Basic How-To Guides on Webscale Product Documentation

How to Create Roles and Invite Users

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

After completing the Webscale onboarding process, you will have your own Webscale account. Access to this account is controlled via roles. By default, your new account includes a few important roles to help you get started: Editor and Reader. In general, editors will have access to view, create, modify and destroy resources in the account while readers will only be able to view those resources. A user’s access in the account is determined by the roles to which they have accepted invitations. This guide details how to create your own custom roles and how to invite users to them.

How to Create Groups and Invite Users

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Overview

Webscale groups consolidate multiple roles so they can be managed as one entity. Generally, the encapsulated roles are expected to be related in some way or share similar responsibilities, though this is not a requirement.

Create a group


	1. Login to the Webscale Control Panel and click the three bars in the upper left. Select Groups from the menu.
	2. Here you view existing groups on the Groups page in the Control Panel.
	3. Clicking Roles lists the roles encapsulated by the group.
	4. Clicking Users lists the users invited to assume the group and whether they have accepted, declined or vacated that invitation.
	5. Click Group in the lower left part of the page to create a new group. In the wizard that appears, you’ll be walked through the steps to configure the group.
	6. It is recommended to use an informative name and description to ease the management of multiple groups.
	7. Select the roles the group should encapsulate. Via the Control Panel, only roles configured in the current account will be listed. Via the API, any role to which the user has access can be configured.
	8. Lastly, invite users to the group. Confirm the changes you’ve made, then click Save to save the changes. This action creates the group and sends invitations to any users invited to the group. If the user invited does not exist, this action will send an email to the user with a link to sign up. Once they complete sign-up (create a password) and log in, they will be taken to the User Profile and can accept the group.

Invite users to an existing group


	1. Login to the Webscale Control Panel and click the three bars in the upper left. Select Groups from the menu.
	2. On this page you see existing groups. To invite a user to the group, click the Users button for the group, then click the pencil in the upper right of the expanded panel.
	3. Enter the user’s email address, and click the + button. A comma-separated list of email addresses can be inputted at a single time. This will send invitations to all the added email addresses.
	4. The user receives an email from Webscale with a link to the User Profile , where they can accept the role. If the user invited does not exist, this action will send an email to the user with a link to sign up. Once they complete sign-up (create a password) and log in, they will be taken to the User Profile and can accept the group.
	5. In the User Profile the user can manage their password and their multi-factor authentication settings. The user will also see some information about their user account, such as: Any existing roles and groups to which the user belongs. The user’s name. The user’s email address. Webscale API access keys. Users can leave a group. In such an event, they must be re-invited to the group if they wish to regain access. If the role the user was invited to does not permit Webscale Control Panel access, the user will only have access to their User Profile. This may be the case if you only want the role to apply to the Webscale Secure Access web control, for example.

How to View Users and Remove Their Access

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Access to Webscale accounts are controlled via Roles and Groups . For users with admin type permissions, the Users page facilitates easy viewing of the users that have a role or group defined in an account. In addition, the Users page allows easy resetting of a user’s MFA, removal of all a user’s access to an account, and revoking an individual invitation from a role or group.

The table on the Users page displays information about each user: their email which functions as their unique identifier, their name, when they were created, and the last time they changed their password. Click on a user’s row to display the roles and groups that user has been invited to as as well as when the invite was sent and accepted.

Working with Labelers

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

A labeler applies a label to all future logs that match the labeler’s configuration. These labels can be a powerful tool in analyzing logs. For example, you can create a labeler using a complex filter query, allowing you to simply search for that label in the traffic viewer and refine the query as needed.

Note:

These labels differ from labels applied using Web Controls in that the labels are applied to the logs just before they are written, instead of when the request is received.

Configuring General Application Settings

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The General page enables you to modify basic settings for an application, including its name, labels, default hostname, and aliases.

Access the General page

To access general application settings

Click the three vertical dots menu icon on the upper right corner of the application box and select Edit.

-or-

On your application page, click the Actions menu icon and select Edit.

The General page displays.

Managing Maintenance Mode

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Maintenance mode provides the ability to temporarily replace your application with a simple microsite in order to perform maintenance or otherwise make changes to your site. A microsite displays to inform users that the site is in maintenance mode and temporarily unavailable.

Microsites are standalone websites that display for your application. A microsite package file (also known as a microsite file) contains the files for one or more microsites. There are five microsites that can display for standard usages, including maintenance mode. For more information about microsites, see Working with Microsites .

Working with Address Sets

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

An address set is a list of IP addresses that Webscale manages and uses in features like Trusted Proxies , Traffic Viewer , Web Controls , and Allowed and Blocked lists. For instance, you must select address sets for the trusted proxies to enable and use the Trusted Proxies feature.

All applications for the account can use the address sets. The Address sets tab of the account settings page enables you to work with address sets through the Webscale Control Panel page. Each address set is listed in the table as a separate entry.

Working with Files

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Through the Files page, you can work with files. After you upload files for your account, they are available for all of the account applications.

The CloudEDGE Workers and microsite features both use uploaded files. Information specific to working with handler and microsite files, including previewing files, is located in Working with CloudEDGE Handlers and Workers and Working with Microsites .

CloudEDGE Workers enables you to easily extend your application’s functionality through custom JavaScript without changing your application code. For more information about the CloudEDGE Workers feature, see CloudEDGE Workers Overview .

How to View Events

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The Events Viewer will show recent events that have taken place for your application on the platform, and some information about those events.

Note:

The events displayed will differ depending upon the privileges of the Control Panel user role .

View Events

To view events, log in to the Webscale Control Panel and click the three bars on the upper left, then select Events from the menu. From here you will see a list of events on the left. To see more information about a specific event, click the event in the list. The right pane will show the information, including the following:

Events Logs Attributes

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The account Events page enables you to view events information for all account applications. The Events section on the Webscale Control Panel page displays recent events for the applications.

You can also view events for a specific application through the application’s Events page. The Events section on the application dashboard displays recent application events.

For more information on viewing events, see Viewing Events .

The following table provides Events logs attribute information. You can view the name, display name, and a description for each attribute.

How to Enable Notifications

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

You can subscribe to alert notifications in the Webscale Control Panel. These notifications provide real-time alerts to various conditions that affect site performance. Find these alert settings in the Alert Notifications tab under Account Settings.

Configure Notifications


	1. Log in to the Webscale Control Panel and click the gear on the upper right, then select Account Settings from the menu.
	2. Click Alert Notifications from the top menu bar to view the cluster information.
	3. You have the option to subscribe to all alerts or just specific alerts. To subscribe to all alerts, enter the email address you want to receive the alerts in the email address box in the All Alerts section. Click the Add Email button, then click the Save button.
	4. If you only want to subscribe to specific alerts, enter the email address you want to receive the alerts in the email address box in the appropriate section. For example, enter your email address in the Application Down section to only receive notifications for Application Down events.
	5. Any alert notifications that you haven’t configured show minimized on the list. To enable these alerts, click on the alert name, then enter your email address and click the Save button.
	6. To disable alert notifications, click the Delete button for the email address you wish to remove from notifications. You should not delete any `webscalenetworks` or `victorops` email addresses for any alerts as the Webscale support team uses these.

Viewing Reports

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

You can access reports on your system through the main Reports page, including usage and performance information.

The Outbound data transfer report presents a consolidated view of the amount of outbound data transferred for your account and applications. Outbound data transfer, measured in gigabytes (GB), consists of responses from Webscale to site user requests.

(The data transfer monitor uses the same information as this report. It tracks data transfer usage for all account applications. You can configure it to generate events when it detects activity that matches or exceeds conditions that you define. This monitor can send email notifications when the events occur.)

Working with Providers

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Webscale uses external services, such as cloud providers and Docker registries, to provide functionality and implement features. To connect to an external service, you must create a provider. External services require authentication to access them. Each provider has a set of credentials to authenticate to the corresponding service.

You can define providers for your account through the Webscale Control Panel. After you create a provider, you can use them in blueprints for data planes and clusters. You can also use providers to implement features such as Webscale CDN.

Creating Clusters

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

A cluster is a collection of servers or containers that can be used to scale an application horizontally. Webscale supports both Virtual Machine (VM) based clusters as well as Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS) clusters. In order to create a cluster, you must first add your provider via the Providers tab. For more information, check out Working with Providers .

Cluster types

Webscale supports two different types of clusters: VM and Kubernetes.

VM Clusters

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

A Virtual Machine (VM) cluster is a server based cluster that scales horizontally in response to increasing or decreasing traffic. VM Clusters are composed of cluster servers which are created based on one or more user provided server blueprints.

Prerequisites

In order to create a VM cluster, you must first add your Provider via the Providers tab. For more information, check out Working with Providers . Creating a provider will automatically create the VM service necessary to create VM clusters.

Kubernetes Clusters

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

A Kubernetes targeted cluster is a container based cluster that scales horizontally in response to increasing or decreasing traffic. The cluster is composed of up to two instances defined by blueprints: a web-server instance and optionally, a cron instance. The web-server instance consists of Pods managed by a Kubernetes Horizontal Pod Autoscaler and routable through a Service in the Kubernetes cluster. Users can specify scaling conditions, an init job, init container, and other container specific parameters when setting up their web-server blueprint. The optional cron instance consists only of a single Pod and any ConfigMaps necessary for successful cron execution.

How to Enable Application Uptime Monitoring

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Webscale allows you to enable uptime and error rate monitoring for your application. You can either enable passive monitoring or active monitoring.

To follow these instructions, log into Webscale Control Panel and click the three vertical dots menu of the application box.

On the menu that appears, click Edit. Then, click the Monitoring button on the left menu.

Monitoring modes

None

No monitoring of client error rate or application up/down state is done. Note that all other alerts are independent of this setting.

Testing Your Application

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Through the optional application testing feature, you can perform load tests for your application. The test results can help you find possible problems like performance bottlenecks. You can use this feature to test your application after making changes to it.

The application testing feature provides the means to run load tests. Webscale or your developer will create customized tests to meet your needs. The test design specifies the application test paths, what to test, and test methodology.

Configuring Application Shielding

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Application shielding protects application servers from unauthorized traffic. Shields are implemented by utilizing cloud provider networking capabilities, eg. firewalls in Google or security groups in AWS. More information about application shielding is available on the Application Shielding reference page .

Configuring a shield will update inbound/ingress rules to permit http and https traffic from Webscale control and proxy servers as well as from whitelisted addresses configured for the application. Traffic from other addresses may be dropped once the shield is selected unless explicitly allowed by higher priority rules.

Introducing Webscale service users

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Overview

Webscale service users are a special type of Webscale user. Instead of representing a particular person, service users encapsulate a persistent Webscale API access key, useful for completing long-standing tasks, typically in an automated environment like deployment scripts. Service users are scoped to the account and, as a result, can be managed like any other account-level resource.

Note:

Service users can be granted access to multiple accounts by inviting them to roles in each account.

Basic How-To Guides on Webscale Product Documentation

How to Create Roles and Invite Users

How to Create Groups and Invite Users

Overview

Create a group

Invite users to an existing group

How to View Users and Remove Their Access

Working with Labelers

Configuring General Application Settings

Access the General page

To access general application settings

Managing Maintenance Mode

Working with Address Sets

Working with Files

How to View Events

View Events

Events Logs Attributes

How to Enable Notifications

Configure Notifications

Further Reading

Viewing Reports

Working with Providers

Creating Clusters

Cluster types

VM Clusters

Prerequisites

Kubernetes Clusters

How to Enable Application Uptime Monitoring

Monitoring modes

None

Testing Your Application

Configuring Application Shielding

Introducing Webscale service users

Overview