Grinch-AP/docs/deploy using containers.md

Deploy Using Containers

If you just want to play and there is a compiled version available on the Archipelago releases page, use that version. To build the full Archipelago software stack, refer to Running From Source. Follow these steps to build and deploy a containerized instance of the web host software, optionally integrating Gunicorn WSGI HTTP Server running behind the nginx reverse proxy.

Building the Container Image

What you'll need:

• A container runtime engine such as:
  • Docker (Version 23.0 or later)
  • Podman (version 4.0 or later)
    • For running with rootless podman, you need to ensure all ports used are usable rootless, by default ports less than 1024 are root only. See the official tutorial for details.
• The Docker Buildx plugin (for Docker), as the Dockerfile uses $TARGETARCH for architecture detection. Follow Docker's guide. Verify with docker buildx version.

Starting from the root repository directory, the standalone Archipelago image can be built and run with the command: docker build -t archipelago . Or: podman build -t archipelago .

It is recommended to tag the image using -t to more easily identify the image and run it.

Running the Container

Running the container can be performed using: docker run --network host archipelago Or: podman run --network host archipelago

The Archipelago web host requires access to multiple ports in order to host game servers simultaneously. To simplify configuration for this purpose, specify --network host.

Given the default configuration, the website will be accessible at the hostname/IP address (localhost if run locally) of the machine being deployed to, at port 80. It can be configured by creating a YAML file and mapping a volume to the container when running initially: docker run archipelago --network host -v /path/to/config.yaml:/app/config.yaml See docs/webhost configuration sample.yaml for example.

Using Docker Compose

An example docker compose file can be found in deploy, along with example configuration files used by the services it orchestrates. Using these files as-is will spin up two separate archipelago containers with special modifications to their runtime arguments, in addition to deploying an nginx reverse proxy container.

To deploy in this manner, from the "deploy" directory, run: docker compose up -d

Services

The docker-compose.yaml file defines three services:

• multiworld:
  • Executes the main WebHost process, using the example config, and overriding with a secondary selflaunch example config. This is because we do not want to launch the website through this service.
• web:
  • Executes gunicorn using its example config, which will bind it to the WebHost application, in effect launching it.
  • We mount the main config without an override to specify that we are launching the website through this service.
  • No ports are exposed through to the host.
• nginx:
  • Serves as a reverse proxy with web as its upstream.
  • Directs all HTTP traffic from port 80 to the upstream service.
  • Exposed to the host on port 8080. This is where we can reach the website.

Configuration

As these are examples, they can be copied and modified. For instance setting the value of HOST_ADDRESS in example config to host machines local IP address, will expose the service to its local area network.

The configuration files may be modified to handle for machine-specific optimizations, such as:

• Web pages responding too slowly
  • Edit the gunicorn config to increase thread and/or worker count.
• Game generation stalls
  • Increase the generator count in selflaunch config
• Gameplay lags
  • Increase the hoster count in selflaunch config

Changes made to docker-compose.yaml can be applied by running docker compose up -d, while those made to other files are applied by running docker compose restart.

Windows

It is possible to carry out these deployment steps on Windows under Windows Subsystem for Linux.

Optional: A Link to the Past Enemizer

Only required to generate seeds that include A Link to the Past with certain options enabled. You will receive an error if it is required. Enemizer can be enabled on x86_64 platform architecture, and is included in the image build process. Enemizer requires a version 1.0 Japanese "Zelda no Densetsu" .sfc rom file to be placed in the application directory: docker run archipelago -v "/path/to/zelda.sfc:/app/Zelda no Densetsu - Kamigami no Triforce (Japan).sfc". Enemizer is not currently available for aarch64.

Optional: Git

Building the image requires a local copy of the ArchipelagoMW source code. Refer to Running From Source.