Documentation

• 1: Quick Start
• 2: Architecture
• 3: Core Concepts
• 3.1: Workflow Types
• 4: Installation
• 4.1: RBAC
• 4.2: Orchestrator CRD Versions
• 4.2.1: CRD Version v1alpha1
• 4.2.2: CRD Version v1alpha2
• 4.3: Requirements
• 4.4: Orchestrator on OpenShift
• 4.5: Orchestrator on Kubernetes
• 4.6: Orchestrator on existing RHDH instance
• 4.7: Workflows
• 4.7.1: Deploy From Helm Repository
• 5: Serverless Workflows
• 5.1: Assessment
• 5.1.1: MTA Analysis
• 5.2: Infrastructure
• 5.2.1: Simple Escalation
• 5.2.2: Move2Kube
• 5.3: Development
• 5.4: Workflow Examples
• 5.5: Troubleshooting
• 5.6: Configuration
• 5.6.1: Configure workflow for token propagation
• 5.7: Best Practices
• 6: Plugins
• 6.1: Notifications Plugin
• 6.2: Orchestrator Plugin

1 - Quick Start

Quickstart Guide

This quickstart guide will help you install the Orchestrator using the Helm-based operator and execute a sample workflow through the Red Hat Developer Hub orchestrator plugin UI.

1. Install Orchestrator: Follow the installation instructions for Orchestrator.

2. Install a sample workflow: Follow the installation instructions for the greetings workflow.

3. Access Red Hat Developer Hub: Open your web browser and navigate to the Red Hat Developer Hub application. Retrieve the URL using the following OpenShift CLI command.

   oc get route backstage-backstage -n rhdh-operator -o jsonpath='{.spec.host}'
   

   Make sure the route is accessible to you locally.

4. Login to Backstage Login to Backstage with the Guest account.

5. Navigate to Orchestrator: Navigate to the Orchestrator page by clicking on the Orchestrator icon in the left navigation menu.

6. Execute Greeting Workflow: Click on the ‘Execute’ button in the ACTIONS column of the Greeting workflow. The ‘Run workflow’ page will open. Click ‘Next step’ and then ‘Run’

7. Monitor Workflow Status: Wait for the status of the Greeting workflow execution to become Completed. This may take a moment.

2 - Architecture

The Orchestrator architecture comprises several integral components, each contributing to the seamless execution and management of workflows. Illustrated below is a breakdown of these components:

• Red Hat Developer Hub: Serving as the primary interface, Backstage fulfills multiple roles:
  • Orchestrator Plugins: Both frontend and backend plugins are instrumental in presenting deployed workflows for execution and monitoring.
  • Notifications Plugin: Employs notifications to inform users or groups about workflow events.
• OpenShift Serverless Logic Operator: This controller manages the Sonataflow custom resource (CR), where each CR denotes a deployed workflow.
• Sonataflow Runtime/Workflow Application: As a deployed workflow, Sonataflow Runtime is currently managed as a Kubernetes (K8s) deployment by the operator. It operates as an HTTP server, catering to requests for executing workflow instances. Within the Orchestrator deployment, each Sonataflow CR corresponds to a singular workflow. However, outside this scope, Sonataflow Runtime can handle multiple workflows. Interaction with Sonataflow Runtime for workflow execution is facilitated by the Orchestrator backend plugin.
• Data Index Service: This serves as a repository for workflow definitions, instances, and their associated jobs. It exposes a GraphQL API, utilized by the Orchestrator backend plugin to retrieve workflow definitions and instances.
• Job Service: Dedicated to orchestrating scheduled tasks for workflows.
• OpenShift Serverless: This operator furnishes serverless capabilities essential for workflow communication. It employs Knative eventing to interface with the Data Index service and leverages Knative functions to introduce more intricate logic to workflows.
• OpenShift AMQ Streams (Strimzi/Kafka): While not presently integrated into the deployment’s current iteration, this operator is crucial for ensuring the reliability of the eventing system.
• KeyCloak: Responsible for authentication and security services within applications. While not installed by the Orchestrator operator, it is essential for enhancing security measures.
• PostgreSQL Server - Utilized for storing both Sonataflow information and Backstage data, PostgreSQL Server provides a robust and reliable database solution essential for data persistence within the Orchestrator ecosystem.

3 - Core Concepts

3.1 - Workflow Types

The Orchestrator features two primary workflow categories:

• Infrastructure workflows: focus on automating infrastructure-related tasks
• Assessment workflows: focus on evaluating and analyzing data to suggest suitable infrastructure workflow options for subsequent execution

Infrastructure workflow

In the Orchestrator, an infrastructure refers to a workflow that executes a sequence of operations based on user input (optional) and generates output (optional) without requiring further action.

To define this type, developers need to include the following annotation in the workflow definition file:

annotations:
  - "workflow-type/infrastructure"

The Orchestrator plugin utilizes this metadata to facilitate the processing and visualization of infrastructure workflow inputs and outputs within the user interface.

Examples:

• Greeting
• Ticket Escalation
• Move2Kube

Assessment workflow

In the Orchestrator, an assessment is akin to an infrastructure workflow that concludes with a recommended course of action. Upon completion, the assessment yields a workflowOptions object, which presents a list of infrastructure workflows suitable from the user’s inputs evaluation.

To define this type, developers must include the following annotation in the workflow definition file:

annotations:
  - "workflow-type/assessment"

The Orchestrator plugin utilizes this metadata to facilitate the processing and visualization of assessment workflow inputs and outputs within the user interface. This includes generating links to initiate infrastructure workflows from the list of recommended options, enabling seamless execution and integration.

The workflowOptions object must possess six essential attributes with specific types, including lists that can be empty or contain objects with id and name properties, similar to the currentVersion attribute. See an example in the below code snippet.

It is the assessment workflow developer’s responsibility to ensure that the provided workflow id in each workflowOptions attribute exists and is available in the environment.

{
    "workflowOptions": {
      "currentVersion": {
        "id": "_AN_INFRASTRUCTURE_WORKFLOW_ID_",
        "name": "_AN_INFRASTRUCTURE_WORKFLOW_NAME_"
      },
      "newOptions": [],
      "otherOptions": [],
      "upgradeOptions": [],
      "migrationOptions": [
        {
            "id": "_ANOTHER_INFRASTRUCTURE_WORKFLOW_ID_",
            "name": "_ANOTHER_INFRASTRUCTURE_WORKFLOW_NAME_"
        }
      ],
      "continuationOptions": []
    }
}

Examples:

• MTA
• Dummy Assessment

Note

If the aforementioned annotation is missing in the workflow definition file, the Orchestrator plugin will default to treating the workflow as an infrastructure workflow, without considering its output.

To avoid unexpected behavior and ensure clarity, it is strongly advised to always include the annotation to explicitly specify the workflow type, preventing any surprises or misinterpretations.

4 - Installation

The deployment of the orchestrator involves multiple independent components, each with its unique installation process. In an OpenShift Cluster, the Red Hat Catalog provides an operator that can handle the installation for you. This installation process is modular, as the CRD exposes various flags that allow you to control which components to install. For a vanilla Kubernetes, there is a helm chart that installs the orchestrator compoments.

The Orchestrator deployment encompasses the installation of the engine for serving serverless workflows and Backstage, integrated with orchestrator plugins for workflow invocation, monitoring, and control.

In addition to the Orchestrator deployment, we offer several workflows (linked below) that can be deployed using their respective installation methods.

4.1 - RBAC

The RBAC policies for RHDH Orchestrator plugins v1.5 are listed here

4.2 - Orchestrator CRD Versions

The following table shows the list of supported Orchestrator Operator versions with their compatible CRD version.

4.2.1 - CRD Version v1alpha1

The v1alpha1 version of Orchestrator CRD is supported only on Orchestrator 1.3 version. It is deprecated and not compatible with future orchestrator versions.

The following Orchestrator CR is an sample of the api v1alpha1 version.

apiVersion: rhdh.redhat.com/v1alpha1
kind: Orchestrator
metadata:
  name: orchestrator-sample
spec:
  sonataFlowOperator:
    isReleaseCandidate: false # Indicates RC builds should be used by the chart to install Sonataflow
    enabled: true # whether the operator should be deployed by the chart
    subscription:
      namespace: openshift-serverless-logic # namespace where the operator should be deployed
      channel: alpha # channel of an operator package to subscribe to
      installPlanApproval: Automatic # whether the update should be installed automatically
      name: logic-operator-rhel8 # name of the operator package
      sourceName: redhat-operators # name of the catalog source
      startingCSV: logic-operator-rhel8.v1.34.0 # The initial version of the operator
  serverlessOperator:
    enabled: true # whether the operator should be deployed by the chart
    subscription:
      namespace: openshift-serverless # namespace where the operator should be deployed
      channel: stable # channel of an operator package to subscribe to
      installPlanApproval: Automatic # whether the update should be installed automatically
      name: serverless-operator # name of the operator package
      sourceName: redhat-operators # name of the catalog source
  rhdhOperator:
    isReleaseCandidate: false # Indicates RC builds should be used by the chart to install RHDH
    enabled: true # whether the operator should be deployed by the chart
    enableGuestProvider: false # whether to enable guest provider
    secretRef:
      name: backstage-backend-auth-secret # name of the secret that contains the credentials for the plugin to establish a communication channel with the Kubernetes API, ArgoCD, GitHub servers and SMTP mail server.
      backstage:
        backendSecret: BACKEND_SECRET # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the Backstage backend secret. Defaults to 'BACKEND_SECRET'. It's required.
      github: #GitHub specific configuration fields that are injected to the backstage instance to allow the plugin to communicate with GitHub.
        token: GITHUB_TOKEN # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the authentication token as expected by GitHub. Required for importing resource to the catalog, launching software templates and more. Defaults to 'GITHUB_TOKEN', empty for not available.
        clientId: GITHUB_CLIENT_ID # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the client ID that you generated on GitHub, for GitHub authentication (requires GitHub App). Defaults to 'GITHUB_CLIENT_ID', empty for not available.
        clientSecret: GITHUB_CLIENT_SECRET # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the client secret tied to the generated client ID. Defaults to 'GITHUB_CLIENT_SECRET', empty for not available.
      k8s: # Kubernetes specific configuration fields that are injected to the backstage instance to allow the plugin to communicate with the Kubernetes API Server.
        clusterToken: K8S_CLUSTER_TOKEN # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the Kubernetes API bearer token used for authentication. Defaults to 'K8S_CLUSTER_TOKEN', empty for not available.
        clusterUrl: K8S_CLUSTER_URL # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the API URL of the kubernetes cluster. Defaults to 'K8S_CLUSTER_URL', empty for not available.
      argocd: # ArgoCD specific configuration fields that are injected to the backstage instance to allow the plugin to communicate with ArgoCD. Note that ArgoCD must be deployed beforehand and the argocd.enabled field must be set to true as well.
        url: ARGOCD_URL # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the URL of the ArgoCD API server. Defaults to 'ARGOCD_URL', empty for not available.
        username: ARGOCD_USERNAME # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the username to login to ArgoCD. Defaults to 'ARGOCD_USERNAME', empty for not available.
        password: ARGOCD_PASSWORD # Key in the secret with name  defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the password to authenticate to ArgoCD. Defaults to 'ARGOCD_PASSWORD', empty for not available.
      notificationsEmail:
        hostname: NOTIFICATIONS_EMAIL_HOSTNAME # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the hostname of the SMTP server for the notifications plugin. Defaults to 'NOTIFICATIONS_EMAIL_HOSTNAME', empty for not available.
        username: NOTIFICATIONS_EMAIL_USERNAME # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the username of the SMTP server for the notifications plugin. Defaults to 'NOTIFICATIONS_EMAIL_USERNAME', empty for not available.
        password: NOTIFICATIONS_EMAIL_PASSWORD # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the password of the SMTP server for the notifications plugin. Defaults to 'NOTIFICATIONS_EMAIL_PASSWORD', empty for not available.
    subscription:
      namespace: rhdh-operator # namespace where the operator should be deployed
      channel: fast-1.3 # channel of an operator package to subscribe to
      installPlanApproval: Automatic # whether the update should be installed automatically
      name: rhdh # name of the operator package
      source: redhat-operators # name of the catalog source
      startingCSV: "" # The initial version of the operator
      targetNamespace: rhdh-operator # the target namespace for the backstage CR in which RHDH instance is created
  rhdhPlugins: # RHDH plugins required for the Orchestrator
    npmRegistry: "https://npm.registry.redhat.com" # NPM registry is defined already in the container, but sometimes the registry need to be modified to use different versions of the plugin, for example: staging(https://npm.stage.registry.redhat.com) or development repositories
    scope: "@redhat"
    orchestrator:
      package: "backstage-plugin-orchestrator@1.3.0"
      integrity: sha512-A/twx1SOOGDQjglLzOxQikKO0XOdPP1jh2lj9Y/92bLox8mT+eaZpub8YLwR2mb7LsUIUImg+U6VnKwoAV9ATA==
    orchestratorBackend:
      package: "backstage-plugin-orchestrator-backend-dynamic@1.3.0"
      integrity: sha512-Th5vmwyhHyhURwQo28++PPHTvxGSFScSHPJyofIdE5gTAb87ncyfyBkipSDq7fwj4L8CQTXa4YP6A2EkHW1npg==
    notifications:
      package: "plugin-notifications-dynamic@1.3.0"
      integrity: sha512-iYLgIy0YdP/CdTLol07Fncmo9n0J8PdIZseiwAyUt9RFJzKIXmoi2CpQLPKMx36lEgPYUlT0rFO81Ie2CSis4Q==
    notificationsBackend:
      package: "plugin-notifications-backend-dynamic@1.3.0"
      integrity: sha512-Pw9Op/Q+1MctmLiVvQ3M+89tkbWkw8Lw0VfcwyGSMiHpK/Xql1TrSFtThtLlymRgeCSBgxHYhh3MUusNQX08VA==
    signals:
      package: "plugin-signals-dynamic@1.3.0"
      integrity: sha512-+E8XeTXcG5oy+aNImGj/MY0dvEkP7XAsu4xuZjmAqOHyVfiIi0jnP/QDz8XMbD1IjCimbr/DMUZdjmzQiD0hSQ==
    signalsBackend:
      package: "plugin-signals-backend-dynamic@1.3.0"
      integrity: sha512-5Bl6C+idPXtquQxMZW+bjRMcOfFYcKxcGZZFv2ITkPVeY2zzxQnAz3vYHnbvKRSwlQxjIyRXY6YgITGHXWT0nw==
    notificationsEmail:
      enabled: false # whether to install the notifications email plugin. requires setting of hostname and credentials in backstage secret to enable. See value backstage-backend-auth-secret. See plugin configuration at https://github.com/backstage/backstage/blob/master/plugins/notifications-backend-module-email/config.d.ts
      package: "plugin-notifications-backend-module-email-dynamic@1.3.0"
      integrity: sha512-sm7yRoO6Nkk3B7+AWKb10maIrb2YBNSiqQaWmFDVg2G9cbDoWr9wigqqeQ32+b6o2FenfNWg8xKY6PPyZGh8BA==
      port: 587 # SMTP server port
      sender: "" # the email sender address
      replyTo: "" # reply-to address
  postgres:
    serviceName: "sonataflow-psql-postgresql" # The name of the Postgres DB service to be used by platform services. Cannot be empty.
    serviceNamespace: "sonataflow-infra" # The namespace of the Postgres DB service to be used by platform services.
    authSecret:
      name: "sonataflow-psql-postgresql" # name of existing secret to use for PostgreSQL credentials.
      userKey: postgres-username # name of key in existing secret to use for PostgreSQL credentials.
      passwordKey: postgres-password # name of key in existing secret to use for PostgreSQL credentials.
    database: sonataflow # existing database instance used by data index and job service
  orchestrator:
    namespace: "sonataflow-infra" # Namespace where sonataflow's workflows run. The value is captured when running the setup.sh script and stored as a label in the selected namespace. User can override the value by populating this field. Defaults to `sonataflow-infra`.
    sonataflowPlatform:
      resources:
        requests:
          memory: "64Mi"
          cpu: "250m"
        limits:
          memory: "1Gi"
          cpu: "500m"
  tekton:
    enabled: false # whether to create the Tekton pipeline resources
  argocd:
    enabled: false # whether to install the ArgoCD plugin and create the orchestrator AppProject
    namespace: "" # Defines the namespace where the orchestrator's instance of ArgoCD is deployed. The value is captured when running setup.sh script and stored as a label in the selected namespace. User can override the value by populating this field. Defaults to `orchestrator-gitops` in the setup.sh script.
  networkPolicy:
    rhdhNamespace: "rhdh-operator" # Namespace of existing RHDH instance

4.2.2 - CRD Version v1alpha2

The v1alpha2 version of Orchestrator CRD was introduced in Orchestrator 1.4 version and is currently supported.

New Fields

In OSL 1.35, these new features are introduced:

1. Support for Workflow Monitoring
2. Support for Knative Eventing

Hence, the CRD schema extends to allow configuration for these features by the user.

• orchestrator.sonataflowPlatform.monitoring.enabled
• orchestrator.sonataflowPlatform.eventing.broker.name
• orchestrator.sonataflowPlatform.eventing.broker.namespace

Deleted Fields

In RHDH 1.4, the notifications and signals plugins are now part of RHDH image and no longer need to be configured by the user.

Hence, these plugin fields are now removed from the CRD schema.

• rhdhPlugins.notifications.package
• rhdhPlugins.notifications.integrity
• rhdhPlugins.notificationsBackend.package
• rhdhPlugins.notificationsBackend.integrity
• rhdhPlugins.signals.package
• rhdhPlugins.signals.integrity
• rhdhPlugins.signalsBackend.package
• rhdhPlugins.signalsBackend.integrity
• rhdhPlugins.notificationsEmail.package
• rhdhPlugins.notificationsEmail.integrity

Renamed Fields

For consistency in the subscription resource/configuration in the CRD, these fields are renamed.

• sonataFlowOperator.subscription.source
• serverlessOperator.subscription.source

The following Orchestrator CR is an sample of the api v1alpha2 version.

apiVersion: rhdh.redhat.com/v1alpha2
kind: Orchestrator
metadata:
  name: orchestrator-sample
spec:
  sonataFlowOperator:
    isReleaseCandidate: false # Indicates RC builds should be used by the chart to install Sonataflow
    enabled: true # whether the operator should be deployed by the chart
    subscription:
      namespace: openshift-serverless-logic # namespace where the operator should be deployed
      channel: alpha # channel of an operator package to subscribe to
      installPlanApproval: Automatic # whether the update should be installed automatically
      name: logic-operator-rhel8 # name of the operator package
      source: redhat-operators # name of the catalog source
      startingCSV: logic-operator-rhel8.v1.35.0 # The initial version of the operator
  serverlessOperator:
    enabled: true # whether the operator should be deployed by the chart
    subscription:
      namespace: openshift-serverless # namespace where the operator should be deployed
      channel: stable # channel of an operator package to subscribe to
      installPlanApproval: Automatic # whether the update should be installed automatically
      name: serverless-operator # name of the operator package
      source: redhat-operators # name of the catalog source
      startingCSV: serverless-operator.v1.35.0 # The initial version of the operator
  rhdhOperator:
    isReleaseCandidate: false # Indicates RC builds should be used by the chart to install RHDH
    enabled: true # whether the operator should be deployed by the chart
    enableGuestProvider: true # whether to enable guest provider
    secretRef:
      name: backstage-backend-auth-secret # name of the secret that contains the credentials for the plugin to establish a communication channel with the Kubernetes API, ArgoCD, GitHub servers and SMTP mail server.
      backstage:
        backendSecret: BACKEND_SECRET # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the Backstage backend secret. Defaults to 'BACKEND_SECRET'. It's required.
      github: # GitHub specific configuration fields that are injected to the backstage instance to allow the plugin to communicate with GitHub.
        token: GITHUB_TOKEN # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the authentication token as expected by GitHub. Required for importing resource to the catalog, launching software templates and more. Defaults to 'GITHUB_TOKEN', empty for not available.
        clientId: GITHUB_CLIENT_ID # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the client ID that you generated on GitHub, for GitHub authentication (requires GitHub App). Defaults to 'GITHUB_CLIENT_ID', empty for not available.
        clientSecret: GITHUB_CLIENT_SECRET # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the client secret tied to the generated client ID. Defaults to 'GITHUB_CLIENT_SECRET', empty for not available.
      gitlab: # Gitlab specific configuration fields that are injected to the backstage instance to allow the plugin to communicate with Gitlab.
        host: GITLAB_HOST # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of Gitlab Host's name. Defaults to 'GITHUB_HOST', empty for not available.
        token: GITLAB_TOKEN # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the authentication token as expected by Gitlab. Required for importing resource to the catalog, launching software templates and more. Defaults to 'GITLAB_TOKEN', empty for not available.
      k8s: # Kubernetes specific configuration fields that are injected to the backstage instance to allow the plugin to communicate with the Kubernetes API Server.
        clusterToken: K8S_CLUSTER_TOKEN # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the Kubernetes API bearer token used for authentication. Defaults to 'K8S_CLUSTER_TOKEN', empty for not available.
        clusterUrl: K8S_CLUSTER_URL # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the API URL of the kubernetes cluster. Defaults to 'K8S_CLUSTER_URL', empty for not available.
      argocd: # ArgoCD specific configuration fields that are injected to the backstage instance to allow the plugin to communicate with ArgoCD. Note that ArgoCD must be deployed beforehand and the argocd.enabled field must be set to true as well.
        url: ARGOCD_URL # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the URL of the ArgoCD API server. Defaults to 'ARGOCD_URL', empty for not available.
        username: ARGOCD_USERNAME # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the username to login to ArgoCD. Defaults to 'ARGOCD_USERNAME', empty for not available.
        password: ARGOCD_PASSWORD # Key in the secret with name  defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the password to authenticate to ArgoCD. Defaults to 'ARGOCD_PASSWORD', empty for not available.
      notificationsEmail:
        hostname: NOTIFICATIONS_EMAIL_HOSTNAME # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the hostname of the SMTP server for the notifications plugin. Defaults to 'NOTIFICATIONS_EMAIL_HOSTNAME', empty for not available.
        username: NOTIFICATIONS_EMAIL_USERNAME # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the username of the SMTP server for the notifications plugin. Defaults to 'NOTIFICATIONS_EMAIL_USERNAME', empty for not available.
        password: NOTIFICATIONS_EMAIL_PASSWORD # Key in the secret with name defined in the 'name' field that contains the value of the password of the SMTP server for the notifications plugin. Defaults to 'NOTIFICATIONS_EMAIL_PASSWORD', empty for not available.
    subscription:
      namespace: rhdh-operator # namespace where the operator should be deployed
      channel: fast-1.4 # channel of an operator package to subscribe to
      installPlanApproval: Automatic # whether the update should be installed automatically
      name: rhdh # name of the operator package
      source: redhat-operators # name of the catalog source
      startingCSV: "" # The initial version of the operator
      targetNamespace: rhdh-operator # the target namespace for the backstage CR in which RHDH instance is created
  rhdhPlugins: # RHDH plugins required for the Orchestrator
    npmRegistry: "https://npm.registry.redhat.com" # NPM registry is defined already in the container, but sometimes the registry need to be modified to use different versions of the plugin, for example: staging(https://npm.stage.registry.redhat.com) or development repositories
    scope: "https://github.com/rhdhorchestrator/orchestrator-plugins-internal-release/releases/download/1.4.0-rc.7"
    orchestrator:
      package: "backstage-plugin-orchestrator-1.4.0-rc.7.tgz"
      integrity: sha512-Vclb+TIL8cEtf9G2nx0UJ+kMJnCGZuYG/Xcw0Otdo/fZGuynnoCaAZ6rHnt4PR6LerekHYWNUbzM3X+AVj5cwg==
    orchestratorBackend:
      package: "backstage-plugin-orchestrator-backend-dynamic-1.4.0-rc.7.tgz"
      integrity: sha512-bxD0Au2V9BeUMcZBfNYrPSQ161vmZyKwm6Yik5keZZ09tenkc8fNjipwJsWVFQCDcAOOxdBAE0ibgHtddl3NKw==
    notificationsEmail:
      enabled: false # whether to install the notifications email plugin. requires setting of hostname and credentials in backstage secret to enable. See value backstage-backend-auth-secret. See plugin configuration at https://github.com/backstage/backstage/blob/master/plugins/notifications-backend-module-email/config.d.ts
      port: 587 # SMTP server port
      sender: "" # the email sender address
      replyTo: "" # reply-to address
  postgres:
    serviceName: "sonataflow-psql-postgresql" # The name of the Postgres DB service to be used by platform services. Cannot be empty.
    serviceNamespace: "sonataflow-infra" # The namespace of the Postgres DB service to be used by platform services.
    authSecret:
      name: "sonataflow-psql-postgresql" # name of existing secret to use for PostgreSQL credentials.
      userKey: postgres-username # name of key in existing secret to use for PostgreSQL credentials.
      passwordKey: postgres-password # name of key in existing secret to use for PostgreSQL credentials.
    database: sonataflow # existing database instance used by data index and job service
  orchestrator:
    namespace: "sonataflow-infra" # Namespace where sonataflow's workflows run. The value is captured when running the setup.sh script and stored as a label in the selected namespace. User can override the value by populating this field. Defaults to `sonataflow-infra`.
    sonataflowPlatform:
      monitoring:
        enabled: true # whether to enable monitoring
      resources:
        requests:
          memory: "64Mi"
          cpu: "250m"
        limits:
          memory: "1Gi"
          cpu: "500m"
      eventing:
        broker:
          name: "my-knative" # Name of existing Broker instance. Optional
          namespace: "knative" # Namespace of existing Broker instance. Optional      
  tekton:
    enabled: false # whether to create the Tekton pipeline resources
  argocd:
    enabled: false # whether to install the ArgoCD plugin and create the orchestrator AppProject
    namespace: "" # Defines the namespace where the orchestrator's instance of ArgoCD is deployed. The value is captured when running setup.sh script and stored as a label in the selected namespace. User can override the value by populating this field. Defaults to `orchestrator-gitops` in the setup.sh script.
  networkPolicy:
    rhdhNamespace: "rhdh-operator" # Namespace of existing RHDH instance

4.3 - Requirements

Operators

The Orchestrator runtime/deployment is made of two main parts: OpenShift Serverless Logic operator and RHDH operator

OpenShift Serverless Logic operator requirements

OpenShift Serverless Logic operator resource requirements are described OpenShift Serverless Logic Installation Requirements. This is mainly for local environment settings.
The operator deploys a Data Index service and a Jobs service. These are the recommended minimum resource requirements for their pods:
Data Index pod:

resources:
      limits:
        cpu: 500m
        memory: 1Gi
      requests:
        cpu: 250m
        memory: 64Mi

Jobs pod:

resources:
      limits:
        cpu: 200m
        memory: 1Gi
      requests:
        cpu: 100m
        memory: 1Gi

The resources for these pods are controlled by a CR of type SonataFlowPlatform. There is one such CR in the sonataflow-infra namespace.

RHDH operator requirements

The requirements for RHDH operator and its components are described here

Workflows

Each workflow has its own logic and therefore different resource requirements that are influenced by its specific logic.
Here are some metrics for the workflows we provide. For each workflow you have the following fields: cpu idle, cpu peak (during execution), memory.

• greeting workflow
  • cpu idle: 4m
  • cpu peak: 12m
  • memory: 300 Mb
• mtv-plan workflow
  • cpu idle: 4m
  • cpu peak: 130m
  • memory: 300 Mb

How to evaluate resource requirements for your workflow

Locate the workflow pod in OCP Console. There is a tab for Metrics. Here you’ll find the CPU and memory. Execute the workflow a few times. It does not matter whether it succeeds or not as long as all the states are executed. Now you can see the peak usage (execution) and the idle usage (after a few executions).

4.4 - Orchestrator on OpenShift

Installing the Orchestrator is facilitated through an operator available in the Red Hat Catalog in the OLM package. This operator is responsible for installing all of the Orchestrator components. The Orchestrator is based on the SonataFlow and the Serverless Workflow technologies to design and manage the workflows. The Orchestrator plugins are deployed on a Red Hat Developer Hub instance, which serves as the frontend.

When installing a Red Hat Developer Hub (RHDH) instance using the Orchestrator operator, the RHDH configuration is managed through the Orchestrator resource.

To utilize Backstage capabilities, the Orchestrator imports software templates designed to ease the development of new workflows and offers an opinionated method for managing their lifecycle by including CI/CD resources as part of the template.

Orchestrator Documentation

For comprehensive documentation on the Orchestrator, please visit https://www.rhdhorchestrator.io.

Installing the Orchestrator Go Operator

Deploy the Orchestrator solution suite in an OCP cluster using the Orchestrator operator.
The operator installs the following components onto the target OpenShift cluster:

• RHDH (Red Hat Developer Hub) Backstage
• OpenShift Serverless Logic Operator (with Data-Index and Job Service)
• OpenShift Serverless Operator
  • Knative Eventing
  • Knative Serving
• (Optional) An ArgoCD project named orchestrator. Requires an pre-installed ArgoCD/OpenShift GitOps instance in the cluster. Disabled by default
• (Optional) Tekton tasks and build pipeline. Requires an pre-installed Tekton/OpenShift Pipelines instance in the cluster. Disabled by default

Important Note for ARM64 Architecture Users

Note that as of November 6, 2023, OpenShift Serverless Operator is based on RHEL 8 images which are not supported on the ARM64 architecture. Consequently, deployment of this operator on an OpenShift Local cluster on MacBook laptops with M1/M2 chips is not supported.

Prerequisites

• Logged in to a Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform (version 4.14 +) cluster as a cluster administrator.
• OpenShift CLI (oc) is installed.
• Operator Lifecycle Manager (OLM) has been installed in your cluster.
• Your cluster has a default storage class provisioned.
• A GitHub API Token - to import items into the catalog, ensure you have a GITHUB_TOKEN with the necessary permissions as detailed here.
  • For classic token, include the following permissions:
    • repo (all)
    • admin:org (read:org)
    • user (read:user, user:email)
    • workflow (all) - required for using the software templates for creating workflows in GitHub
  • For Fine grained token:
    • Repository permissions: Read access to metadata, Read and Write access to actions, actions variables, administration, code, codespaces, commit statuses, environments, issues, pull requests, repository hooks, secrets, security events, and workflows.
    • Organization permissions: Read access to members, Read and Write access to organization administration, organization hooks, organization projects, and organization secrets.

⚠️Warning: Skipping these steps will prevent the Orchestrator from functioning properly.

Deployment with GitOps

If you plan to deploy in a GitOps environment, make sure you have installed the ArgoCD/Red Hat OpenShift GitOps and the Tekton/Red Hat Openshift Pipelines Install operators following these instructions. The Orchestrator installs RHDH and imports software templates designed for bootstrapping workflow development. These templates are crafted to ease the development lifecycle, including a Tekton pipeline to build workflow images and generate workflow K8s custom resources. Furthermore, ArgoCD is utilized to monitor any changes made to the workflow repository and to automatically trigger the Tekton pipelines as needed.

• ArgoCD/OpenShift GitOps operator

  • Ensure at least one instance of ArgoCD exists in the designated namespace (referenced by ARGOCD_NAMESPACE environment variable). Example here
  • Validated API is argoproj.io/v1alpha1/AppProject

• Tekton/OpenShift Pipelines operator

  • Validated APIs are tekton.dev/v1beta1/Task and tekton.dev/v1/Pipeline
  • Requires ArgoCD installed since the manifests are deployed in the same namespace as the ArgoCD instance.

  Remember to enable argocd in your CR instance.

Detailed Installation Guide

From OperatorHub

1. Deploying PostgreSQL reference implementation
   • If you do not have a PostgreSQL instance in your cluster
     you can deploy the PostgreSQL reference implementation by following the steps here.
   • If you already have PostgreSQL running in your cluster
     ensure that the default settings in the PostgreSQL values file match the postgres field provided in the Orchestrator CR file.
2. Install Orchestrator operator
   1. Go to OperatorHub in your OpenShift Console.
   2. Search for and install the Orchestrator Operator.
3. Run the Setup Script
   1. Follow the steps in the Running the Setup Script section to download and execute the setup.sh script, which initializes the RHDH environment.
4. Create an Orchestrator instance
   1. Once the Orchestrator Operator is installed, navigate to Installed Operators.
   2. Select Orchestrator Operator.
   3. Click on Create Instance to deploy an Orchestrator instance.
5. Verify resources and wait until they are running

   1. From console run the following command get the necessary wait commands:
      oc describe orchestrator orchestrator-sample -n openshift-operators | grep -A 10 "Run the following commands to wait until the services are ready:"\

      The command will return an output similar to the one below, which lists several oc wait commands. This depends on your specific cluster.

        oc wait -n openshift-serverless deploy/knative-openshift --for=condition=Available --timeout=5m
        oc wait -n knative-eventing knativeeventing/knative-eventing --for=condition=Ready --timeout=5m
        oc wait -n knative-serving knativeserving/knative-serving --for=condition=Ready --timeout=5m
        oc wait -n openshift-serverless-logic deploy/logic-operator-rhel8-controller-manager --for=condition=Available --timeout=5m
        oc wait -n sonataflow-infra sonataflowplatform/sonataflow-platform --for=condition=Succeed --timeout=5m
        oc wait -n sonataflow-infra deploy/sonataflow-platform-data-index-service --for=condition=Available --timeout=5m
        oc wait -n sonataflow-infra deploy/sonataflow-platform-jobs-service --for=condition=Available --timeout=5m
        oc get networkpolicy -n sonataflow-infra
      

   2. Copy and execute each command from the output in your terminal. These commands ensure that all necessary services and resources in your OpenShift environment are available and running correctly.

   3. If any service does not become available, verify the logs for that service or consult troubleshooting steps.

Manual Installation

1. Deploy the PostgreSQL reference implementation for persistence support in SonataFlow following these instructions

2. Create a namespace for the Orchestrator solution:

   oc new-project orchestrator
   

3. Run the Setup Script

   1. Follow the steps in the Running the Setup Script section to download and execute the setup.sh script, which initializes the RHDH environment.

4. Use the following manifest to install the operator in an OCP cluster:

   apiVersion: operators.coreos.com/v1alpha1
   kind: Subscription
   metadata:
     name: orchestrator-operator
     namespace: openshift-operators
   spec:
     channel: stable
     installPlanApproval: Automatic
     name: orchestrator-operator
     source: redhat-operators
     sourceNamespace: openshift-marketplace
   

5. Run the following commands to determine when the installation is completed:

   wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/rhdhorchestrator/orchestrator-go-operator/main/hack/wait_for_operator_installed.sh -O /tmp/wait_for_operator_installed.sh && chmod u+x /tmp/wait_for_operator_installed.sh && /tmp/wait_for_operator_installed.sh
   

   During the installation process, the Orchestrator Operator creates and monitors the lifecycle of the sub-components operators: RHDH operator, OpenShift Serverless operator and OpenShift Serverless Logic operator. Furthermore, it creates the necessary CRs and resources needed for orchestrator to function properly. Please refer to the troubleshooting-section for known issues with the operator resources.

6. Apply the Orchestrator custom resource (CR) on the cluster to create an instance of RHDH and resources of OpenShift Serverless Operator and OpenShift Serverless Logic Operator. Make any changes to the CR before applying it, or test the default Orchestrator CR:

   oc apply -n orchestrator -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/rhdhorchestrator/orchestrator-go-operator/refs/heads/main/config/samples/_v1alpha3_orchestrator.yaml
   

   Note: After the first reconciliation of the Orchestrator CR, changes to some of the fields in the CR may not be propagated/reconciled to the intended resource. For example, changing the platform.resources.requests field in the Orchestrator CR will not have any effect on the running instance of the SonataFlowPlatform (SFP) resource. For simplicity sake, that is the current design and may be revisited in the near future. Please refer to the CRD Parameter List to know which fields can be reconciled.

Running The Setup Script

The setup.sh script simplifies the initialization of the RHDH environment by creating the required authentication secret and labeling GitOps namespaces based on the cluster configuration.

1. Create a namespace for the RHDH instance. This namespace is predefined as the default in both the setup.sh script and the Orchestrator CR but can be overridden if needed.

   oc new-project rhdh
   

2. Download the setup script from the github repository and run it to create the RHDH secret and label the GitOps namespaces:

   wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/rhdhorchestrator/orchestrator-go-operator/main/hack/setup.sh -O /tmp/setup.sh && chmod u+x /tmp/setup.sh
   

3. Run the script:

   /tmp/setup.sh --use-default
   

NOTE: If you don’t want to use the default values, omit the --use-default and the script will prompt you for input.

The contents will vary depending on the configuration in the cluster. The following list details all the keys that can appear in the secret:

• BACKEND_SECRET: Value is randomly generated at script execution. This is the only mandatory key required to be in the secret for the RHDH Operator to start.
• K8S_CLUSTER_URL: The URL of the Kubernetes cluster is obtained dynamically using oc whoami --show-server.
• K8S_CLUSTER_TOKEN: The value is obtained dynamically based on the provided namespace and service account.
• GITHUB_TOKEN: This value is prompted from the user during script execution and is not predefined.
• GITHUB_CLIENT_ID and GITHUB_CLIENT_SECRET: The value for both these fields are used to authenticate against GitHub. For more information open this link.
• GITLAB_HOST and GITLAB_TOKEN: The value for both these fields are used to authenticate against GitLab.
• ARGOCD_URL: This value is dynamically obtained based on the first ArgoCD instance available.
• ARGOCD_USERNAME: Default value is set to admin.
• ARGOCD_PASSWORD: This value is dynamically obtained based on the ArgoCD instance available.

Keys will not be added to the secret if they have no values associated. So for instance, when deploying in a cluster without the GitOps operators, the ARGOCD_URL, ARGOCD_USERNAME and ARGOCD_PASSWORD keys will be omitted in the secret.

Sample of a secret created in a GitOps environment:

$> oc get secret -n rhdh -o yaml backstage-backend-auth-secret
apiVersion: v1
data:
  ARGOCD_PASSWORD: ...
  ARGOCD_URL: ...
  ARGOCD_USERNAME: ...
  BACKEND_SECRET: ...
  GITHUB_TOKEN: ...
  K8S_CLUSTER_TOKEN: ...
  K8S_CLUSTER_URL: ...
kind: Secret
metadata:
  creationTimestamp: "2024-05-07T22:22:59Z"
  name: backstage-backend-auth-secret
  namespace: rhdh-operator
  resourceVersion: "4402773"
  uid: 2042e741-346e-4f0e-9d15-1b5492bb9916
type: Opaque

Enabling Monitoring for Workflows

If you want to enable monitoring for workflows, you shall enable it in the Orchestrator CR as follows:

apiVersion: rhdh.redhat.com/v1alpha3
kind: Orchestrator
metadata:
  name: ...
spec:
  ...
  platform:
    ...
    monitoring:
      enabled: true
      ...

After the CR is deployed, follow the instructions to deploy Prometheus, Grafana and the sample Grafana dashboard.

Using Knative eventing communication

To enable eventing communication communication between the different components (Data Index, Job Service and Workflows), a broker should be used. Kafka is a good candidate as it fulfills the reliability need. You can find the list of available brokers for Knative is here: https://knative.dev/docs/eventing/brokers/broker-types/

Alternatively, an in-memory broker could also be used, however it is not recommended to use it for production purposes.

Follow these instructions to setup the Knative broker communication.

Additional information

Proxy configuration

Your Backstage instance might be configured to work with a proxy. In that case you need to tell Backstage to bypass the workflow for requests to workflow namespaces and sonataflow namespace (sonataflow-infra). You need to add the namespaces to the environment variable NO_PROXY. E.g. NO_PROXY=current-value-of-no-proxy, .sonataflow-infra, .my-workflow-namespace. Note the . before the namespace name.

Additional Workflow Namespaces

When deploying a workflow in a namespace different from where Sonataflow services are running (e.g., sonataflow-infra), several essential steps must be followed:

1. Allow Traffic from the Workflow Namespace: To allow Sonataflow services to accept traffic from workflows, either create an additional network policy or update the existing policy with the new workflow namespace.

   Create Additional Network Policy

   oc create -f - <<EOF
   apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
   kind: NetworkPolicy
   metadata:
     name: allow-external-workflows-to-sonataflow-infra
     # Namespace where network policies are deployed
     namespace: sonataflow-infra
   spec:
     podSelector: {}
     ingress:
       - from:
         - namespaceSelector:
             matchLabels:
               # Allow Sonataflow services to communicate with new/additional workflow namespace.
               kubernetes.io/metadata.name: <new-workflow-namespace>
   EOF
   

   Alternatively - Update Existing Network Policy

   oc -n sonataflow-infra patch networkpolicy allow-rhdh-to-sonataflow-and-workflows --type='json' \
   -p='[
   {
     "op": "add",
     "path": "/spec/ingress/0/from/-",
     "value": {
       "namespaceSelector": {
         "matchLabels": {
           "kubernetes.io/metadata.name": <new-workflow-namespace>
         }
       }          
     }
   }]'
   

2. Identify the RHDH Namespace: Retrieve the namespace where RHDH is running by executing:

   oc get backstage -A
   

   Store the namespace value in $RHDH_NAMESPACE in the Network Policy manifest below.

3. Identify the Sonataflow Services Namespace: Check the namespace where Sonataflow services are deployed:

   oc get sonataflowclusterplatform -A
   

   If there is no cluster platform, check for a namespace-specific platform:

   oc get sonataflowplatform -A
   

   Store the namespace value in $WORKFLOW_NAMESPACE.

4. Set Up a Network Policy: Configure a network policy to allow traffic only between RHDH, Knative, Sonataflow services, and workflows.

   oc create -f - <<EOF
   apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
   kind: NetworkPolicy
   metadata:
     name: allow-rhdh-to-sonataflow-and-workflows
     namespace: $ADDITIONAL_NAMESPACE
   spec:
     podSelector: {}
     ingress:
       - from:
         - namespaceSelector:
             matchLabels:
               # Allows traffic from pods in the RHDH namespace.
               kubernetes.io/metadata.name: $RHDH_NAMESPACE
         - namespaceSelector:
             matchLabels:
               # Allow traffic from pods in the in the Workflow namespace.
               kubernetes.io/metadata.name: $WORKFLOW_NAMESPACE
         - namespaceSelector:
             matchLabels:
               # Allows traffic from pods in the K-Native Eventing namespace.
               kubernetes.io/metadata.name: knative-eventing
         - namespaceSelector:
             matchLabels:
               # Allows traffic from pods in the K-Native Serving namespace.
               kubernetes.io/metadata.name: knative-serving
   EOF
   

   To allow unrestricted communication between all pods within the workflow’s namespace, create the allow-intra-namespace network policy.

   oc create -f - <<EOF
   apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
   kind: NetworkPolicy
   metadata:
    name: allow-intra-namespace
    namespace:  $ADDITIONAL_NAMESPACE
   spec:
    # Apply this policy to all pods in the namespace
    podSelector: {}
    # Specify policy type as 'Ingress' to control incoming traffic rules
    policyTypes:
      - Ingress
    ingress:
      - from:
          # Allow ingress from any pod within the same namespace
          - podSelector: {}
   EOF
   

5. Ensure Persistence for the Workflow: If persistence is required, follow these steps:

• Create a PostgreSQL Secret: The workflow needs its own schema in PostgreSQL. Create a secret containing the PostgreSQL credentials in the workflow’s namespace:

  oc get secret sonataflow-psql-postgresql -n sonataflow-infra -o yaml > secret.yaml
  sed -i '/namespace: sonataflow-infra/d' secret.yaml
  oc apply -f secret.yaml -n $ADDITIONAL_NAMESPACE
  

• Configure the Namespace Attribute: Add the namespace attribute under the serviceRef property where the PostgreSQL server is deployed.

  apiVersion: sonataflow.org/v1alpha08
  kind: SonataFlow
    ...
  spec:
    ...
    persistence:
      postgresql:
        secretRef:
          name: sonataflow-psql-postgresql
          passwordKey: postgres-password
          userKey: postgres-username
        serviceRef:
          databaseName: sonataflow
          databaseSchema: greeting
          name: sonataflow-psql-postgresql
          namespace: $POSTGRESQL_NAMESPACE
          port: 5432
  

  Replace POSTGRESQL_NAMESPACE with the namespace where the PostgreSQL server is deployed.

By following these steps, the workflow will have the necessary credentials to access PostgreSQL and will correctly reference the service in a different namespace.

GitOps environment

See the dedicated document

Deploying PostgreSQL reference implementation

See here

ArgoCD and workflow namespace

If you manually created the workflow namespaces (e.g., $WORKFLOW_NAMESPACE), run this command to add the required label that allows ArgoCD to deploy instances there:

oc label ns $WORKFLOW_NAMESPACE argocd.argoproj.io/managed-by=$ARGOCD_NAMESPACE

Workflow installation

Follow Workflows Installation

Cleanup

/!\ Before removing the orchestrator, make sure you have first removed any installed workflows. Otherwise the deletion may become hung in a terminating state.

To remove the operator, first remove the operand resources

Run:

oc delete namespace orchestrator

to delete the Orchestrator CR. This will remove the OSL, Serverless and RHDH Operators, Sonataflow CRs.

To clean up the rest of resources run

oc delete namespace sonataflow-infra rhdh

If you want to remove knative related resources, you may also run:

oc get crd -o name | grep -e knative | xargs oc delete

To remove the operator from the cluster, delete the subscription:

oc delete subscriptions.operators.coreos.com orchestrator-operator -n openshift-operators

Note that the CRDs created during the installation process will remain in the cluster.

Compatibility Matrix between Orchestrator Operator and Dependencies

Compatibility Matrix for Orchestrator Plugins

Troubleshooting/Known Issue

Zip bomb detected with Orchestrator Plugin

Currently, there is a known issue with RHDH pod starting up due to the size of the orchestrator plugin. The error Zip bomb detected in backstage-plugin-orchestrator-1.5.0 will be seen and this can be resolved by increasing the MAX_ENTRY_SIZE" of the initContainer which downloads the plugins. This will be resolved in the next operator release. More information can be found here.

To fix this issue, please run patch command within the RHDH instance namespace:

oc -n <rhdh-namespace> patch backstage <rhdh-name> --type='json' -p='[
    {
      "op": "add",
      "path": "/spec/deployment/patch/spec/template/spec/initContainers",
      "value": [
        {
          "name": "install-dynamic-plugins",
          "env": [
            {
              "name": "MAX_ENTRY_SIZE",
              "value": "30000000"
            }
          ]
        }
      ]
    }
  ]'

4.5 - Orchestrator on Kubernetes

The following guide is for installing on a Kubernetes cluster. It is well tested and working in CI with a kind installation.

Here’s a kind configuration that is easy to work with (the apiserver port is static, so the kubeconfig is always the same)

kind: Cluster
apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
networking:
  apiServerAddress: "127.0.0.1"
  apiServerPort: 16443
nodes:
  - role: control-plane
    kubeadmConfigPatches:
    - |
      kind: InitConfiguration
      nodeRegistration:
        kubeletExtraArgs:
          node-labels: "ingress-ready=true"      
    - |
      kind: KubeletConfiguration
      localStorageCapacityIsolation: true      
    extraPortMappings:
      - containerPort: 80
        hostPort: 9090
        protocol: TCP
      - containerPort: 443
        hostPort: 9443
        protocol: TCP
  - role: worker

Save this file as kind-config.yaml, and now run:

kind create cluster --config kind-config.yaml
kubectl apply -f https://projectcontour.io/quickstart/contour.yaml
kubectl patch daemonsets -n projectcontour envoy -p '{"spec":{"template":{"spec":{"nodeSelector":{"ingress-ready":"true"},"tolerations":[{"key":"node-role.kubernetes.io/control-plane","operator":"Equal","effect":"NoSchedule"},{"key":"node-role.kubernetes.io/master","operator":"Equal","effect":"NoSchedule"}]}}}}'

The cluster should be up and running with Contour ingress-controller installed, so localhost:9090 will direct the traffic to Backstage, because of the ingress created by the helm chart on port 80.

Orchestrator-k8s helm chart

This chart will install the Orchestrator and all its dependencies on kubernetes.

THIS CHART IS NOT SUITED FOR PRODUCTION PURPOSES, you should only use it for development or tests purposes

The chart deploys:

• RHDH-backstage https://github.com/redhat-developer/rhdh-chart
• Serverless Workflows Operator (see sonata-serverless-operator.yaml)
• knative serving
• Knative eventing
• Serverless Workflows (optional)

Usage

helm repo add orchestrator https://rhdhorchestrator.github.io/orchestrator-helm-chart

helm install orchestrator orchestrator/orchestrator-k8s

Configuration

All of the backstage app-config is derived from the values.yaml.

Secrets as env vars:

To use secret as env vars, like the one used for the notification, see charts/Orchestrator-k8s/templates/secret.yaml Every key in that secret will be available in the app-config for resolution.

Development

git clone https://github.com/rhdhorchestrator.github.io/orchestrator-helm-chart
cd orchestrator-helm-chart/charts/orchestrator-k8s


helm repo add bitnami https://charts.bitnami.com/bitnami
helm repo add backstage https://backstage.github.io/charts
helm repo add postgresql https://charts.bitnami.com/bitnami
helm repo add redhat-developer https://redhat-developer.github.io/rhdh-chart
helm repo add workflows https://rhdhorchestrator.io/serverless-workflows-config

helm dependencies build
helm install orchestrator .

The output should look like that

$ helm install orchestrator .
Release "orchestrator" has been upgraded. Happy Helming!
NAME: orchestrator
LAST DEPLOYED: Tue Sep 19 18:19:07 2023
NAMESPACE: default
STATUS: deployed
REVISION: 1
NOTES:
This chart will install RHDH-backstage(RHDH upstream) + Serverless Workflows.

To get RHDH's route location:
    $ oc get route orchestrator-white-backstage -o jsonpath='https://{ .spec.host }{"\n"}'

To get the serverless workflow operator status:
    $ oc get deploy -n sonataflow-operator-system 

To get the serverless workflows status:
    $ oc get sf

The chart notes will provide more information on:

• route location of backstage
• the sonata operator status
• the sonata workflow deployed status

4.6 - Orchestrator on existing RHDH instance

When RHDH is already installed and in use, reinstalling it is unnecessary. Instead, integrating the Orchestrator into such an environment involves a few key steps:

1. Utilize the Orchestrator operator to install the requisite components, such as the OpenShift Serverless Logic Operator and the OpenShift Serverless Operator, while ensuring the RHDH installation is disabled.
2. Manually update the existing RHDH ConfigMap resources with the necessary configuration for the Orchestrator plugin.
3. Import the Orchestrator software templates into the Backstage catalog.

Prerequisites

• RHDH is already deployed with a running Backstage instance.
  • Software templates for workflows requires GitHub provider to be configured.
• Ensure that a PostgreSQL database is available and that you have credentials to manage the tablespace (optional).
  • For your convenience, a reference implementation is provided.
  • If you already have a PostgreSQL database installed, please refer to this note regarding default settings.

In this approach, since the RHDH instance is not managed by the Orchestrator operator, its configuration is handled through the Backstage CR along with the associated resources, such as ConfigMaps and Secrets.

The installation steps are detailed here.

4.7 - Workflows

In addition to deploying the Orchestrator, we provide several preconfigured workflows that serve either as ready-to-use solutions or as starting points for customizing workflows according to the user’s requirements. These workflows can be installed through a Helm chart.

4.7.1 - Deploy From Helm Repository

Orchestrator Workflows Helm Repository

This repository serves as a Helm chart repository for deploying serverless workflows with the Sonataflow Operator. It encompasses a collection of pre-defined workflows, each tailored to specific use cases. These workflows have undergone thorough testing and validation through Continuous Integration (CI) processes and are organized according to their chart versions.

The repository includes a variety of serverless workflows, such as:

• Greeting: A basic example workflow to demonstrate functionality.
• Migration Toolkit for Application Analysis (MTA): This workflow evaluates applications to determine potential risks and the associated costs of containerizing the applications.
• Move2Kube: Designed to facilitate the transition of an application to Kubernetes (K8s) environments.
• …

Usage

Prerequisites

To utilize the workflows contained in this repository, the Orchestrator Deployment must be installed on your OpenShift Container Platform (OCP) cluster. For detailed instructions on installing the Orchestrator, please visit the Orchestrator Helm Based Operator Repository

Installation

helm repo add orchestrator-workflows https://rhdhorchestrator.io/serverless-workflows-config

View available workflows on the Helm repository:

helm search repo orchestrator-workflows

The expected result should look like (with different versions):

NAME                            	CHART VERSION	APP VERSION	DESCRIPTION                                      
orchestrator-workflows/greeting 	0.4.2        	1.16.0     	A Helm chart for the greeting serverless workflow
orchestrator-workflows/move2kube	0.2.16       	1.16.0     	A Helm chart to deploy the move2kube workflow.   
orchestrator-workflows/mta      	0.2.16       	1.16.0     	A Helm chart for MTA serverless workflow         
orchestrator-workflows/workflows	0.2.24       	1.16.0     	A Helm chart for serverless workflows
...

You can install the workflows following their respective README

Installing workflows in additional namespaces

When deploying a workflow in a namespace different from where Sonataflow services are running (e.g. sonataflow-infra), there are essential steps to follow. For detailed instructions, see the Additional Workflow Namespaces section.

Version Compatability

The workflows rely on components included in the Orchestrator Operator. Therefore, it is crucial to match the workflow version with the corresponding Orchestrator version that supports it. The list below outlines the compatibility between the workflows and Orchestrator versions:

Helm index

https://www.rhdhorchestrator.io/serverless-workflows-config/index.yaml

5 - Serverless Workflows

A serverless workflow in Orchestrator refers to a sequence of operations that run in response to user input (optional) and produce output (optional) without requiring any ongoing management of the underlying infrastructure. The workflow is executed automatically, and frees users from having to manage or provision servers. This simplifies the process by allowing the focus to remain on the logic of the workflow, while the infrastructure dynamically adapts to handle the execution.

5.1 - Assessment

5.1.1 - MTA Analysis

MTA - migration analysis workflow

Synopsis

This workflow is an assessment workflow type, that invokes an application analysis workflow using MTA and returns the move2kube workflow reference, to run next if the analysis is considered to be successful.

Users are encouraged to use this workflow as self-service alternative for interacting with the MTA UI. Instead of running a mass-migration of project from a managed place, the project stakeholders can use this (or automation) to regularly check the cloud-readiness compatibility of their code.

Workflow application configuration

Application properties can be initialized from environment variables before running the application:

Inputs

• repositoryUrl [mandatory] - the git repo url to examine
• recipients [mandatory] - A list of recipients for the notification in the format of user:<namespace>/<username> or group:<namespace>/<groupname>, i.e. user:default/jsmith.

Output

1. On completion the workflow returns an options structure in the exit state of the workflow (also named variables in SonataFlow) linking to the move2kube workflow that will generate k8s manifests for container deployment.
2. When the workflow completes there should be a report link on the exit state of the workflow (also named variables in SonataFlow) Currently this is working with MTA version 6.2.x and in the future 7.x version the report link will be removed or will be made optional. Instead of an html report the workflow will use a machine friendly json file.

Dependencies

• MTA version 6.2.x or Konveyor 0.2.x

  • For OpenShift install MTA using the OperatorHub, search for MTA. Documentation is here
  • For Kubernetes install Konveyor with olm

    kubectl create -f https://operatorhub.io/install/konveyor-0.2/konveyor-operator.yaml
    

Runtime configuration

All the configuration items are on [./application.properties]

For running and testing the workflow refer to mta testing.

Workflow Diagram

Installation

See official installation guide

5.2 - Infrastructure

5.2.1 - Simple Escalation

Simple escalation workflow

An escalation workflow integrated with Atlassian JIRA using SonataFlow.

Prerequisite

• Access to a Jira server (URL, user and API token)
• Access to an OpenShift cluster with admin Role

Workflow diagram

Note: The value of the .jiraIssue.fields.status.statusCategory.key field is the one to be used to identify when the done status is reached, all the other similar fields are subject to translation to the configured language and cannot be used for a consistent check.

Application configuration

Application properties can be initialized from environment variables before running the application:

(1) This is still hardcoded as PT5S while waiting for a fix to KOGITO-9811

How to run

mvn clean quarkus:dev

Example of POST to trigger the flow (see input schema in ocp-onboarding-schema.json):

curl -XPOST -H "Content-Type: application/json" http://localhost:8080/ticket-escalation -d '{"namespace": "_YOUR_NAMESPACE_"}'

Tips:

• Visit Workflow Instances
• Visit (Data Index Query Service)[http://localhost:8080/q/graphql-ui/]

5.2.2 - Move2Kube

Move2kube (m2k) workflow

Context

This workflow is using https://move2kube.konveyor.io/ to migrate the existing code contained in a git repository to a K8s/OCP platform.

Once the transformation is over, move2kube provides a zip file containing the transformed repo.

Design diagram

Workflow

Note that if an error occurs during the migration planning there is no feedback given by the move2kube instance API. To overcome this, we defined a maximum amount of retries (move2kube_get_plan_max_retries) to execute while getting the planning before exiting with an error. By default the value is set to 10 and it can be overridden with the environment variable MOVE2KUBE_GET_PLAN_MAX_RETRIES.

Workflow application configuration

Move2kube workflow

Application properties can be initialized from environment variables before running the application:

m2k-func serverless function

Application properties can be initialized from environment variables before running the application:

Components

The use case has the following components:

1. m2k: the Sonataflow resource representing the workflow. A matching Deployment is created by the sonataflow operator..
2. m2k-save-transformation-func: the Knative Service resource that holds the service retrieving the move2kube instance output and saving it to the git repository. A matching Deployment is created by the Knative deployment.
3. move2kube instance: the Deployment running the move2kube instance
4. Knative Trigger:
   1. m2k-save-transformation-event: event sent by the m2k workflow that will trigger the execution of m2k-save-transformation-func.
   2. transformation-saved-trigger-m2k: event sent by m2k-save-transformation-func if/once the move2kube output is successfully saved to the git repository.
   3. error-trigger-m2k: event sent by m2k-save-transformation-func if an error while saving the move2kube output to the git repository.
5. The Knative Broker named default which link the components together.

Installation

See official installation guide

Usage

1. Create a workspace and a project under it in your move2kube instance
   • you can reach your move2kube instance by running

   oc -n sonataflow-infra get routes
   

   Sample output:

   NAME                                   HOST/PORT                                                                                             PATH   SERVICES                                 PORT    TERMINATION   WILDCARD
   move2kube-route                        move2kube-route-sonataflow-infra.apps.cluster-c68jb.dynamic.redhatworkshops.io                               move2kube-svc                            <all>   edge          None
   

   • for more information, please refer to https://move2kube.konveyor.io/tutorials/ui
2. Go to the backstage instance.

To get it, you can run

oc -n rhdh-operator get routes

Sample output:

NAME                  HOST/PORT                                                                            PATH   SERVICES              PORT           TERMINATION     WILDCARD
backstage-backstage   backstage-backstage-rhdh-operator.apps.cluster-c68jb.dynamic.redhatworkshops.io   /      backstage-backstage   http-backend   edge/Redirect   None

3. Go to the Orchestrator page.

4. Click on Move2Kube workflow and then click the run button on the top right of the page.

5. In the repositoryURL field, put the URL of your git project

   • ie: https://bitbucket.org/rhdhorchestrator/m2k-test

6. In the sourceBranch field, put the name of the branch holding the project you want to transform

   • ie: main

7. In the targetBranch field, put the name of the branch in which you want the move2kube output to be persisted. If the branch exists, the workflow will fail

   • ie: move2kube-output

8. In the workspaceId field, put the ID of the move2kube instance workspace to use for the transformation. Use the ID of the workspace created at the 1st step.

   • ie: a46b802d-511c-4097-a5cb-76c892b48d71

9. In the projectId field, put the ID of the move2kube instance project under the previous workspace to use for the transformation. Use the ID of the project created at the 1st step.

   • ie: 9c7f8914-0b63-4985-8696-d46c17ba4ebe

10. Then click on nextStep

11. Click on run to trigger the execution

12. Once a new transformation has started and is waiting for your input, you will receive a notification with a link to the Q&A

    • For more information about what to expect and how to answer the Q&A, please visit the official move2kube documentation

13. Once you completed the Q&A, the process will continue and the output of the transformation will be saved in your git repository, you will receive a notification to inform you of the completion of the workflow.

    • You can now clone the repository and checkout the output branch to deploy your manifests to your cluster! You can check the move2kube documention if you need guidance on how to deploy the generated artifacts.

5.3 - Development

Serverless-Workflows

This repository contains multiple workflows. Each workflow is represented by a directory in the project. Below is a table listing all available workflows:

Here is the layout of directories per workflow. Each folder contains at least:

• application.properties the configuration item specific for the workflow app itself.
• ${workflow}.sw.yaml the serverless workflow definitions with respect to the best practices.
• specs/ optional folder with OpenAPI specs if the flow needs them.

All .svg can be ignored, there’s no real functional use for them in deployment and all of them are created by VSCode extension.

Every workflow has a matching container image pushed to quay.io by a github workflows in the form of quay.io/orchestrator/serverless-workflow-${workflow}.

Current image statuses:

• https://quay.io/repository/orchestrator/serverless-workflow-mta-v7.x
• https://quay.io/repository/orchestrator/serverless-workflow-m2k
• https://quay.io/repository/orchestrator/serverless-workflow-greeting
• https://quay.io/repository/orchestrator/serverless-workflow-escalation

After image publishing, GitHub action will generate kubernetes manifests and push a PR to the workflows helm chart repo under a directory matching the workflow name. This repo is used to deploy the workflows to an environment with Sonataflow operator running.

How to introduce a new workflow

Follow these steps to successfully add a new workflow:

1. Create a folder under the root with the name of the flow, e.x /onboarding
2. Copy application.properties, onboarding.sw.yaml into that folder
3. Create a GitHub workflow file .github/workflows/${workflow}.yaml that will call main workflow (see greeting.yaml)
4. Create a pull request but don’t merge yet.
5. Send a pull request to serverless-workflows-config repository to add a sub-chart under the path charts/workflows/charts/onboarding. You can copy the greeting sub-chart directory and files.
6. Create a PR to serverless-workflows-config repository and make sure its merge.
7. Now the PR from 4 can be merged and an automatic PR will be created with the generated manifests. Review and merge.

See Continuous Integration with make for implementation details of the CI pipeline.

Builder image

There are two builder images under ./pipeline folder:

• workflow-builder-dev.Dockerfile - references nightly build image from docker.io/apache/incubator-kie-sonataflow-builder:main that doesn’t required any authorization
• workflow-builder.Dockerfile - references OpenShift Serverless Logic builder image from registry.redhat.io which requires authorization.
  • To use this dockerfile locally, you must be logged to registry.redhat.io. To get access to that registry, follow:
    1. Get tokens here. Once logged in to podman, you should be able to pull the image.
    2. Verify pulling the image here

Note on CI: For every PR merged in the workflow directory, a GitHub Action runs an image build to generate manifests, and a new PR is automatically generated in the serverless-workflows-config repository. The credentials used by the build process are defined as organization level secret, and the content is from a token on the helm repo with an expiry period of 60 days. Currently only the repo owner (rgolangh) can recreate the token. This should be revised.

5.4 - Workflow Examples

Our Orchestrator Serverless Workflow Examples repository, located at GitHub, provides a collection of sample workflows designed to help you explore and understand how to build serverless workflows using Orchestrator. These examples showcase a range of use cases, demonstrating how workflows can be developed, tested, and executed based on various inputs and conditions.

Please note that this repository is intended for development and testing purposes only. It serves as a reference for developers looking to create custom workflows and experiment with serverless orchestration concepts. These examples are not optimized for production environments and should be used to guide your own development processes.

5.5 - Troubleshooting

Troubleshooting Guide

This document provides solutions to common problems encountered with serverless workflows.

Table of Contents

1. HTTP Errors
2. Workflow Errors
3. Configuration Problems
4. Performance Issues
5. Error Messages
6. Network Problems
7. Common Scenarios
8. Contact Support

HTTP Errors

Many workflow operations are REST requests to REST endpoints. If an HTTP error occurs then the workflow will fail and the HTTP code and message will be displayed. Here is an example of the error in the UI. Please use HTTP codes documentation for understanding the meaning of such errors. Here are some examples:

• 409. Usually indicates that we are trying to update or create a resource that already exists. E.g. K8S/OCP resources.
• 401. Unauthorized access. A token, password or username might be wrong or expired.

Workflow Errors

Problem: Workflow execution fails

Solution:

1. Examine the container log of the workflow

       oc logs my-workflow-xy73lj
   

Problem: Workflow is not listed by the orchestrator plugin

Solution:

1. Examine the container status and logs

       oc get pods my-workflow-xy73lj
       oc logs my-workflow-xy73lj
   

2. Most probably the Data index service was unready when the workflow started. Typically this is what the log shows:

       2024-07-24 21:10:20,837 ERROR [org.kie.kog.eve.pro.ReactiveMessagingEventPublisher] (main) Error while creating event to topic kogito-processdefinitions-events for event ProcessDefinitionDataEvent {specVersion=1.0, id='586e5273-33b9-4e90-8df6-76b972575b57', source=http://mtaanalysis.default/MTAAnalysis, type='ProcessDefinitionEvent', time=2024-07-24T21:10:20.658694165Z, subject='null', dataContentType='application/json', dataSchema=null, data=org.kie.kogito.event.process.ProcessDefinitionEventBody@7de147e9, kogitoProcessInstanceId='null', kogitoRootProcessInstanceId='null', kogitoProcessId='MTAAnalysis', kogitoRootProcessId='null', kogitoAddons='null', kogitoIdentity='null', extensionAttributes={kogitoprocid=MTAAnalysis}}: java.util.concurrent.CompletionException: io.netty.channel.AbstractChannel$AnnotatedConnectException: Connection refused: sonataflow-platform-data-index-service.default/10.96.15.153:80
   

3. Check if you use a cluster-wide platform:

      $ oc get sonataflowclusterplatforms.sonataflow.org
      cluster-platform
   

   If you have, like in the example output, then use the namespace sonataflow-infra when you look for the sonataflow services

   Make sure the Data Index is ready, and restart the workflow - notice the sonataflow-infra namespace usage:

       $ oc get pods -l sonataflow.org/service=sonataflow-platform-data-index-service -n sonataflow-infra
       NAME                                                      READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
       sonataflow-platform-data-index-service-546f59f89f-b7548   1/1     Running   0          11kh
   
       $ oc rollout restart deployment my-workflow
   

Problem: Workflow is failing to reach an HTTPS endpoint because it can’t verify it

• REST actions performed by the workflow can fail the SSL certificate check if the target endpoint is signed with a CA which is not available to the workflow. The error in the workflow pod log usually looks like this:

      sun.security.provider.certpath.SunCertPathBuilderException - unable to find valid certification path to requested target
  

Solution:

1. If this happens then we need to load the additional CA cert into the running workflow container. To do so, please follow this guile from the SonataFlow guides site: https://sonataflow.org/serverlessworkflow/main/cloud/operator/add-custom-ca-to-a-workflow-pod.html

Configuration Problems

Problem: Workflow installed in a different namespace than Sonataflow services fails to start

Solution: When deploying a workflow in a namespace other than the one where Sonataflow services are running (e.g., sonataflow-infra), there are essential steps to follow to enable persistence and connectivity for the workflow. See the following steps.

Problem: sonataflow-platform-data-index-service pods can’t connect to the database on startup

1. Ensure PostgreSQL Pod has Fully Started
   If the PostgreSQL pod is still initializing, allow additional time for it to become fully operational before expecting the DataIndex and JobService pods to connect.
2. Verify network policies if PostgreSQL Server is in a different namespace
   If PostgreSQL Server is deployed in a separate namespace from Sonataflow services (e.g., not in sonataflow-infra namespace), ensure that network policies in the PostgreSQL namespace allow ingress from the Sonataflow services namespace (e.g., sonataflow-infra). Without appropriate ingress rules, network policies may prevent the DataIndex and JobService pods from connecting to the database.

5.6 - Configuration

5.6.1 - Configure workflow for token propagation

By default, the RHDH Orchestrator plugin adds headers for each token in the ‘authTokens’ field of the POST request that is used to trigger a workflow execution. Those headers will be in the following format: X-Authorization-{provider}: {token}. This allows the user identity to be propagated to the third parties and externals services called by the workflow. To do so, a set of properties must be set in the workflow application.properties file.

Prerequisites

• Having a Keycloak instance running with a client
• Having RHDH with the latest version of the Orchestrator plugins
• Having a workflow using openapi spec file to send REST requests to a service. Using custom REST function within the workflow will not propagate the token; it is only possible to propagate tokens when using openapi specification file.

Build

When building the workflow’s image, you will need to make sure the following extensions are present in the QUARKUS_EXTENSION:

• io.quarkus:quarkus-oidc-client-filter # needed for propagation
• io.quarkus:quarkus-oidc # neded for token validity check thus accessing $WORKFLOW.identity

See https://github.com/rhdhorchestrator/orchestrator-demo/blob/main/scripts/build.sh#L180 to see how we do it.

Configuration

Oauth2

1. In the OpenAPI spec file(s) where you want to propagate the incoming token, define the security scheme used by the endpoints you’re interested in. All endpoints may use the same security scheme if configured globally. e.g

components:
  securitySchemes:
    BearerToken:
     type: oauth2
     flows:
       clientCredentials:
         tokenUrl: http://<keycloak>/realms/<yourRealm>/protocol/openid-connect/token
         scopes: {}
     description: Bearer Token authentication

2. In the application.properties of your workflow, for each security scheme, add the following:

auth-server-url=https://<keycloak>/realms/<yourRealm>
client-id=<client ID>
client-secret=<client secret>

# Properties to check for identity, needed to use $WORKFLOW.identity within the workflow
quarkus.oidc.auth-server-url=${auth-server-url}
quarkus.oidc.client-id=${client-id}
quarkus.oidc.credentials.secret=${client-secret}
quarkus.oidc.token.header=X-Authorization-<provider>
quarkus.oidc.token.issuer=any # needed in case the auth server url is not the same as the one configured; e.g: localhost VS the k8S service

# Properties for propagation
quarkus.oidc-client.BearerToken.auth-server-url=${auth-server-url}
quarkus.oidc-client.BearerToken.token-path=${auth-server-url}/protocol/openid-connect/token
quarkus.oidc-client.BearerToken.discovery-enabled=false
quarkus.oidc-client.BearerToken.client-id=${client-id}
quarkus.oidc-client.BearerToken.grant.type=client
quarkus.oidc-client.BearerToken.credentials.client-secret.method=basic
quarkus.oidc-client.BearerToken.credentials.client-secret.value=${client-secret}

quarkus.openapi-generator.<spec_file_yaml_or_json>.auth.<security_scheme>.token-propagation=true
quarkus.openapi-generator.<spec_file_yaml_or_json>.auth.<security_scheme>.header-name=X-Authorization-<provider>

With:

• spec_file_yaml_or_json: the name of the spec file configured with _ as separator. E.g: if the file name is simple-server.yaml the normalized property name will be simple_server_yaml. This should be the same for every security scheme defined in the file.
• security_scheme: the name of the security scheme for which propagates the token located in the header defined by the header-name property. In our example it would be BearerToken.
• provider: the name of the expected provider from which the token comes from. As explained above, for each provider in RHDH, the Orchestrator plugin is adding a header with the format X-Authorization-{provider}: {token}.
• keycloak: the URL of the running Keycloak instance.
• yourRealm: the name of the realm to use.
• client ID: the ID of the Keycloak client to use to authenticate against the Keycloak instance.

See https://sonataflow.org/serverlessworkflow/latest/security/authention-support-for-openapi-services.html#ref-authorization-token-propagation and https://quarkus.io/guides/security-openid-connect-client-reference#token-propagation-rest for more information about token propagation.

Setting the quarkus.oidc.* properties will enforce the token validity check against the OIDC provider. Once successful, you will be able to use $WORKFLOW.identity in the workflow definition in order to get the identity of the user. See https://quarkus.io/guides/security-oidc-bearer-token-authentication and https://quarkus.io/guides/security-oidc-bearer-token-authentication-tutorial for more information.

Bearer token

1. In the OpenAPI spec file(s) where you want to propagate the incoming token, define the security scheme used by the endpoints you’re interested in. All endpoints may use the same security scheme if configured globally. e.g

components:
  securitySchemes:
    SimpleBearerToken:
     type: http
     scheme: bearer

2. In the application.properties of your workflow, for each security scheme, add the following:

auth-server-url=https://<keycloak>/realms/<yourRealm>
client-id=<client ID>
client-secret=<client secret>

# Properties to check for identity, needed to use $WORKFLOW.identity within the workflow
quarkus.oidc.auth-server-url=${auth-server-url}
quarkus.oidc.client-id=${client-id}
quarkus.oidc.credentials.secret=${client-secret}
quarkus.oidc.token.header=X-Authorization-<provider>
quarkus.oidc.token.issuer=any # needed in case the auth server url is not the same as the one configured; e.g: localhost VS the k8S service

quarkus.openapi-generator.<spec_file_yaml_or_json>.auth.<security_scheme>.token-propagation=true
quarkus.openapi-generator.<spec_file_yaml_or_json>.auth.<security_scheme>.header-name=X-Authorization-<provider>

With:

• spec_file_yaml_or_json: the name of the spec file configured with _ as separator. E.g: if the file name is simple-server.yaml the normalized property name will be simple_server_yaml. This should be the same for every security scheme defined in the file.
• security_scheme: the name of the security scheme for which propagates the token located in the header defined by the header-name property. In our example it would be SimpleBearerToken.
• provider: the name of the expected provider from which the token comes from. As explained above, for each provider in RHDH, the Orchestrator plugin is adding a header with the format X-Authorization-{provider}: {token}.

Setting the quarkus.oidc.* properties will enforce the token validity check against the OIDC provider. Once successful, you will be able to use $WORKFLOW.identity in the workflow definition in order to get the identity of the user. See https://quarkus.io/guides/security-oidc-bearer-token-authentication and https://quarkus.io/guides/security-oidc-bearer-token-authentication-tutorial for more information.

Basic auth

Basic auth token propagation is not currently supported. A pull request has been opened to add support for it: https://github.com/quarkiverse/quarkus-openapi-generator/pull/1078

With Basic auth, the $WORKFLOW.identity is not available.

Instead you could access the header directly: $WORKFLOW.headers.X-Authorization-{provider} and decode it:

functions:
- name: getIdentity
  type: expression
  operation: '.identity=($WORKFLOW.headers["x-authorization-basic"] | @base64d | split(":")[0])' # mind the lower case!!

You can see a full example here: https://github.com/rhdhorchestrator/workflow-token-propagation-example.

5.7 - Best Practices

Best practices when creating a workflow

A workflow should be developed in accordance with the guidelines outlined in the Serverless Workflow definitions documentation.

This document provides a summary of several additional rules and recommendations to ensure smooth integration with other applications, such as the Backstage Orchestrator UI.

Workflow output schema

To effectively display the results of the workflow and any optional outputs generated by the user interface, or to facilitate the chaining of workflow executions, it is important for a workflow to deliver its output data in a recognized structured format as defined by the WorkflowResult schema.

The output meant for next processing should be placed under data.result property.

id: my-workflow
version: "1.0"
specVersion: "0.8"
name: My Workflow
start: ImmediatelyEnd
extensions:
  - extensionid: workflow-output-schema
    outputSchema: schemas/workflow-output-schema.json
states:
  - name: ImmediatelyEnd
     type: inject
     data:
       result:
          message: A human-readable description of the successful status. Or an error.
          outputs:
            - key: Foo Bar human readable name which will be shown in the UI
              value: Example string value produced on the output. This might be an input for a next workflow.
          nextWorkflows:
            - id: my-next-workflow-id
              name: Next workflow name suggested if this is an assessment workflow. Human readable, it's text does not need to match true workflow name.
    end: true

Then the schemas/workflow-output-schema.json can look like (referencing the WorkflowResult schema):

{
    "$schema": "http://json-schema.org/draft-07/schema#",
    "title": "WorkflowResult",
    "description": "Schema of workflow output",
    "type": "object",
    "properties": {
        "result": {
            "$ref": "shared/schemas/workflow-result-schema.json",
            "type": "object"
        }
    }
}

6 - Plugins

6.1 - Notifications Plugin

The Backstage Notifications System provides a way for plugins and external services to send notifications to Backstage users.

These notifications are displayed in the dedicated page of the Backstage frontend UI or by frontend plugins per specific scenarios.

Additionally, notifications can be sent to external channels (like email) via “processors” implemented within plugins.

Upstream documentation can be found in:

• Notifications and Signals
• Backend email plugin

Frontend

Notifications are messages sent to either individual users or groups. They are not intended for inter-process communication of any kind.

To list and manage, choose Notifications from the left-side menu item.

There are two basic types of notifications:

• Broadcast: Messages sent to all users of Backstage.
• Entity: Messages delivered to specific listed entities from the Catalog, such as Users or Groups.

Backend

The backend plugin provides the backend application for reading and writing notifications.

Authentication

The Notifications are primarily meant to be sent by backend plugins. In such flow, the authentication is shared among them.

To let external systems (like a Workflow) create new notifications by sending POST requests to the Notification REST API, authentication needs to be properly configured via setting the backend.auth.externalAccess property of the app-config .

Refer to the service-to-service auth documentation for more details, focusing on the Static Tokens section as the simplest setup option.

Creating a notification by external services

An example request for creating a broadcast notification can look like:

curl -X POST https://[BACKSTAGE_BACKEND]/api/notifications -H "Content-Type: application/json" -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_BASE64_SHARED_KEY_TOKEN" -d '{"recipients":{"type":"broadcast"},"payload": {"title": "Title of broadcast message","link": "http://foo.com/bar","severity": "high","topic": "The topic"}}'

Configuration

Configuration of the dynamic plugins is in the dynamic-plugins-rhdh ConfigMap created by the Helm chart during installation.

Frontend configuration

Usually there is no need to change the defaults but little tweaks can be done on the props section:

            frontend:
              redhat.plugin-notifications:
                dynamicRoutes:
                  - importName: NotificationsPage
                    menuItem:
                      config:
                        props:
                          titleCounterEnabled: true
                          webNotificationsEnabled: false
                      importName: NotificationsSidebarItem
                    path: /notifications

Backend configuration

Except setting authentication for external callers, there is no special plugin configuration needed.

Forward to Email

It is possible to forward notification content to email address. In order to do that you must add the Email Processor Module to your Backstage backend.

Configuration

Configuration options can be found in plugin’s documentation.

Example configuration:

      pluginConfig:
        notifications:
          processors:
            email:
              filter:
                minSeverity: low
                maxSeverity: critical
                excludedTopics: []
              broadcastConfig:
                receiver: config # or none or users
                receiverEmails:
                  - foo@company.com
                  - bar@company.com
              cache:
                ttl:
                  days: 1
              concurrencyLimit: 10
              replyTo: email@company.com
              sender: email@company.com
              transportConfig:
                hostname: your.smtp.host.com
                password: a-password
                username: a-smtp-username
                port: 25
                secure: false
                transport: smtp

Ignoring unwanted notifications

The configuration of the module explains how to configure filters. Filters are used to ignore notifications that should not be forwarded to email. The supported filters include minimum/maximum severity and list of excluded topics.

User notifications

Each user notification has a list of recipients. The recipient is an entity in Backstage catalog. The notification will be sent to the email addresses of the recipients.

Broadcast notifications

In broadcast notifications we do not have recipients, the notifications are delivered to all users.

The module’s configuration supports a few options for broadcast notifications:

• Ignoring broadcast notifications to be forwarded
• Sending to predefined address list only
• Sending to all users whose catalog entity has an email

6.2 - Orchestrator Plugin

Orchestrator GitHub documentation