Skip to main content
Star us on GitHub Star

Run a Router in a Public Cloud

2.0 Configure a Router​

In this section, we are describing how to setup the edge router (pub-er) for our test network.

2.1 Create the Edge Router VM​

Please follow Create a VM section of the controller cloud guide to setup a VM to be used as router.

2.2 Login and Update the repo and apps on VM​

  • Once the VM is created, we can get the IP address of the VM from the Virtual machine screen.
  • Login to the VM by using defined user "username" (default username is azureuser) and the private sshkey:
ssh -i <private_key> <username>@<ip>

2.2.1 apt update​

sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade

2.2.2 Download ziti_router_auto_enroll binary​

ziti_router_auto_enroll is an easy way to setup your router automatically.

wget https://github.com/netfoundry/ziti_router_auto_enroll/releases/latest/download/ziti_router_auto_enroll.tar.gz
tar xf ziti_router_auto_enroll.tar.gz

You should have a file ziti_router_auto_enroll under the directory.

For detail info on ziti_router_auto_enroll, please checkout the ziti_router_auto_enroll github page

2.3 Create and Set Up Router Directly on Router VM​

You can setup the router directly on the router VM with one command if you did not block your controller's edge-management port. At this time, the quickstart for setting up controller does not separate edge-management port from edge-client port, so the edge-management port has to be open. You may continue this section if you know your controller's management password, Fabric Port (default 8440) and Management Port (default 8441).

You can also choose to create router on the controller and then register with the jwt file (created when creating the router) on the router. The procedure for this is detailed in "Create Router On the Controller" section.

2.3.1 Info needed for creating Router​

In order to create the Router, the VM needs to contact controller. We need the following information before we can continue:

  • Controller IP or Controller NDS
  • Controller Fabric Port: On the controller, issue this command echo $ZITI_CTRL_PORT
  • Controller Management Port: On the controller, issue this command echo $ZITI_EDGE_CONTROLLER_PORT
  • Controller Passwd: On the controller, issue this command echo $ZITI_PWD
  • Router Name: Name for this router

2.3.2 Info gathered for creating Router​

Here is information I gathered from previous step:

  • Controller IP: 68.183.52.206
  • Controller Fabric Port: 8440 (default value if following controller setup guide)
  • Controller Management Port: 8441 (default value if following controller setup guide)
  • Controller Passwd: Test@123
  • Router Name: pub-er

We are also going to create the router without healthcheck section, so the following option will be used to create the router:

  • --disableHealthChecks

If you choose to explore these two functionalities, you can remove the options (from command line) when creating router.

Use this procedure to create a Public Router with link listener (but without tunnel).

sudo ./ziti_router_auto_enroll -f -n --controller 68.183.52.206 --controllerFabricPort 8440 --controllerMgmtPort 8441 --adminUser admin --adminPassword Test@123 --assumePublic --disableHealthChecks --routerName pub-er

output

2023-04-05-04:07:44-INFO-Writing jwt file: pub-er_enrollment.jwt
2023-04-05-04:07:44-INFO-Version not specified, going to check with controller
2023-04-05-04:07:45-INFO-Found version 0.27.7
2023-04-05-04:07:45-INFO-Downloading file: https://github.com/openziti/ziti/releases/download/v0.27.7/ziti-linux-amd64-0.27.7.tar.gz
Downloading: 100%|████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████| 115M/115M [00:01<00:00, 67.3MiB/s]
2023-04-05-04:07:47-INFO-Successfully downloaded file
2023-04-05-04:07:47-INFO-Starting binary install
2023-04-05-04:07:50-INFO-Installing service unit file
2023-04-05-04:07:50-INFO-Creating config file
2023-04-05-04:07:50-INFO-Starting Router Enrollment
2023-04-05-04:07:54-INFO-Successfully enrolled Ziti
2023-04-05-04:07:54-INFO-Service ziti-router.service start successful.
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/ziti-router.service → /etc/systemd/system/ziti-router.service.
2023-04-05-04:07:55-INFO-Service ziti-router.service enable successful.

Alternative way of creating router

Instead of passing parameters through the command line to create routers, the parameters can be specified via environmental variables. Here is example on how to accomplish that.

export CONTROLLER="68.183.52.206"
export CONTROLLERFABRICPORT="8440"
export CONTROLLERMGMTPORT="8441"
export ADMINUSER="admin"
export ADMINPASSWORD="Test@123"

sudo -E ./ziti_router_auto_enroll -f -n --assumePublic --disableHealthChecks --routerName pub-er

NOTE

When using the environmental variable for ziti_router_auto_enroll, you must
use "-E" option to pass the environmental value to sudo.

2.3.4 Other Router creation options​

If you need to create router with difference options than the one mentioned above, please choose one of the options from this section.

sudo ./ziti_router_auto_enroll -f -n --controller 68.183.52.206 --controllerFabricPort 8440 --controllerMgmtPort 8441 --adminUser admin --adminPassword Test@123 --assumePublic --disableHealthChecks --autoTunnelListener --routerName pub-er
sudo ./ziti_router_auto_enroll -f -n --controller 68.183.52.206 --controllerFabricPort 8440 --controllerMgmtPort 8441 --adminUser admin --adminPassword Test@123 --disableHealthChecks --routerName pub-er

2.3.4.3 Create the Router with edge listener and tunneler​

sudo ./ziti_router_auto_enroll -f -n --controller 68.183.52.206 --controllerFabricPort 8440 --controllerMgmtPort 8441 --adminUser admin --adminPassword Test@123 --disableHealthChecks --autoTunnelListener --routerName pub-er

2.4 Creating Router on the Controller first​

If you already setup the router directly on the VM, you can skip to the next section 2.5

You can create the router on the controller first then register the router on the router VM.

2.4.1 Creating Router on the controller Using ZAC​

If you prefer to create router using CLI, you can jump to cli section.

In order to complete the procedures in this section, you need to install ZAC first and have access to the controller using the ZAC. If you have trouble using ZAC, you can use the CLI procedures to create router.

From the ZAC welcome screen, choose the ROUTERS

Diagram

Click on + to bring up the CREATE EDGE ROUTER widget. The NAME of Router is required, and it has to be unique. Also choose whether you want the tunneler to be enable or not on the router. Enter other optional fields and hit SAVE

Diagram

If the router is created successfully, you will be back to the MANAGE EDGE ROUTERS screen. From the list of edge routers, you will see the JWT icon on the newly created router. You need this JWT for the registration.

Diagram

Click on the JWT ICON, the JWT will be downloaded to your machine. On Chrome browser, the downloaded file will appear on the bottom left corner of the browser like picture below.

Diagram

Open the JWT file, and copy the content. Now you are ready for the registration.

Diagram

2.4.2 Creating Router on the controller Using CLI​

If you already created router using ZAC, you can skip ahead to register the router.

Otherwise, this section provides CLI commands to create routers on the controller.

login to controller

login to CLI first

zitiLogin

To create an edge router (no tunneler)

ziti edge create edge-router pub-er -o pub-er.jwt

output

New edge router pub-er2 created with id: BzUtjC7E.
Enrollment expires at 2023-04-07T03:52:03.997Z

To create an edge router with tunneler

ziti edge create edge-router pub-er -t -o pub-er.jwt

Cat out the content of the jwt file. We will need to use the jwt to register router

# cat  pub-er.jwt
eyJhbGciOiJSUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJlbSI6ImVyb3R0IiwiZXhwIjoxNjgwODM5NjA4LCJpc3MiOiJodHRwczovLzE2MS4zNS4xMDguMjE4Ojg0NDEiLCJqdGkiOiJhNDg5N2Q0ZS1lZTY4LTQ1M2UtYjY1NS03MGU0YjgyZTllNDciLCJzdWIiOiJpY2JLakM3RS5QIn0.Y6DohYyWEeJQmRMe29v4cL3Y1APCnBlrv_-S_941au2OESuQdt2CS4C4djvESYzV5vbnbgZgyU5xtNvb4lW5Uv2HP3XUGQNVsWjpwZbazNoTXg1IX6hhWb7T6u1AhS4xnJ3jpoapKsdOkUSqeQNUMSiN3aeLNcGVA_XK1-utCYjVsHDC90M1ZYZqgd8C9IKziDI10XQVlKTqosv8hoJD0OKIu7WZMslweRSMBtQUA2lZ2QSkIhFr2bvtgPll-5aBnG7eo6Ka_WtEW6EikU2fxgpNaVVBEIdZs1tkdGU6dfBDA6j5wA1TBI0FZnuKlNW24bMZCWKy2B_AMqJW1a80I0qNDx-QHEy-pt8FzZ-eqXWyfhc_nYzwT9kr6hO9VJrrD81hboCeTl8G6EXZjwCi2lPbKHROtkQu08-Ns1Kps7R3GILeNMltW9tKApP746ek4DVxm2cKqiB1Axcb0tNjDWTthjyp8m40aSiiqOPIoQbwa43JLqbHcuhZOSBLQNb_bwzkxBSf34D2w5eVETWy9VX-lgHwM-uhT5SfZIWdnWtO7-Cxn-cqgz89twtOim-yc5j0p0ieAbrOArbjKFBXiQjP8yWkorQKlj5PTSk7vyb3X4q6p--RxP2Z5F8alCPQx3XiVcohvIJnrJiEP86myNIYcKhhJ4OB4r9iOr0qTc8

We also need the management port (default 8441) and fabric port (default 8440) of the controller to register the router

# echo $ZITI_EDGE_CONTROLLER_PORT
8441
# echo $ZITI_CTRL_PORT
8440

Perform this on the Router VM

Use this procedure to create a Public Router with link listener (but without tunnel).

command

sudo ./ziti_router_auto_enroll -f -n --controllerFabricPort 8440 --controllerMgmtPort 8441 --assumePublic --disableHealthChecks <jwt content>
sudo ./ziti_router_auto_enroll -f -n --controllerFabricPort 8440 --controllerMgmtPort 8441 --assumePublic --disableHealthChecks eyJhbGciOiJSUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJlbSI6ImVyb3R0IiwiZXhwIjoxNjgwODM5NjA4LCJpc3MiOiJodHRwczovLzE2MS4zNS4xMDguMjE4Ojg0NDEiLCJqdGkiOiJhNDg5N2Q0ZS1lZTY4LTQ1M2UtYjY1NS03MGU0YjgyZTllNDciLCJzdWIiOiJpY2JLakM3RS5QIn0.Y6DohYyWEeJQmRMe29v4cL3Y1APCnBlrv_-S_941au2OESuQdt2CS4C4djvESYzV5vbnbgZgyU5xtNvb4lW5Uv2HP3XUGQNVsWjpwZbazNoTXg1IX6hhWb7T6u1AhS4xnJ3jpoapKsdOkUSqeQNUMSiN3aeLNcGVA_XK1-utCYjVsHDC90M1ZYZqgd8C9IKziDI10XQVlKTqosv8hoJD0OKIu7WZMslweRSMBtQUA2lZ2QSkIhFr2bvtgPll-5aBnG7eo6Ka_WtEW6EikU2fxgpNaVVBEIdZs1tkdGU6dfBDA6j5wA1TBI0FZnuKlNW24bMZCWKy2B_AMqJW1a80I0qNDx-QHEy-pt8FzZ-eqXWyfhc_nYzwT9kr6hO9VJrrD81hboCeTl8G6EXZjwCi2lPbKHROtkQu08-Ns1Kps7R3GILeNMltW9tKApP746ek4DVxm2cKqiB1Axcb0tNjDWTthjyp8m40aSiiqOPIoQbwa43JLqbHcuhZOSBLQNb_bwzkxBSf34D2w5eVETWy9VX-lgHwM-uhT5SfZIWdnWtO7-Cxn-cqgz89twtOim-yc5j0p0ieAbrOArbjKFBXiQjP8yWkorQKlj5PTSk7vyb3X4q6p--RxP2Z5F8alCPQx3XiVcohvIJnrJiEP86myNIYcKhhJ4OB4r9iOr0qTc8

output

2023-04-07-01:07:49-INFO-Version not specified, going to check with controller
2023-04-07-01:07:49-INFO-Found version 0.27.7
2023-04-07-01:07:49-INFO-Downloading file: https://github.com/openziti/ziti/releases/download/v0.27.7/ziti-linux-amd64-0.27.7.tar.gz
Downloading: 100%|██████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████| 115M/115M [00:01<00:00, 68.9MiB/s]
2023-04-07-01:07:51-INFO-Successfully downloaded file
2023-04-07-01:07:51-INFO-Starting binary install
2023-04-07-01:07:54-INFO-Installing service unit file
2023-04-07-01:07:55-INFO-Service ziti-router daemon-reload successful.
2023-04-07-01:07:55-INFO-Creating config file
2023-04-07-01:07:55-INFO-Starting Router Enrollment
2023-04-07-01:07:57-INFO-Successfully enrolled Ziti
2023-04-07-01:07:57-INFO-Service ziti-router.service start successful.
2023-04-07-01:07:57-INFO-Service ziti-router.service enable successful.

2.4.4 Other Router creation options​

If you need to create router with difference options than the one mentioned above, please choose one of the options from this section.

sudo ./ziti_router_auto_enroll -f -n --controllerFabricPort 8440 --controllerMgmtPort 8441 --assumePublic --disableHealthChecks --autoTunnelListener <jwt content>
sudo ./ziti_router_auto_enroll -f -n --controllerFabricPort 8440 --controllerMgmtPort 8441 --disableHealthChecks  <jwt content>

2.4.4.3 Register the Router with edge listener and tunneler​

sudo ./ziti_router_auto_enroll -f -n --controllerFabricPort 8440 --controllerMgmtPort 8441 --disableHealthChecks --autoTunnelListener <jwt content>

2.5 Auto start the router​

After enroll the router, a systemd service file is automatically created and enabled. To check the status of the service file, issue the following command:

systemctl status ziti-router.service

Output

● ziti-router.service - Ziti-Router
     Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/ziti-router.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
     Active: active (running) since Wed 2023-04-05 14:45:59 UTC; 4s ago
   Main PID: 18381 (ziti)
      Tasks: 6 (limit: 2323)
     Memory: 16.5M
        CPU: 222ms
     CGroup: /system.slice/ziti-router.service
             └─18381 ziti router run /opt/ziti/config.yaml

If the status shows active (running), then the setup finished correctly.

On the controller, you can check the status of the routers. Please refer to the controller guide (useful command for the Router) section for more information.

2.6 Fix the resolver​

Not applicable

2.7 Route Table​

  • For any router setup as a local gateway (i.e. local-er in test network 2), you will need to setup routes in Azure.

  • First you need to create a Route Table from Marketplace. Diagram

  • Then go to your subnet of your VM, associate the Route Table just created to the subnet. Diagram

  • Click on the route table, then choose Routes from the left side menu.

  • Now you will be presented a screen like below, you can then add your route.

  • Following is an example route for intercepting traffic destine for ip: 11.11.11.11/32.

  • The Next hop address is local IP of our local gateway ER.

Diagram

The following routes are required:

  • any intercept address cidr
  • 100.64.0.0/10 (for DNS based intercept)

2.8 Source and Destination Check​

Most cloud provider checks the source and destination of the traffic to make sure it is either originated or terminated at the VM. When our ER is used as a local GW, it is neither the source or the destination of the traffic. Therefore, the source and destination check must be disabled.

  • In Azure, the "Source and Destination Check" is called IP forwarding
  • From your Virtual machine screen, click on the Network Interface of that VM.
  • On the left side menu, choose IP configurations (like the picture below).
  • Enable the IP forwarding
  • SaveDiagram

2.9 Firewall​

Azure's default firewall is blocking all incoming access to the VM. You will need the following ports open for your ERs:

  • 443/TCP (default port for edge listener)
  • 80/TCP (default port for link listener)
  • 53/UDP (when using as local gw)
  • any intercept ports. (i.e. if you want to intercept RDP traffic, you will need to open port 3389)

To open ports:

  • From your Virtual machine page, click on Networking from the left side menu.
  • Under the Inbound port rules, you can click on Add inbound port rule to allow traffic in. Like example here. Diagram