Background

Sometimes for testing purposes network engineer needs to deploy small RADIUS server with SQL backend and some sort of web management. It can take from one hour or up to a whole day, just because since last time network engineer had done it, technology moved forward and this time one will account for new cobweb. So spending time on IT management should be minimal as much as possible. This article is about how to deploy Freeradius application with MySQL as backend and PMA as web management in short order. Short, I mean, are several minutes.

Action

Imagine you have a root access to Linux machine with Internet connection. It does not matter it's virtual or physical. I would prefer to manage box with deadly simple orcherstration tool - Ansible. So you've better to have it on the box.

1. Installing Ansible.

Install packages.

apt-get -y update
apt-get install -y python-yaml python-jinja2 python-httplib2 python-keyczar python-paramiko python-setuptools python-pkg-resources git python-pip

Clone current ansible from Github.

git clone http://github.com/ansible/ansible.git
cd ansible
git submodule update --init

Source ansible environment.

. ./hacking/env-setup

Create global inventory file with localhost.

echo '[local]\nlocalhost\n' > /etc/ansible/hosts

2. Installing Docker.

Next step is to install fresh Docker ecosystem. If you do not already installed proceed with this recipe.

ansible-galaxy install angstwad.docker_ubuntu

Create simple playbook with your favorite text editor...

cat /tmp/docker.yml

---
- hosts:local
  connection: local
  roles:
    - angstwad.docker_ubuntu

... and just execute it.

ansible-playbook /tmp/docker.yml

Now you should have fresh and up-to-date Docker.

3. Dockerize it.

So here where really magic begins. We create playbook with three simple tasks. These tasks actually will start MySQL, PMA and Freeradius. On the output you will get three running containers connected to each other and ready to serve.

Once again take your favorite editor and create following playbook:

cat fr_mysql_pma.yml 

---
- hosts: local
  connection: local
  vars:
    - mysql_root_pass: password123  

  tasks:
    - name: Start MySQL
      docker: image=mysql name=freeradius-mysql volumes="/var/lib/mysql:volumes/mysql" env="MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD={{ mysql_root_pass }}"

    - name: Start PMA
      docker: image=corbinu/docker-phpmyadmin name=pma env="MYSQL_USERNAME=root" links=freeradius-mysql:mysql ports=80:80

    - name: Start Freeradius
      docker: image=ramelito/docker-freeradius name=frv2 links=freeradius-mysql:mysql ports=1812:1812/udp,1813:1813/udp command="freeradius -f"

Run it:

ansible-playbook fr_mysql_pma.yml

Check it:

docker ps -a
CONTAINER ID        IMAGE                               COMMAND                CREATED             STATUS              PORTS                                            NAMES
fc250eae3986        ramelito/docker-freeradius:latest   "./entrypoint.sh fre   7 minutes ago       Up 7 minutes        0.0.0.0:1812->1812/udp, 0.0.0.0:1813->1813/udp   frv2                
5526ad668362        corbinu/docker-phpmyadmin:latest    "/bin/sh -c phpmyadm   About an hour ago   Up About an hour    0.0.0.0:80->80/tcp                               pma                 
bdaf6aeaf452        mysql:latest                        "/entrypoint.sh mysq   About an hour ago   Up About an hour    3306/tcp                                         freeradius-mysql  

Conclusion

This relatively simple and timesaving scenario does not require much from user's experience and can be easily deployed either inside virtualbox image or physical lab machine. Have a nice BRASing.

References

http://www.ansible.com/2014/02/12/installing-and-building-docker-with-ansible https://docs.docker.com/userguide/dockerlinks/ http://wiki.freeradius.org/guide/FAQ