murakami 0.1.0

A webthings-compliant network measurement tool from M-Lab.

Murakami

Murakami is a tool for creating an automated internet measurement service, running in a Docker container. A Murakami measurement container can be configured to automatically run supported tests four times a day using a randomized schedule, and export each test result to a local storage device, to one or more remote servers via SCP, or to a Google Cloud Storage bucket. Results are saved as individual files in JSON new line format (.jsonl).

Supported Measurement Tests

• M-Lab Network Diagnostic Tool (NDT) - both ndt5 and ndt7 protocols, using the libndt client library
• Neubot DASH - Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP, hosted by M-Lab
• speedtest-cli - Command line interface for testing internet bandwidth using speedtest.net

Murakami Deployment Scenarios

Murakami supports three types of container deployment scenarios on supported systems:

• Standalone: a single Murakami device, configured on-device
• Local Managed: one or more Murakami devices in a single network, configured individually on-device, or using a Mozilla WebThings Gateway on the same network, via the M-Lab WebThings Murakami Add-on
• Balena Cloud: one or more Murakami devices, configured and managed by the Balena Cloud IoT platform

Supported Operating Systems

Murakami supports Linux operating systems like Ubuntu, Debian, etc. Windows is not supported. Mac OS is supportable as a standalone device, but is not completely compatible with the Webthings interface. Balena cloud has not beed tested on Mac OS.

TO DO: test deployment on MacOS

Murakami Configurations and Customization

A Murkami container can be configured flexibly depending on the deployment scenario. If you simply run a Murakami container using M-Lab's pre-built images on Dockerhub, by default all tests are configured to run four times daily at randomized intervals, but no data exporters enabled. This section focuses on which options can be configured using the file murakami.toml OR using environment variables. Examples are provided in later sections of this document.

The Murakami container can be customized using:

• environment variables on the command line when running docker (Standalone, Local Managed)
• environment variables in a file, passed on the command line when running docker (Standalone, Local Managed)
• customizing the murakami.toml configuration file (Standalone, Local Managed, Balena Cloud)
• environment variables in your Balena Cloud project, or per device (Balena Cloud)

The table below summarizes the options you can configure in murakami.toml and how to format the options as command line variables at the command line.

murakami.toml	corresponding environment variable	options/examples	function
[settings]
port = 80	MURAKAMI_SETTINGS_PORT	80, 8080	Sets the web port used by the Murakami WebThing code
loglevel = "DEBUG"	MURAKAMI_SETTINGS_LOGLEVEL	DEBUG, ?, ?	Sets the log level for the Murakami service
immediate = 1	MURAKAMI_SETTINGS_IMMEDIATE	0, 1, true, false	If set to 1 or true, instructs the container to run the first set of tests when it starts
location = "Baltimore"	MURAKAMI_SETTINGS_LOCATION	any string	Optional - If set, value is used in exported test file names.
network_type = "home"	MURAKAMI_SETTINGS_NETWORK_TYPE	any string	Optional - If set, value is used in exported test file names
connection_type = "wired"	MURAKAMI_SETTINGS_CONNECTION_TYPE	any string	Optional - If set, value is used in exported test file names
[exporters]		The 'exporters' configuration sections OR environment variables define where test data should be saved or exported. For each exporter all variables listed must be defined.
[exporters.local]			The 'local' exporter defines where on the system's local disk to save test results.
type = "local"	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_LOCAL_TYPE	local
enabled = true	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_LOCAL_ENABLED	0, 1, true, false
path = "/data/"	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_LOCAL_PATH	Any system path available to the Murakami container service may be used to save local data.
[exporters.scp]			The 'scp' exporter defines a remote server where data should be copied. The server must be configured to allow secure copy via SSH using a private key file.
type = "scp"	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_SCP_TYPE	scp
enabled = true	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_SCP_ENABLED	0, 1, true, false
target = "myserver.com:system/path/"	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_SCP_TARGET	hostname:path/	Defines the remote server and system path where the SCP exporter should save data. A server's IP address is also supported.
port = 22	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_SCP_PORT	22, alternate SCP port used by the remote server	Defines the port used by the remote server for the server's SCP/SSH service.
username = "murakami"	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_SCP_USERNAME	remote server username	Defines the username to be used by the SCP exporter.
private_key = "/murakami/keys/id_rsa_murakami"	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_SCP_PRIVATE_KEY	The system path within the Murakami container where the SCP user's private SSH key is located.
[exporters.gcs]			The 'gcs' exporter defines a storage bucket in a Google Cloud Storage project where test data should be saved.
type = "gcs"	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS_TYPE	gcs
enabled = true	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS_ENABLED	0, 1, true, false
target = "gs://murakami-gcs-test/"	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS_TARGET	gs://bucketname	Defines the GCS storage bucket name where data should be stored.
service_account = "[e-mail]"	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS_SERVICE_ACCOUNT	The name of the GCS service account which has access to write data to the GCS storage bucket.
key = "/murakami/keys/murakami-gcs-serviceaccount.json"	MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS_KEY	The system path within the Murakami container where the GCS service account's JSON keyfile is located.

Multiple exporters of any type are supported as well. For example if you wanted to define two different SCP servers or GCS storage buckets where data should be exported, the config file exporters section might look like this:

[exporters]

  [exporters.gcs1]
  type = "gcs"
  enabled = true
  target = "gs://murakami-storage-bucket-archive/"
  service_account = "[e-mail]"
  key = "/murakami/keys/murakami-gcs-serviceaccount.json"

  [exporters.gcs2]
  type = "gcs"
  enabled = true
  target = "gs://murakami-storage-bucket-access/"
  service_account = "[e-mail]"
  key = "/murakami/keys/murakami-gcs-serviceaccount.json"

OR as environment variables:

MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS1_TYPE = "gcs"
MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS1_ENABLED = "true"
MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS1_TARGET = "gs://murakami-storage-bucket-archive/"
MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS1_SERVICE_ACCOUNT = "[e-mail]"
MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS1_KEY = "/murakami/keys/murakami-gcs-serviceaccount.json"

MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS2_TYPE = "gcs"
MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS2_ENABLED = "true"
MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS2_TARGET = "gs://murakami-storage-bucket-access/"
MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS2_SERVICE_ACCOUNT = "[e-mail]"
MURAKAMI_EXPORTERS_GCS2_KEY = "/murakami/keys/murakami-gcs-serviceaccount.json"

M-Lab Supported Dockerhub Images and Tags

TO DO Describe how we structure tags for different system architectures here.