While these modules are really nice and helpful, we can't use them
for at least 2 reasons:
- for us, Postgres runs in a container on a private Docker network
(`--network=matrix`) without usually being exposed to the host.
These modules execute on the host so they won't be able to reach it.
- these modules require `psycopg2`, so we need to install it before
using it. This might or might not be its own can of worms.
The tasks in `create_additional_databases.yml` will likely
ensure `matrix-postgres.service` is started, etc.
If no additional databases are defined, we'd rather not execute that
file and all these tasks that it may do in the future.
> Invalid data passed to 'loop', it requires a list, got this instead: matrix_postgres_additional_databases. Hint: If you passed a list/dict of just one element, try adding wantlist=True to your lookup invocation or use q/query instead of lookup.
Well, or working around it, as I've done in this commit (which seems
more sane than `wantlist=True` stuff).
To avoid needing to have `jq` installed on the machine, we could:
- try to run jq in a Docker container using some small image providing
that
- better yet, avoid `jq` altogether
Moving it above the "uninstalling" set of tasks is better.
Extracting it out to another file at the same time, for readability,
especially given that it will probably have to become more complex in
the future (potentially installing `jq`, etc.)
If a service is enabled, a database for it is created in postgres with a uniqque password. The service can then use this database for data storage instead of relying on sqlite.
If the SQLite database was from an older version of Synapse, it appears
that Synapse would try to run migrations on it first, before importing.
This was failing, because the file wasn't writable.
Hopefully, this fixes the problem.
We recently had a report of the Postgres backup container's log file
growing the size of /var/lib/docker until it ran out of disk space.
Trying to prevent similar problems in the future.
the current version fails the import, because the volume for the media is missing. It still fails if you have the optional shared secret password provider is enabled, so that might need another mount. Commenting out the password provider in the hoimeserver.yaml during the run works as well.
We do use some `:latest` images by default for the following services:
- matrix-dimension
- Goofys (in the matrix-synapse role)
- matrix-bridge-appservice-irc
- matrix-bridge-appservice-discord
- matrix-bridge-mautrix-facebook
- matrix-bridge-mautrix-whatsapp
It's terribly unfortunate that those software projects don't release
anything other than `:latest`, but that's how it is for now.
Updating that software requires that users manually do `docker pull`
on the server. The playbook didn't force-repull images that it already
had.
With this patch, it starts doing so. Any image tagged `:latest` will be
force re-pulled by the playbook every time it's executed.
It should be noted that even though we ask the `docker_image` module to
force-pull, it only reports "changed" when it actually pulls something
new. This is nice, because it lets people know exactly when something
gets updated, as opposed to giving the indication that it's always
updating the images (even though it isn't).
Using `docker_container` with a `cap_drop` argument requires
Ansible >=2.7.
We want to support older versions too (2.4), so we either need to
stop invoking it with `cap_drop` (insecure), or just stop using
the module altogether.
Since it was suffering from other bugs too (not deleting containers
on failure), we've decided to remove `docker_container` usage completely.
This makes all containers (except mautrix-telegram and
mautrix-whatsapp), start as a non-root user.
We do this, because we don't trust some of the images.
In any case, we'd rather not trust ALL images and avoid giving
`root` access at all. We can't be sure they would drop privileges
or what they might do before they do it.
Because Postfix doesn't support running as non-root,
it had to be replaced by an Exim mail server.
The matrix-nginx-proxy nginx container image is patched up
(by replacing its main configuration) so that it can work as non-root.
It seems like there's no other good image that we can use and that is up-to-date
(https://hub.docker.com/r/nginxinc/nginx-unprivileged is outdated).
Likewise for riot-web (https://hub.docker.com/r/bubuntux/riot-web/),
we patch it up ourselves when starting (replacing the main nginx
configuration).
Ideally, it would be fixed upstream so we can simplify.
If this is a brand new server and Postgres had never started,
detecting it before we even start it is not possible.
This moves the logic, so that it happens later on, when Postgres
would have had the chance to start and possibly initialize
a new empty database.
Fixes#82 (Github issue)
With this change, the following roles are now only dependent
on the minimal `matrix-base` role:
- `matrix-corporal`
- `matrix-coturn`
- `matrix-mailer`
- `matrix-mxisd`
- `matrix-postgres`
- `matrix-riot-web`
- `matrix-synapse`
The `matrix-nginx-proxy` role still does too much and remains
dependent on the others.
Wiring up the various (now-independent) roles happens
via a glue variables file (`group_vars/matrix-servers`).
It's triggered for all hosts in the `matrix-servers` group.
According to Ansible's rules of priority, we have the following
chain of inclusion/overriding now:
- role defaults (mostly empty or good for independent usage)
- playbook glue variables (`group_vars/matrix-servers`)
- inventory host variables (`inventory/host_vars/matrix.<your-domain>`)
All roles default to enabling their main component
(e.g. `matrix_mxisd_enabled: true`, `matrix_riot_web_enabled: true`).
Reasoning: if a role is included in a playbook (especially separately,
in another playbook), it should "work" by default.
Our playbook disables some of those if they are not generally useful
(e.g. `matrix_corporal_enabled: false`).
As suggested in #63 (Github issue), splitting the
playbook's logic into multiple roles will be beneficial for
maintainability.
This patch realizes this split. Still, some components
affect others, so the roles are not really independent of one
another. For example:
- disabling mxisd (`matrix_mxisd_enabled: false`), causes Synapse
and riot-web to reconfigure themselves with other (public)
Identity servers.
- enabling matrix-corporal (`matrix_corporal_enabled: true`) affects
how reverse-proxying (by `matrix-nginx-proxy`) is done, in order to
put matrix-corporal's gateway server in front of Synapse
We may be able to move away from such dependencies in the future,
at the expense of a more complicated manual configuration, but
it's probably not worth sacrificing the convenience we have now.
As part of this work, the way we do "start components" has been
redone now to use a loop, as suggested in #65 (Github issue).
This should make restarting faster and more reliable.
