Deployment Shell Access

Abilities to manage deployed Akash containers have been accentuated greatly within this release. Introduced deployment capabilities include:

• Ability to execute commands within running Linux containers/Akash deployments. Such an ability resembles “docker exec” command execution within a live container instance.
• Ability to gain access to the CLI/shell of a running Linux container/Akash deployment.
• Ability to remote copy files from running Linux containers/Akash deployments to a local file instance for inspection.

In the subsections which follow granular details of these introduced features will be explored with example executions and depictions.

Remote Shell Command Execution

Execute command sets within a running Akash deployment

• Command template with variable bracketing as such <variable-name>
• Notes of interest pertaining to command execution:
  • The service-name variable must match the service value in the deployment’s SDL. For example - in the depicted segment of an SDL file below - the service-name in remote shell execution would be “web”

provider-services lease-shell --from <key-name> --dseq <dseq-number> --provider=<provider-address> <service-name> <command-to-execute>

• Example command fully populated

  provider-services lease-shell --from mykey --dseq 226186 --provider=akash1gx4aevud37w4d6kfd5szgp87lmkqvumaz57yww web cat /etc/passwd

• Example command fully populated using environment variables

• Prior establishment of the AKASH_KEY_NAME and AKASH_PROVIDER environment variables would be necessary to allow this syntax

provider-services lease-shell --from $AKASH_KEY_NAME --dseq 226186 --provider=$AKASH_PROVIDER web cat /etc/passwd

• Expected output example

Access the Deployment Shell (CLI)

Gain access to an active Akash deployment’s CLI/shell

• Command template with variable bracketing as such <variable-name>
• Command notes of interest:
  • The service-name variable must match the service value in the deployment’s SDL. For example - in the depicted segment of an SDL file below - the service-name in remote shell execution would be “web”
  • Note the “tty” switch dictating desire for shell/CLI access

provider-services lease-shell --from <key-name> --dseq <dseq-number> --tty --provider=<provider-address> <service-name> /bin/sh --node $AKASH_NODE

• Example command fully populated
• Note - the container instance must have a /bin/sh shell for the command to work in this exact syntax. If this were an Alpine container base image /bin/sh would need to become /bin/ash and this serves as an example of possible edit to the command syntax based on container type.
• Prior establishment of the AKASH_KEY_NAME and AKASH_PROVIDER environment variables would be necessary to allow this syntax

provider-services lease-shell --from $AKASH_KEY_NAME --dseq 226186 --tty --provider=$AKASH_PROVIDER web /bin/sh --node $AKASH_NODE

• Expected output example
• Note - Linux commands “pwd” and “ls” are included and as executed within the deployment to validate Akash container shell access

Copy File from Akash Container/Deployment

Copy a file from an active Akash deployment to a local file instance for inspection

• Command template with variable bracketing as such <variable-name>
• Command notes of interest:
  • The service-name variable must match the service value in the deployment’s SDL. For example - in the depicted segment of an SDL file below - the service-name in remote shell execution would be “web”

provider-services lease-shell --from <key-name> --dseq <dseq-number> --provider=<provider-address> <service-name> <command-to-execute> > <local-file-name>

• Example command fully populated

provider-services lease-shell --from mykey --dseq 226186 --provider=akash1gx4aevud37w4d6kfd5szgp87lmkqvumaz57yww web cat /etc/passwd > local_copy_of_passwd

• Example command fully populated using environment variables
• Prior establishment of the AKASH_KEY_NAME and AKASH_PROVIDER environment variables would be necessary to allow this syntax

provider-services lease-shell --from $AKASH_KEY_NAME --dseq 226186 --provider=$AKASH_PROVIDER web cat /etc/passwd > local_copy_of_passwd

• Expected output example
• Note - Linux command “ls” and “cat” are included in the depiction to validate successful file copy from remote Akash container/deployment to local file

SDL Example Utilized

Full SDL code samples used throughout this guide

---
version: "2.0"
services:
 web:
   image: pengbai/docker-supermario
   expose:
     - port: 8080
       as: 80
       to:
         - global: true
       http_options:
         max_body_size: 3145728
         read_timeout: 50000
         send_timeout: 51000
         next_cases: ["error", "500"]
         next_tries: 2
       accept:
         - supermariotest.akash.network
profiles:
 compute:
   web:
     resources:
       cpu:
         units: 0.1
       memory:
         size: 512Mi
       storage:
         size: 512Mi
 placement:
   westcoast:
     signedBy:
       anyOf:
         - "akash1365yvmc4s7awdyj3n2sav7xfx76adc6dnmlx63"
     pricing:
       web:
         denom: uakt
         amount: 3000
deployment:
 web:
   westcoast:
     profile: web
     count: 1