guide

Deploy the OpenFaaS Cloud Functions

Optionally set the gateway URL:

export OPENFAAS_URL=https://gw.my-site.xyz

Now deploy:

faas-cli deploy

Test it out

Now find the public URL of your GitHub App and navigate to it. Click "Install" and pick a GitHub repo you want to use.

Now create a new function, rename the YAML file for the functions to stack.yml and then commit it. When you put it up you'll see the logs in the github-push function.

Troubleshoot Kubernetes

Find out whether the pull/checkout/tar and build and deploy operation passed for each function.

kubectl logs -f deploy/github-push -n openfaas-fn

kubectl logs -f deploy/git-tar -n openfaas-fn

Find out if the build and deployment passed:

kubectl logs -f deploy/buildshiprun -n openfaas-fn

Find all events on the functions namespace

kubectl get events --sort-by=.metadata.creationTimestamp -n openfaas-fn

Troubleshoot Network Policies

The NetworkPolicy configuration is designed to work with a Kubernetes IngressController. If you are using a NodePort or LoadBalancer you have to deploy NetworkPolicy below.

apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: NetworkPolicy
metadata:
  name: gateway
  namespace: openfaas
spec:
  policyTypes:
    - Ingress
  podSelector:
    matchLabels:
      app: gateway
  ingress:
    - from: []
      ports:
        - port: 8080

Troubleshoot Swarm

docker service logs github-push --tail 50

docker service logs git-tar --tail 50

docker service logs buildshiprun --tail 50

Auth

Auth is optional and protects the dashboard from users accessing the page. It is implemented by the edge-router contacting the edge-auth service to validate each HTTP request.

To enable OAuth 2.0 we will need to set up a number of DNS entries or host file entries for local development.

Disable auth for local development

If you wish to disable Auth then you can change the edge-router's URL from http://edge-auth:8080 (on Swarm) or http://edge-auth.openfaas:8080 (on Kubernetes) to http://echo:8080 or http://echo.openfaas:8080 which will by-pass any need for a Cookie or JWT to be established by allowing the "echo" service to act as the authorziation. This works because the echo service will always return "200 OK" to requests.

Set host file entries for the router (Option A)

Now edit /etc/hosts and add:

127.0.0.1       alexellis.gw.io
127.0.0.1       auth.system.gw.io
127.0.0.1       system.gw.io

Add an additional line for your own GitHub username such as alexellis.gw.io. The IP Address 127.0.0.1 can be replaced for the IP address of where you are running Docker or the OpenFaaS Cloud services.

Add DNS entries (Option B)

Alternatively add DNS entries for the above:

IP  user.domain
IP  auth.system.domain
IP  system.domain

Create a GitHub OAuth 2.0 App

From your GitHub profile click Developer settings, OAuth Apps and New OAuth App.

Application name

OpenFaaS Cloud Testing

Homepage URL

https://github.com/openfaas/openfaas-cloud/

Application Description

Log into OpenFaaS Cloud

Authorization callback URL

For local testing use the following:

http://auth.system.gw.io:8081/

Port 8081 corresponds to the port where you are running the router component.

Note: in a production-grade deployment the router is running on port 443 (HTTPS) so the URL may be https://auth.o6s.io/.

Collect client_id / client_secret

You will now be presented with your client_id and client_secret values for the GitHub OAuth 2.0 App. You need these to configure the auth service, which you can deploy in a container or run locally following the instructions in the auth README.

If you are running the router via Kubernetes you may need to edit core/yaml/edge-auth-dep.yml and update the client_id there. The client_secret can be created with a Kubernetes secret which is then mounted into the container at runtime.

Appendix

Custom labels

Users can set the following custom labels:

com.openfaas.scale.zero - either to true or false to enable/disable scale to zero (where the feature is enabled)

Custom annotations

Users can set the following custom annotations:

topic - the topic annotation is used with the event-connector pattern, if at least one event-connector is installed on the OFC installation.
schedule - the schedule annotation is used with the cron-connector function.

Dashboard

The Dashboard is optional and can be installed to visualise your functions.

A pretty URL means that users get their own sub-domain per function. You will need to setup a wildcard DNS entry for this, but it's not essential, using the gateway address will also work.

Pretty vs non-pretty:

https://alexellis.domain.com/function1

https://gateway.domain.com/alexellis-function1

On Docker Swarm you must remove the suffix .openfaas from the gateway address.

Prerequisites

The Dashboard is a SPA(Single Page App) made with React and will require the following:

Node.js
Yarn

Build and Bundle the Assets

If you have satisfied the prerequisites, the following command should create the assets for the Dashboard.

make

Edit stack.yml if needed.

Set query_pretty_url to true when using a sub-domain for each user. If set, also define pretty_url with the pattern for the URL.

Example with domain o6s.io:

pretty_url: "http://user.o6s.io/function"

Set public_url to be the URL for the IP / DNS of the OpenFaaS Cloud.

Deploy

Don't forget to pull the node10-express-template

$ cd dashboard

$ faas-cli template pull https://github.com/openfaas-incubator/node10-express-template

Note: if using dockerhub change the function prefix in stack.yml with your username

$ faas-cli up

Access the dashboard via: http://gateway_ip:port/functions/system-dashboard/username or http://system.o6s.io/dashboard where o6s.io is your domain configured with a wildcard entry.

SealedSecret support

The support for SealedSecrets is optional.

Install SealedSecrets from chart:

helm install --namespace kube-system --name ofc-sealedsecrets stable/sealed-secrets

Note: If you're having issues with already existing CRD, like:
Error: release ofc-sealedsecrets failed: clusterroles.rbac.authorization.k8s.io "secrets-unsealer" already exists
run the following before helm install
helm del --purge ofc-sealedsecrets
kubectl delete customresourcedefinition sealedsecrets.bitnami.com

Install kubeseal CLI

You can perform the following two commands on the client or the server providing that you have a .kube/config file available and have switched to that context with kubectl config set-context.

release=$(curl --silent "https://api.github.com/repos/bitnami-labs/sealed-secrets/releases/latest" | sed -n 's/.*"tag_name": *"\([^"]*\)".*/\1/p')
GOOS=$(go env GOOS)
GOARCH=$(go env GOARCH)
wget https://github.com/bitnami/sealed-secrets/releases/download/$release/kubeseal-$GOOS-$GOARCH
sudo install -m 755 kubeseal-$GOOS-$GOARCH /usr/local/bin/kubeseal

Export your public key

Now export the public key from Kubernetes cluster

kubeseal  --controller-name=ofc-sealedsecrets-sealed-secrets  --controller-namespace=kube-system --fetch-cert > pub-cert.pem

You will need to distribute or share pub-cert.pem so that people can use this with the OpenFaaS CLI faas-cli cloud seal command to seal secrets.

Patch the service account for the import-secrets function

This ServiceAccount needs to be patched in place so that the function can perform create / get and update on the SealedSecret CRD:

kubectl patch -n openfaas-fn deploy import-secrets -p '{"spec":{"template":{"spec":{"serviceAccountName":"sealedsecrets-importer-rw"}}}}'

Custom templates

You can add your own custom templates by re-deploying the git-tar function in stack.yml.

In order to do that follow the steps below:

Navigate to gateway_config.yml:
- Under environment key you should be able to locate custom_templates in which you can see listed templates.
- Append your own template to the list.
Re-deploy git-tar function from your stack.yml with the changed configuration:

$ faas-cli deploy --filter git-tar --gateway=<of_gateway_url>

Files

README.md

Latest commit

History

README.md

File metadata and controls

OpenFaaS Cloud installation guide

Pre-reqs

Moving parts

Before you begin

Steps

Create your GitHub App

Create an internal trust secret

Set your GitHub App config

Set the App ID

Create a secret for your GitHub App's private key

Setup your customer access control list (ACL)

Customize for Kubernetes or Swarm

Edit hostnames

Set limits

Deploy your container builder

For Kubernetes

For Swarm

Configure push repository, gateway URL and build branch

Configure pull secret

Swarm

Kubernetes

Create basic-auth secrets for the functions

Swarm

Kubernetes

Log storage with Minio/S3

Kubernetes

Swarm

Deploy the OpenFaaS Cloud Functions

Test it out

Troubleshoot Kubernetes

Troubleshoot Network Policies

Troubleshoot Swarm

Auth

Disable auth for local development

Set host file entries for the router (Option A)

Add DNS entries (Option B)

Create a GitHub OAuth 2.0 App

Collect client_id / client_secret

Appendix

Custom labels

Custom annotations

Dashboard

Prerequisites

Build and Bundle the Assets

SealedSecret support

Custom templates