API Builder CLI

This document will walk you through the process of how to publish API Builder apps to a newly deployed cluster using Appcelerator CLI commands.

Setup

You will need Appcelerator CLI (appc cli) version 7.0.0+. To install Appcelerator CLI 7.0.0, execute this command:

Publish source code

 The legacy method to publish the API Builder app is as follows:

1. Create a new API Builder app:

   $ appc new -t arrow Appcelerator Command-Line Interface, version 7.0.0 Copyright (c) 2014-2017, Appcelerator, Inc.  All Rights Reserved.    ? What's the project name? appctest *** new completed. ***

2. Update appc.json environment to add extra_hosts if you haven't set up a DNS yet. If your cluster uses appctest.com as a domain name, then you need to add NODE_ENV as well:

   $ cd appctest $ vi appc.json { ...   "cloud": {     ...     // Change your container size here     "container": "Medium",     // Number of containers for your app     "minimum": 3,     // Maximum number of containers for you app when autoscalling kicks in     "maximum": 5,     // NODE_ENV is only needed if     // a. You are running in an alternately-named environment (like staging)     // b. You are running on a domain with appctest in the name     "environment": {"NODE_ENV":"PRODUCTION","extra_hosts":"54.212.208.81 api.cloudapp-1.appctest.com"},     ...    } }

3. Execute appc install (required prior to the release of version 6.2.0).
4. Then publish the app normally by executing this command: appc publish

Publish by providing Dockerfile

Starting from AMPLIFY Runtime Services (formerly known as Arrow Cloud) 1.6.0, you can publish to AMPLIFY Runtime Services by pushing a Docker image directly. If your cluster has no Internet access, this is the recommended method to publish.

1. Create a new API Builder app:

   $ appc new -t arrow Appcelerator Command-Line Interface, version 7.0.0 Copyright (c) 2014-2017, Appcelerator, Inc.  All Rights Reserved.    ? What's the project name? appctest *** new completed. ***

2. Prepare a Dockerfile by creating a Dockerfile under your project directory and use the start_app script. Use of start_app is required if you want to able to retrieve access and console logs of your app using the appc cloud logcat and appc cloud accesslog commands. The following is a sample Dockerfile for an API Builder app:

   FROM mhart/alpine-node:5.12.0 # Install curl command for app health check RUN apk add --no-cache curl   # This is the script to start app COPY start_app /usr/local/bin/ RUN chmod 755 /usr/local/bin/start_app   RUN mkdir -p /opt/app WORKDIR /opt/app   COPY package.json /opt/app COPY app.js /opt/app COPY README.md /opt/app   RUN npm install     ENTRYPOINT ["/usr/local/bin/start_app"]

3. The start_app script should look something like this and be placed under the project directory with the Dockerfile:

   #!/bin/sh   APP_DIR="/opt/app"   # command to retrieve the containerId inside docker container CONTAINID=$(cat /proc/1/cgroup | grep 'docker/' | tail -1 | sed 's/^.*\///' | cut -c 1-12)   # replace the fake "serverId" with the real container id if [ ! -z $CONTAINID ]; then     ARROWCLOUD_APP_LOG_DIR=$(echo ${ARROWCLOUD_APP_LOG_DIR} | sed "s/serverId/${CONTAINID}/")     export serverId=${CONTAINID} fi    APP_LOG_DIR="/ctdebuglog/${ARROWCLOUD_APP_LOG_DIR}" APP_DEBUG_LOG_DIR="${APP_LOG_DIR}/debug" APP_REQUESTS_LOG_DIR="${APP_LOG_DIR}/requests"   mkdir -p "${APP_DEBUG_LOG_DIR}" if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then     echo "Failed to create ${APP_DEBUG_LOG_DIR}"     exit 1 fi    mkdir -p "${APP_REQUESTS_LOG_DIR}" if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then     echo "Failed to create ${APP_REQUESTS_LOG_DIR}"     exit 1 fi    # make a symbolic link from ${APP_REQUESTS_LOG_DIR} to /ctlog to satisfy appc-logger ln -s ${APP_REQUESTS_LOG_DIR} /ctlog if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then     echo "Failed to create link from ${APP_REQUESTS_LOG_DIR} to /ctlog"     exit 1 fi    STDOUT_LOG_FILE="${APP_DEBUG_LOG_DIR}/stdout.log" STDERR_LOG_FILE="${APP_DEBUG_LOG_DIR}/stderr.log"   # curl is used for health-check when creating docker service for an app. curl >/dev/null 2>&1 if [ $? -eq 127 ]; then     echo "curl not found! App image must include curl for health-check purpose." >> ${STDOUT_LOG_FILE} 2>>${STDERR_LOG_FILE}     exit 1 fi    cd $APP_DIR echo "[app_launcher] starting application via \"$DAEMON $DAEMON_ARGS\"" >> ${STDOUT_LOG_FILE} 2>>${STDERR_LOG_FILE} # start the app in the same process which is the main process(pid 1), so that the app can get signals exec node app.js >> ${STDOUT_LOG_FILE} 2>>${STDERR_LOG_FILE} RETVAL=$? if [ $RETVAL -ne 0 ]; then     echo "[app_launcher] application is over with status code $RETVAL." >> ${STDOUT_LOG_FILE} 2>>${STDERR_LOG_FILE} else     echo "[app_launcher] application is over." >> ${STDOUT_LOG_FILE} 2>>${STDERR_LOG_FILE} fi exit $RETVAL

4. Execute appc publish. You will need to provide the app version using the --app-version flag. You should always provide the app name since Appcelerator CLI will not scan package.json as it would normally with source code publishing that does obtain the app name. Using appc publish will build the Docker image by using the provided Dockerfile and push the image to AMPLIFY Runtime Services directly:

   $ cd appctest $ appc publish --app-version 1.0.0 appctest

5. If you need to scale up the number of servers, execute these commands:

   # Set maximum number of containers allowed for appctest $ appc cloud config appctest --maxsize <size> # Set current number of containers for appctest as long as the cluster has enough resource) $ appc cloud config appcteest --minsize <size>

Publish by using existing Docker image

Alternatively, after preparing your Dockerfile and start_app script, you can build the Docker image yourself and publish the image to AMPLIFY Runtime Services: 

1. Build the Docker image:

   $ cd appctest $ docker build -t appctestimage . # Double check the image presents locally $ docker images |grep appctestimage appctestimage               latest              869918dab71b        43 minutes ago      277 MB

2. Next, publish the image directly. Ensure that you provide the app version and name and image name by using the --app-version, appname, and --image flags:

   $ cd appctest $ appc publish --app-version 1.0.0 --image appctestimage appctest

3. If you need to scale up the number of servers, execute these commands:

   # Set maximum number of containers allowed for appctest $ appc cloud config appctest --maxsize <size> # Set current number of containers for appctest as long as the cluster has enough resource) $ appc cloud config appcteest --minsize <size>

Note: If you haven't set up your DNS yet, your app publish may fail with the following error:

In this case, you will need to execute the following command to configure the custom host info in the app container. Please note if you try to update /etc/hosts file in the Dockerfile with the custom hostname and IP. It will not work because the Docker swarm mode will override that information at the time of the container launch.

Note about Docker image publish with Alpine: You will need to execute apk add --no-cache curl in the Docker file when publishing the Docker image.

CLI commands