Mainflux.mainflux/bootstrap

BOOTSTRAP SERVICE

New devices need to be configured properly and connected to the Mainflux. Bootstrap service is used in order to accomplish that. This service provides the following features:

1. Creating new Mainflux Things
2. Providing basic configuration for the newly created Things
3. Enabling/disabling Things

Pre-provisioning a new Thing is as simple as sending Configuration data to the Bootstrap service. Once the Thing is online, it sends a request for initial config to Bootstrap service. Bootstrap service provides an API for enabling and disabling Things. Only enabled Things can exchange messages over Mainflux. Bootstrapping does not implicitly enable Things, it has to be done manually.

In order to bootstrap successfully, the Thing needs to send bootstrapping request to the specific URL, as well as a secret key. This key and URL are pre-provisioned during the manufacturing process. If the Thing is provisioned on the Bootstrap service side, the corresponding configuration will be sent as a response. Otherwise, the Thing will be saved so that it can be provisioned later.

Thing Configuration Entity

Thing Configuration consists of two logical parts: the custom configuration that can be interpreted by the Thing itself and Mainflux-related configuration. Mainflux config contains:

1. corresponding Mainflux Thing ID
2. corresponding Mainflux Thing key
3. list of the Mainflux channels the Thing is connected to

Note: list of channels contains IDs of the Mainflux channels. These channels are pre-provisioned on the Mainflux side and, unlike corresponding Mainflux Thing, Bootstrap service is not able to create Mainflux Channels.

Enabling and disabling Thing (adding Thing to/from whitelist) is as simple as connecting corresponding Mainflux Thing to the given list of Channels. Configuration keeps state of the Thing:

State	What it means
Inactive	Thing is created, but isn't enabled
Active	Thing is able to communicate using Mainflux

Switching between states Active and Inactive enables and disables Thing, respectively.

Thing configuration also contains the so-called external ID and external key. An external ID is a unique identifier of corresponding Thing. For example, a device MAC address is a good choice for external ID. External key is a secret key that is used for authentication during the bootstrapping procedure.

Configuration

The service is configured using the environment variables presented in the following table. Note that any unset variables will be replaced with their default values.

Variable	Description	Default
MF_BOOTSTRAP_LOG_LEVEL	Log level for Bootstrap (debug, info, warn, error)	error
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_HOST	Database host address	localhost
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_PORT	Database host port	5432
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_USER	Database user	mainflux
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_PASS	Database password	mainflux
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB	Name of the database used by the service	bootstrap
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_SSL_MODE	Database connection SSL mode (disable, require, verify-ca, verify-full)	disable
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_SSL_CERT	Path to the PEM encoded certificate file
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_SSL_KEY	Path to the PEM encoded key file
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_SSL_ROOT_CERT	Path to the PEM encoded root certificate file
MF_BOOTSTRAP_ENCRYPT_KEY	Secret key for secure bootstrapping encryption	12345678910111213141516171819202
MF_BOOTSTRAP_CLIENT_TLS	Flag that indicates if TLS should be turned on	false
MF_BOOTSTRAP_CA_CERTS	Path to trusted CAs in PEM format
MF_BOOTSTRAP_PORT	Bootstrap service HTTP port	8180
MF_BOOTSTRAP_SERVER_CERT	Path to server certificate in pem format
MF_BOOTSTRAP_SERVER_KEY	Path to server key in pem format
MF_SDK_BASE_URL	Base url for Mainflux SDK	http://localhost
MF_SDK_THINGS_PREFIX	SDK prefix for Things service
MF_THINGS_ES_URL	Things service event source URL	localhost:6379
MF_THINGS_ES_PASS	Things service event source password
MF_THINGS_ES_DB	Things service event source database	0
MF_BOOTSTRAP_ES_URL	Bootstrap service event source URL	localhost:6379
MF_BOOTSTRAP_ES_PASS	Bootstrap service event source password
MF_BOOTSTRAP_ES_DB	Bootstrap service event source database	0
MF_BOOTSTRAP_EVENT_CONSUMER	Bootstrap service event source consumer name	bootstrap
MF_JAEGER_URL	Jaeger server URL	localhost:6831
MF_AUTH_GRPC_URL	Auth service gRPC URL	localhost:8181
MF_AUTH_GRPC_TIMEOUT	Auth service gRPC request timeout in seconds	1s

Deployment

The service itself is distributed as Docker container. Check the boostrap service section in docker-compose to see how service is deployed.

To start the service outside of the container, execute the following shell script:

# download the latest version of the service
git clone https://github.com/mainflux/mainflux

cd mainflux

# compile the service
make bootstrap

# copy binary to bin
make install

# set the environment variables and run the service
MF_BOOTSTRAP_LOG_LEVEL=[Bootstrap log level] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_HOST=[Database host address] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_PORT=[Database host port] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_USER=[Database user] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_PASS=[Database password] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB=[Name of the database used by the service] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_SSL_MODE=[SSL mode to connect to the database with] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_SSL_CERT=[Path to the PEM encoded certificate file] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_SSL_KEY=[Path to the PEM encoded key file] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_DB_SSL_ROOT_CERT=[Path to the PEM encoded root certificate file] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_ENCRYPT_KEY=[Hex-encoded encryption key used for secure bootstrap] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_CLIENT_TLS=[Boolean value to enable/disable client TLS] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_CA_CERTS=[Path to trusted CAs in PEM format] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_PORT=[Service HTTP port] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_SERVER_CERT=[Path to server certificate] \
MF_BOOTSTRAP_SERVER_KEY=[Path to server key] \
MF_SDK_BASE_URL=[Base SDK URL for the Mainflux services] \
MF_SDK_THINGS_PREFIX=[SDK prefix for Things service] \
MF_JAEGER_URL=[Jaeger server URL] \
MF_AUTH_GRPC_URL=[Auth service gRPC URL] \
MF_AUTH_GRPC_TIMEOUT=[Auth service gRPC request timeout in seconds] \
$GOBIN/mainflux-bootstrap

Setting MF_BOOTSTRAP_CA_CERTS expects a file in PEM format of trusted CAs. This will enable TLS against the Users gRPC endpoint trusting only those CAs that are provided.

Usage

For more information about service capabilities and its usage, please check out the API documentation.