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Example Enabling BrowZer

This page will demonstrate adding BrowZer to an existing network that was started using the "host it anywhere" quickstart. It will use Ubuntu Linux as well, if your Linux distribution is different, change the commands accordingly. The August 18 2023 Ziti TV features a full walkthrough and explanation of this whole page. If you are interested in watching a narrated and explained run through of this page, watch the video and follow along with the doc here.

Before you Begin​

This guide will use BASH. If you're using a different shell, it's up to you to translate any commands that don't work correctly (or run a BASH shell). This guide will expect you have set a variable named wildcard_url which represents the root domain you want to enable BrowZer with. For this example, this guide uses and references this value for the wildcard_url=browzerexample.demo.openziti.org. (Make sure you set this value)

This quickstart will use Docker to obtain a wildcard certificate. You'll need to be familiar with Docker and have it installed to proceed, or you'll need to figure out alternative ways to obtain a wildcard certificate.

If you already have an existing network, you'll likely want to skim through this document and pick out the sections that are relevant to your configuration.

If you lose your shell, one or more important variables may be lost. It is probably easiest to start again and follow this guide, or you will need to ensure the variables are reset in the shell.

BrowZer also leverages an OIDC provider. Configuring and picking an OIDC provider are topics largely out of scope for this document. This example will choose to use a provider that can delegate to other providers, hopefully making it simple to follow this guide. We'll be using Auth0 in this guide.

Get a Wildcard Certificate​

First, to obtain the a wildcard certificate, I used Docker to run Certbot. On the Certbot site there are instructions illustrating how to use Certbot. I chose to use Docker to run Certbot instead of having to install Certbot on the machine. I was able to generate a wildcard certificate from LetsEncrypt for the ${wildcard_url} domain using the DNS challenge method. Also notice that Certbot can contact you as a reminder that your certificates are expiring. LetsEncrypt certs are only valid for 90 days, if you follow these instructions remember that and plan on rotating the certs often. Set your_email as shown below and obtain certificates from LetsEncrypt now:

Run Certbot via Docker
your_email="your.email@someserver.com"
sudo docker run -it --rm --name certbot \
  -v "/etc/letsencrypt:/etc/letsencrypt" \
  -v "/var/lib/letsencrypt:/var/lib/letsencrypt" \
  certbot/certbot certonly -d "*.${wildcard_url}" \
                  --manual \
                  --preferred-challenges dns \
                  --email "${your_email}" \
                  --agree-tos

Enable Certificate Access by Specific Users​

Certbot will make the files it creates available to root only (a good practice). If you run your network as root, this you'll have no problems but generally, it's a better practice to not run as root when you don't need to. In order to run this example as "us" (not the root user) we'll need to grant specific users the ability to read the files.

A flexible way to allow other processes to use/access these files is to make a new group and a new user, that is what is shown below. In linux, groups and users are assigned ids. 2171 looks like "ziti" so we'll use UID 2171 and GID 2171. The example below will make a new group named zitiweb. This group will then be granted ownership of the letsencrypt folder via chown. Changing the ownership of the files to the group will allow any user in that group the ability to read these files so be careful granting this group to users. Then we'll add the user we are currently logged in with to that group so that "we" can see the files for debugging or other purposes. Finally, we'll make a ziggy user that is also in this group so that if we want to, we can run processes as ziggy. Please plan accordingly here. This is just a reasonable example to follow to get you going, change it to suit your needs and do not take this example as authoritative. There are many ways to solve this problem, it's up to you to pick 'the best' way.

Example Changing LetsEncrypt Permissions
sudo groupadd -g 2171 zitiweb
sudo useradd -u 2171 -M ziggy
sudo usermod -aG zitiweb ziggy
sudo usermod -aG zitiweb $USER
sudo chown -R root:zitiweb /etc/letsencrypt/
sudo chmod -R g+rX /etc/letsencrypt/

You will want to enable the new group permissions in the current shell. Log out of your current session and log back in again. Doing so will enable the new group permission in your shell. After, set the wildcard_url variable again. Once set, verify you can access to the certificates:

ls -l /etc/letsencrypt/live/${wildcard_url}/

You should see something similar to:

total 8
-rw-r--r-- 1 root zitiweb 692 Aug 17 21:12 README
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root zitiweb  56 Aug 17 21:12 cert.pem -> ../../archive/browzerexample.demo.openziti.org/cert1.pem
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root zitiweb  57 Aug 17 21:12 chain.pem -> ../../archive/browzerexample.demo.openziti.org/chain1.pem
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root zitiweb  61 Aug 17 21:12 fullchain.pem -> ../../archive/browzerexample.demo.openziti.org/fullchain1.pem
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root zitiweb  59 Aug 17 21:12 privkey.pem -> ../../archive/browzerexample.demo.openziti.org/privkey1.pem

Install Ziti​

BrowZer is built around OpenZiti. You'll need a network deployed. Since this guide is using a legitimate 3rd party verifiable certificate from LetsEncrypt, we'll deploy a brand new network by following the steps outlined in the "host it anywhere" quickstart with one important exception! We are going to set two variables before running the quickstart to allow the servers to use the LetsEncrypt wildcard certificate:

Setup for Alternative Server Certs

Since we have just obtained some LetsEncrypt certificates, we'll enable OpenZiti with Alternative Server Certs immediately! To do that we'll set two new variables introduced with v0.29.0. Notice that the ${wildcard_url} variable needs to be set if it's not already set:

export ZITI_PKI_ALT_SERVER_CERT="/etc/letsencrypt/live/${wildcard_url}/fullchain.pem"
export ZITI_PKI_ALT_SERVER_KEY="/etc/letsencrypt/live/${wildcard_url}/privkey.pem"

Run the Ziti Quickstart​

With the ZITI_PKI_ALT_* environment variables set, we are ready to follow the "host it anywhere" quickstart instructions. Run the quickstart and return here when complete.

Verify that Ziti is Listening

After completing the quickstart, you should be able to access the controller at both the alternate server cert url. Notice there's no need for 'insecure' (-sk) curl mode for the${wildcard_url} URL:

curl https://ctrl.${wildcard_url}:${ZITI_CTRL_EDGE_ADVERTISED_PORT}

and we should be able to curl to the non-alternative server url. Note for this we need to use -sk since this will be the self-signed PKI endpoint:

curl -sk https://${ZITI_CTRL_EDGE_ADVERTISED_ADDRESS}:${ZITI_CTRL_EDGE_ADVERTISED_PORT}

Add WebSocket Support​

BrowZer operates in a web browser. For it to connect to a router, BrowZer will attempt to connect to the router using a web socket. We'll need to provision an edge router on the network that supports web sockets. We will do that by modifying the configuration of the router provisioned in the quickstart.

Update edge router for WebSocket Support

After completing the quickstart, you will have an edge router configuration file in the user's home directory. Use your favorite editor, such as vim to edit the file:

vi $ZITI_HOME/${ZITI_NETWORK}-edge-router.yaml

Locate the "binding" section, and add a section that looks like this. Make sure to change the address and advertise fields accordingly to fit your ${wildcard_url} value:

  - binding: edge
    address: wss:0.0.0.0:8447
    options:
      advertise: ws.browzerexample.demo.openziti.org:8447
      connectTimeoutMs: 5000
      getSessionTimeout: 60
Restart the Edge Router

After updating the router's configuration file you'll need to restart the router:

sudo systemctl restart ziti-router
Verify the edge router is Websocket Enabled

After the router restarts you'll be able to verify the router is properly configured. The following curl statement should succeed and return a 404 message similar to the one shown below. Note port 8447 is used, if you change this port you will obviously need to change the port number to the one you chose:

curl https://ws.${wildcard_url}:8447

Install the Ziti Admin Console (ZAC)​

In this example, we will be protecting the Ziti Administration Console (ZAC) with BrowZer. That means we'll need to install ZAC first. Follow the ZAC install guide. After installing ZAC, continue.

Configure the OIDC Provider​

As stated in the "Before You Begin" section, we will be using Auth0 for this quickstart. Lett's configure Auth0 to be the BrowZer OIDC provider.

  • Begin by signing up and authenticating to Auth0.
  • Follow the 'vanillajs' quickstart from Auth0: https://auth0.com/docs/quickstart/spa/vanillajs/interactive
  • Configure the Callback URLs and Logout URLs. Replace the values accordingly, for me, I used: the value https://*.browzerexample.demo.openziti.org:8446

Create a BrowZer env File​

At this point we have a functioning network. We're ready to start BrowZer-specific configuration. First we need to decide/find an OIDC provider.

Set a shell variable named AUTH0_DOMAIN and set it to the value shown on the "Basic Information" page in Auth0. Then set a shell variable named AUTHO_CLIENTID. For me, this looked like this:

AUTH0_DOMAIN=dev-b2q0t23rxctngxka.us.auth0.com
AUTH0_CLIENTID=mKWvp7xJHWxHKPf4eol4VwZxRCmdJIMy
Generate the BrowZer.env File
Warning

Make sure all variables listed below are set in your shell before running

Now copy and paste this command to generate the browzer.env file.

export NODE_ENV=production
export ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_LOGLEVEL=debug
export ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_HOST=browzer.${wildcard_url}
export ZITI_BROWZER_RUNTIME_LOGLEVEL=debug
export ZITI_BROWZER_RUNTIME_HOTKEY=alt+F12
export ZITI_CONTROLLER_HOST=ctrl.${wildcard_url}
export ZITI_CONTROLLER_PORT=${ZITI_CTRL_EDGE_ADVERTISED_PORT}
export ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_SCHEME=https
export ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_CERTIFICATE_PATH=/etc/letsencrypt/live/${wildcard_url}/fullchain.pem
export ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_KEY_PATH=/etc/letsencrypt/live/${wildcard_url}/privkey.pem
export ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_LISTEN_PORT=8446
export ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE=brozac
export ZITI_BROWZER_VHOST=${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.${wildcard_url}
export ZITI_BROWZER_OIDC_URL=https://${AUTH0_DOMAIN}
export ZITI_BROWZER_CLIENT_ID=${AUTH0_CLIENTID}

export ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_TARGETS="$(cat <<HERE
  {
    "targetArray": [
      {
        "vhost": "${ZITI_BROWZER_VHOST}",
        "service": "${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}",
        "path": "/",
        "scheme": "http",
        "idp_issuer_base_url": "${ZITI_BROWZER_OIDC_URL}",
        "idp_client_id": "${ZITI_BROWZER_CLIENT_ID}"
      }
    ]
  }
HERE
)"

cat > $ZITI_HOME/browzer.env << HERE
ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_HOST="${ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_HOST}"
ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_LOGLEVEL="${ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_LOGLEVEL}"
ZITI_BROWZER_RUNTIME_LOGLEVEL="${ZITI_BROWZER_RUNTIME_LOGLEVEL}"
ZITI_BROWZER_RUNTIME_HOTKEY="${ZITI_BROWZER_RUNTIME_HOTKEY}"
ZITI_CONTROLLER_HOST="${ZITI_CONTROLLER_HOST}"
ZITI_CONTROLLER_PORT="${ZITI_CONTROLLER_PORT}"
ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_SCHEME="${ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_SCHEME}"
ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_CERTIFICATE_PATH="${ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_CERTIFICATE_PATH}"
ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_KEY_PATH="${ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_KEY_PATH}"
ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_LISTEN_PORT="${ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_LISTEN_PORT}"
ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_TARGETS='${ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_TARGETS}'
NODE_EXTRA_CA_CERTS=node_modules/node_extra_ca_certs_mozilla_bundle/ca_bundle/ca_intermediate_root_bundle.pem
HERE
echo browzer env file written to: $ZITI_HOME/browzer.env
Inspect the browzer.env File

You should see something like:

browzer env file written to: /home/ubuntu/.ziti/quickstart/ip-172-31-47-200/browzer.env

Open this file up and visually inspect it to verify the file seems to be full, complete and not missing anything obvious. If you had verified all the variables used in the previous command were set, this file will be correctly created.

Install BrowZer

BrowZer is ready to be installed. The main BrowZer page has two sections showing you how to install BrowZer either by cloning from GitHub or by Running via Docker. I have used the "clone" approach to run my BrowZer (and ZAC).

Follow one of those methods and ensure BrowZer is up and running.

browzer env file written to: /home/ubuntu/.ziti/quickstart/ip-172-31-47-200/browzer.env

Open this file up and visually inspect it to verify the file seems to be full, complete and not missing anything obvious. If you had verified all the variables used in the previous command were set, this file will be correctly created.

Prepare the Network​

For the following steps, make sure you have all the variables set and make sure you have logged into the controller:

ziti edge login -u $ZITI_USER -p $ZITI_PWD -y ${ZITI_CTRL_EDGE_ADVERTISED_ADDRESS}:${ZITI_CTRL_EDGE_ADVERTISED_PORT}
Configure the External JWT Signer and Auth Policy
echo "configuring OpenZiti for BrowZer..."
ziti_object_prefix=browzer-auth0
issuer=$(curl -s ${ZITI_BROWZER_OIDC_URL}/.well-known/openid-configuration | jq -r .issuer)
jwks=$(curl -s ${ZITI_BROWZER_OIDC_URL}/.well-known/openid-configuration | jq -r .jwks_uri)

echo "OIDC issuer   : $issuer"
echo "OIDC jwks url : $jwks"

ext_jwt_signer=$(ziti edge create ext-jwt-signer "${ziti_object_prefix}-ext-jwt-signer" "${issuer}" --jwks-endpoint "${jwks}" --audience "${ZITI_BROWZER_CLIENT_ID}" --claims-property email)
echo "ext jwt signer id: $ext_jwt_signer"

auth_policy=$(ziti edge create auth-policy "${ziti_object_prefix}-auth-policy" --primary-ext-jwt-allowed --primary-ext-jwt-allowed-signers ${ext_jwt_signer})
echo "auth policy id: $auth_policy"

After running the commands listed above, you should see output that confirms an ext-jwt-signer and auth-policy were created successfully. It should look similar to what is shown below. Ensure the id's for the signer and auth policy have some value and are not blank:

configuring OpenZiti for BrowZer...
OIDC issuer   : https://dev-b2q0t23rxctngxka.us.auth0.com/
OIDC jwks url : https://dev-b2q0t23rxctngxka.us.auth0.com/.well-known/jwks.json
ext jwt signer id: 23sRIAoaPqh9RDoFO8iwGZ
auth policy id: 6EbCIB8ke40SI8eQxc3O0X
Add a Service to Access an HTTP Web App

To enable access to the ZAC using BrowZer we need to make a service. Things to notice here are that we are using the HTTP port (the BrowZer Bootstrapper will provide HTTPS) and we're using the default port of 1408. Ensure the variables referenced are all set accordingly and then copy/paste these commands:

intercept_address="${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.ziti"
intercept_port=80
offload_address=127.0.0.1
offload_port=1408

function createService {
ziti edge create config ${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.host.config host.v1 '{"protocol":"tcp", "address":"'"${offload_address}"'", "port":'${offload_port}'}'
ziti edge create config ${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.int.config  intercept.v1 '{"protocols":["tcp"],"addresses":["'"${intercept_address}"'"], "portRanges":[{"low":'${intercept_port}', "high":'${intercept_port}'}]}'
ziti edge create service "${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}" --configs "${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.host.config","${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.int.config"
ziti edge create service-policy "${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.bind" Bind --service-roles "@${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}" --identity-roles "#${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.binders"
ziti edge create service-policy "${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.dial" Dial --service-roles "@${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}" --identity-roles "#${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.dialers"
}

function deleteService {
ziti edge delete config  where 'name contains "'"${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}"'."'
ziti edge delete service where 'name = "'"${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}"'"'
ziti edge delete sp      where 'name contains "'"${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}"'."'
}

createService

Verify the commands all succeed (no errors shown) and the output looks similar to this after running:

New config brozac.host.config created with id: 5i85SF4pnehz1LEjJNvCtH
New config brozac.int.config created with id: 2p8xuev7Vb9NzuZoEGi4tq
New service brozac created with id: 5Ry0BOMr6VJGQjF51LdDxv
New service policy brozac.bind created with id: 8EoBqEhKeIKQLQxY5zr3Z
New service policy brozac.dial created with id: 1TUzPYdN3GpGdA4k9Uauv3
Associate/Update Identities with the Auth Policy

Now we need to associate the claims presented by the OIDC provider with one or more identities inside the network. Since we have decided to use Auth0, in the previous step we were able to create an ext-jwt-signer and reference the claim named email. Since we chose Auth0, I know that it will provide this particular claim to OpenZiti after the user logs into the OIDC provider. If your OIDC provider doesn't provide email, you'll have to learn/explore/understand how the OIDC provider you're using works. It's out of scope of this document to provide that sort of insight. Set a variable named ZITI_BROWZER_IDENTITIES and assign it an email address you plan to use:

ZITI_BROWZER_IDENTITIES="clint.dovholuk@company.name"

After create a space delimited list (one value/email is fine too), copy and paste the following command:

echo "creating users specified by ZITI_BROWZER_IDENTITIES: ${ZITI_BROWZER_IDENTITIES}"
for id in ${ZITI_BROWZER_IDENTITIES}; do
ziti edge create identity user "${id}" --auth-policy ${auth_policy} --external-id "${id}" -a "${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.dialers"
done

#ziti edge update identity "${id}" -a $(ziti edge list identities 'name="'${id}'"' -j | jq -r '.data[].roleAttributes | map(. // "") | @csv'),"${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.dialers"
ziti edge update identity "${ZITI_ROUTER_NAME}" -a "${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}.binders"

After you run that command you should see output looking similar to this:

creating users specified by ZITI_BROWZER_IDENTITIES: clint.dovholuk@company.name
New identity clint.dovholuk@company.name created with id: hmnQByTn3

Try It Out​

This is it! This is the moment we've been working for. Copy and paste this command to echo to the screen the url to test out and let's see ZAC protected by BrowZer!!!

echo " "
echo "now go to: https://${ZITI_BROWZER_VHOST}:${ZITI_BROWZER_BOOTSTRAPPER_LISTEN_PORT} and see your ${ZITI_BROWZER_SERVICE}!"
echo " "

If Needed, BrowZer Bootstrapper Logs​

journalctl -fu browzer-bootstrapper

Cleaning up and Trying Again​

To clean everything up and try it all over (if you need to) run these commands:

sudo systemctl stop browzer-bootstrapper
sudo systemctl stop ziti-controller 
sudo systemctl stop ziti-router
sudo rm -rf $HOME/.ziti/quickstart
unsetZitiEnv
cd