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Active/Standby#

Configuration#

To change an existing project to support active/standby you'll need to configure some project settings with the Lagoon API.

  • productionEnviromment should be set to the branch name of the current active environment.
  • standbyProductionEnvironment should be set to the branch name of the current environment that is in standby.
mutation updateProject {
  updateProject(input:{
    id:1234
    patch:{
      productionEnvironment:"production-brancha"
      standbyProductionEnvironment:"production-branchb"
    }
  }){
    standbyProductionEnvironment
    name
    productionEnvironment
  }
}

.lagoon.yml - production_routes#

To configure a project for active/standby in the .lagoon.yml file, you'll need to configure the production_routes section with any routes you want to attach to the active environment, and any routes to the standby environment. During an active/standby switch, these routes will migrate between the two environments.

If you have two production environments, production-brancha and production-branchb, with the current active production environment as production-brancha then:

  • Routes under production_routes.active will direct you to production-brancha.
  • Routes under production_routes.standby will direct you to production-branchb.

During an active/standby switch, the routes will swap:

  • Routes under production_routes.active will direct you to production-branchb.
  • Routes under production_routes.standby will direct you to production-brancha.
.lagoon.yml
production_routes:
  active:
    routes:
      - nginx:
        - example.com:
            tls-acme: 'false'
        - active.example.com:
            tls-acme: 'false'
  standby:
    routes:
      - nginx:
        - standby.example.com:
            tls-acme: 'false'

Note:

Any routes that are under the section environments..routes will not be moved as part of active/standby. These routes will always be attached to the environment as defined. Ensure that if you do need a specific route to be migrated during an active/standby switch, that you remove them from the environments section and place them under the production_routes section specific to if it should be an active or standby route. See more about routes in .lagoon.yml.

Triggering a switch event#

via the UI#

To trigger the switching of environment routes, you can visit the standby environment in the Lagoon UI and click on the button labeled Switch Active/Standby environments. You will be prompted to confirm your action.

Once confirmed, it will take you to the tasks page where you can view the progress of the switch.

via the API#

To trigger an event to switch the environments, run the following graphQL mutation. This will tell Lagoon to begin the process.

mutation ActiveStandby {
  switchActiveStandby(
    input:{
      project:{
        name:"drupal-example"
      }
    }
  ){
    id
    remoteId
  }
}

A task is created in the current active environment tasks tab when a switch event is triggered. You can check the status of the switch here.

Using the remoteId from the switchActiveStandby mutation, we can also check the status of the task.

query getTask {
  taskByRemoteId(id: "<remoteId>") {
    id
    name
    created
    started
    completed
    status
    logs
  }
}

drush aliases#

By default, projects will be created with the following aliases that will be available when active/standby is enabled on a project.

  • lagoon-production
  • lagoon-standby

The lagoon-production alias will point to whichever site is defined as productionEnvironment, and lagoon-standby will always point to the site that is defined as standbyProductionEnvironment.

These aliases are configurable by updating the project. Be aware that changing them may require you to update any scripts that rely on them.

mutation updateProject {
  updateProject(input:{
    id:1234
    patch:{
      productionAlias:"custom-lagoon-production-alias"
      standbyAlias:"custom-lagoon-standby-alias"
    }
  }){
    productionAlias
    name
    standbyAlias
  }
}

Disabling Active/Standby#

You need to decide which of these 2 branches are the one you want to go forward with as being the main environment and then ensure it is set as the active branch (e.g production-branchb).

  1. In your .lagoon.yml file in this (now active) branch, move the routes from the production_routes.active.routes section into the environments.production-branchb section. This will mean that they are then attached to the production-branchb environment only.
  2. Once you've done this, you can delete the entire production_routes section from the .lagoon.yml file and re-deploy the production-branchb environment.
  3. If you no longer need the other branch production-brancha, you can delete it.
  4. If you keep the branch in git, you should also remove the production_routes from that branch .lagoon.yml too, just to prevent any confusion. The branch will remain as production type unless you delete and redeploy it (wiping all storage and databases etc)
  5. Once you've got the project in a state where there is only the production-branchb production environment, and all the other environments are development, update the project to remove the standbyProductionEnvironment from the project so that the active/standby labels on the environments go away
mutation updateProject {
  updateProject(input:{
    id:1234
    patch:{
      productionEnvironment:"production-branchb"
      standbyProductionEnvironment:""
    }
  }){
    standbyProductionEnvironment
    name
    productionEnvironment
  }
}

Notes#

When the active/standby trigger has been executed, the productionEnvironment and standbyProductionEnvironments will switch within the Lagoon API. Both environments are still classed as production environment types. We use the productionEnvironment to determine which one is labelled as active. For more information on the differences between environment types, read the documentation for environment types

query projectByName {
  projectByName(name:"drupal-example"){
    productionEnvironment
    standbyProductionEnvironment
  }
}

Before switching environments:

{
  "data": {
    "projectByName": {
      "productionEnvironment": "production-brancha",
      "standbyProductionEnvironment": "production-branchb"
    }
  }
}

After switching environments:

{
  "data": {
    "projectByName": {
      "productionEnvironment": "production-branchb",
      "standbyProductionEnvironment": "production-brancha"
    }
  }
}