dtaas 0.8.1

DTaaS CLI

DTaaS Command Line Interface

This is a command-line tool for the INTO-CPS-Association Digital Twin as a Service platform.

📦 Installation

Installation in a virtual environment is recommended.

Steps to install:

• Create and activate a virtual environment.

• Install the package:

pip install dtaas

📖 Usage

Generate Project Files

Before configuring the CLI, generate the required project files in your working directory:

dtaas generate-project

By default, this creates files in the current directory and skips any that already exist. You can customize this behaviour with the following options:

# Generate files in a specific directory
dtaas generate-project --output-dir /path/to/target/dir

# Overwrite existing files
dtaas generate-project --force

# Combine options
dtaas generate-project --output-dir /path/to/target/dir --force

Options:

• --output-dir (default: .): Target directory for generated files. The directory must already exist.
• --force: Overwrite existing files. Without this flag, existing files are left untouched and a message is printed.

This creates three configuration files and the workspace directory structure:

Item	Purpose
dtaas.toml	Main CLI configuration (server DNS, paths, resources, users)
users.server.yml	Docker Compose user-workspace template for HTTP deployments
users.server.secure.yml	Docker Compose user-workspace template for HTTPS/TLS deployments
files/template/	Template directory for user workspace initialization

The files/template/ directory is created if it does not exist.

Important: Verify Docker Image Tag

The generated users.server.yml and users.server.secure.yml files contain a pinned Docker image tag for the workspace container (e.g., intocps/workspace:main-967bc10). This tag is baked into the templates at generation time and may become stale as the project evolves.

You should verify and update the Docker image tag in these templates to use a current, stable version before deploying user workspaces. Check the available tags in the INTO-CPS workspace repository or your Docker registry to ensure you are using an up-to-date image version.

Generate Deployment Project

To generate the full project structure for a specific deployment scenario without downloading separate zip packages:

dtaas generate-deployment --type <name>

Available types:

--type	Deployment scenario	Support level
localhost	Single-machine Docker deployment	dev/demo only
insecure-server	Multi-user HTTP server deployment	insecure/demo only
secure-server	Multi-user HTTPS/TLS server deployment	production-supported
secure-server-gitlab	HTTPS/TLS server with integrated GitLab	production-supported
workspace-localhost	Workspace service with Dex on localhost	dev/demo only
workspace-secure-server	Workspace service with Keycloak in production	production-supported

[!WARNING] Templates labelled dev/demo only or insecure/demo only run over plain HTTP and use default or static credentials. They are not safe for internet-facing or shared deployments. Use a production-supported type for any environment reachable from outside your local machine.

Production-supported types still require manual hardening steps documented inside each generated project (see the README.md and CONFIGURATION.md shipped with the template).

Options:

• --type (required): Deployment scenario to generate.
• --output-dir (default: .): Target directory for generated files. The directory must already exist.
• --force: Overwrite existing files. Without this flag, existing files are left untouched and a message is printed.

Examples:

# Generate a localhost deployment in the current directory
dtaas generate-deployment --type localhost

# Generate a secure-server deployment in a specific directory
dtaas generate-deployment --type secure-server --output-dir /path/to/project

# Regenerate, overwriting any existing files
dtaas generate-deployment --type insecure-server --output-dir /path/to/project --force

Each type copies the relevant docker-compose.yml, configuration examples, and supporting files into the target directory, ready to be customised.

Configuration substitution

When dtaas.toml is present, generate-deployment reads deployment-specific values from it and substitutes them into the generated files, so you do not have to edit every placeholder by hand. The CLI looks for dtaas.toml in --output-dir first; if not found there, it falls back to the current working directory.

Each --type reads from its matching top-level section in dtaas.toml. Values are written into the generated config files by key: dotenv files (config/.env, config/conf.server) line by line, and client website config files (config/client.js) via the object assigned to window.env.

The [frontend] section holds the OAuth application for the DTaaS client website (React frontend): react-app-client-id and react-app-oauth-url are substituted as REACT_APP_CLIENT_ID and REACT_APP_AUTH_AUTHORITY in config/client.js. This is a separate OAuth application from the server one (traefik-forward-auth) configured by oauth-client-id and friends in the [insecure-server] and [secure-server] sections.

The [common] section (server-dns) and the [users] section (usernames, paths, and emails) are substituted across all types where they appear.

If dtaas.toml is not found in either location, a note is printed and the files keep their default placeholder values.

TLS certificate placement

For the TLS deployment types (secure-server, secure-server-gitlab, workspace-secure-server), generate-deployment also populates the generated certs/ directory so the reverse proxy can find its certificates. It reads the source location from [common.security].certs-src in dtaas.toml and copies the latest fullchain.pem and privkey.pem into <output-dir>/certs/.

🚀 Install Deployment

Once a deployment has been generated (and dtaas.toml configured), bring it up with a single command:

dtaas admin install

This runs docker compose up -d against the generated docker-compose.yml in the installation directory.

Before starting the stack, the command ensures the per-user workspace directories listed in [users].add exist — recreating each from files/template if missing — and sets their ownership to 1000:100. This means a fresh install, or a reinstall after uninstall --remove-user-files, does not leave Docker to auto-create empty, root-owned mount directories.

Options:

• --output-dir (default: .): Installation directory containing the generated deployment.

The docker-compose.yml must live in --output-dir. The CLI looks for dtaas.toml in --output-dir first and, if not found there, falls back to the current working directory, so a single top-level dtaas.toml can serve a deployment generated into a subdirectory (e.g. dtaas admin install --output-dir insecure).

The command fails with a clear error if the deployment has not been generated (docker-compose.yml missing), if dtaas.toml is missing from both locations, or if the Docker daemon is not reachable.

🧹 Uninstall Deployment

To tear the deployment down:

dtaas admin uninstall

This runs docker compose down, stopping and removing the deployment's containers and networks. Containers added with admin user add run as a separate Compose project, so they are torn down first; otherwise they would survive and hold the shared network open. If nothing is currently installed, the command reports that there is no existing installation rather than claiming a successful teardown, but --remove-user-files is still honoured, so you can clean up workspace files after a teardown. Per-user workspace files are preserved by default.

To additionally delete the generated per-user workspace directories, pass --remove-user-files:

dtaas admin uninstall --remove-user-files

Because this is destructive, the command prompts for confirmation. Supply --yes (or -y) to skip the prompt in non-interactive scripts:

dtaas admin uninstall --remove-user-files --yes

Options:

• --output-dir (default: .): Installation directory containing the generated deployment.
• --remove-user-files: Also delete the generated per-user workspace directories. Opt-in to avoid accidental data loss: it requires a generated deployment in --output-dir, prompts for confirmation, and refuses to follow a symlinked files/. It removes only the per-user directories inside <output-dir>/files, keeping the shared files/common and the files/template skeleton so a later admin install can recreate the user directories. It does not protect against pointing --output-dir at the wrong directory, so double-check the path.
• --yes / -y: Skip the confirmation prompt for --remove-user-files.

🔁 Update TLS Certificates

To rotate the TLS certificates of a running deployment in place, without regenerating the project or copying files by hand:

dtaas admin update --certs

This reads the certificate source from [common.security].certs-src in dtaas.toml (the same key used to seed certs/ during generate-deployment), picks the newest fullchain.pem and privkey.pem there, and then:

1. Validates the new pair before anything is replaced — it must be parseable, the private key must match the certificate, and neither the leaf nor any intermediate in the chain may already be expired.
2. Stops the traefik service so nothing holds the certificate files open while they are replaced.
3. Swaps the validated files into <output-dir>/certs/, backing up the live pair first and restoring it on any failure, so the deployment is never left with a half-updated (mismatched) pair.
4. Restricts the private key to 0600 on POSIX hosts; on Windows it prints a warning instead, because file permissions cannot be enforced there.
5. Restarts traefik and waits for it to come back up, so certificates the proxy rejects are reported as a failure rather than a false success.

If validation fails, the live certificates are left untouched and a clear error is raised. The command is safe to run repeatedly.

Options:

• --certs: Refresh the deployment's TLS certificates. Required; it is the only update target today, and the update group leaves room for future ones.
• --output-dir (default: .): Installation directory containing the generated deployment (the docker-compose.yml and certs/). The CLI looks for dtaas.toml here first, then in the current directory. Keep dtaas.toml inside --output-dir: if it is absent there, certs-src is read from the dtaas.toml in the directory you run the command from, which may belong to a different deployment.

The command fails with a clear error if the deployment has not been generated (docker-compose.yml missing), if certs-src is unset or missing, if either certificate is absent from certs-src, if the Docker daemon is not reachable, or if traefik does not come back up after the swap.

📁 Select Template

The cli uses YAML templates provided in this directory to create new user workspaces. The available templates are:

1. user.local.yml: localhost installation
2. User.server.yml: multi-user web application over HTTP
3. user.server.secure.yml: multi-user web application over HTTPS

➕ Add Users

To add new users using the CLI, fill in the users.add list in dtaas.toml with the Gitlab instance usernames of the users to be added

[users]
# matching user info must present in this config file
add = ["username1","username2", "username3"]

Ensure the working directory is cli.

Then run:

dtaas admin user add

The command checks for the existence of files/<username> directory. If it does not exist, a new directory with correct file structure is created. The directory, if it exists, must be owned by the user executing dtaas command on the host operating system. If the files do not have the expected ownership rights, the command fails.

Caveats

This brings up the containers, without the AuthMS authentication.

When an email is provided for a user in dtaas.toml, the CLI automatically adds the traefik-forward-auth routing rule to config/conf.server. For the change to take effect, restart the traefik-forward-auth container:

docker compose -f compose.server.yml --env-file .env up -d --force-recreate traefik-forward-auth

The new users are now added to the DTaaS instance, with authorization enabled.

➖ Delete Users

To delete users, add their GitLab instance usernames to the users.delete list in dtaas.toml file.

[users]
# matching user info must present in this config file
delete = ["username1","username2", "username3"]

• Ensure you are in the working directory where the dtaas.toml file is.

Then run:

dtaas admin user delete

The CLI automatically removes the traefik-forward-auth routing rules for deleted users from config/conf.server. Restart traefik-forward-auth for the change to take effect:

docker compose -f compose.server.yml --env-file .env up -d --force-recreate traefik-forward-auth

📌 Additional Points

• The user add CLI will add and start a container for a new user. It can also start a container for an existing user if that container was somehow stopped. It shows a Running status for existing user containers that are already up and running, it doesn't restart them.

• user add and user delete CLIs return an error if the add and delete lists in dtaas.toml are empty, respectively.

• '.' is a special character. Currently, usernames which have '.'s in them cannot be added properly through the CLI. This is an active issue that will be resolved in future releases.

⚙️ Configure

After running dtaas generate-project, open dtaas.toml and fill in the values below. The [users], [frontend], and config-substitution behaviour are described in the command sections above.

[common]

Set server-dns to your server's public hostname (localhost for a local deployment) and path to the absolute path of your DTaaS installation. Set [common.security] tls = true for HTTPS deployments.

For TLS deployments, set [common.security].certs-src to the directory holding your fullchain.pem and privkey.pem.

Adjust [common.resources] to match your hardware:

Key	Default	Description
cpus	4	Virtual CPUs per user container
mem_limit	"4G"	Memory limit per container
pids_limit	4960	Process limit per container
shm_size	"512m"	Shared memory per container

Deployment-specific credentials

Each section name matches a --type value for dtaas generate-deployment.

[insecure-server] and [secure-server] GitLab OAuth app for traefik-forward-auth (Redirect URI https://<server-dns>/_oauth, Confidential ticked, scopes openid profile read_user):

Key	Description
oauth-url	Base URL of your GitLab instance
oauth-client-id	Application ID
oauth-client-secret	Application secret
oauth-secret	Random string for signing session cookies

[secure-server-gitlab] same keys as above, without oauth-url (derived from the bundled GitLab service).

[localhost] single-machine deployment with an external OIDC provider:

Key	Description
default-user	Username shown in the UI
client-id	OAuth client ID
auth-authority	OIDC provider URL

[workspace-localhost] workspace service with Dex on localhost:

Key	Description
default-user	Default workspace username
client-id	Dex client ID
auth-authority	Dex OIDC provider URL

[workspace-secure-server] workspace service with Keycloak in production:

Key	Description
keycloak-admin	Keycloak admin username
keycloak-admin-password	Keycloak admin password
keycloak-realm	Realm name (e.g. dtaas)
keycloak-issuer-url	OIDC issuer URL of the realm
keycloak-client-id	Client ID for the workspace service
keycloak-client-secret	Client secret
oauth-secret	Random string for signing session cookies
client-id	Frontend OAuth client ID
auth-authority	Keycloak OIDC authority URL