Help:Proxy

There are two reasons why web pages cannot be served by a default Labs instance:

• Instances are closed off from outside networks with a firewall. You must open holes in the firewall by editing the security groups for your project.
• Instances are assigned private IP addresses that are only visible from within labs. This can be addressed by assigning your instance a public IP or by creating a web proxy.

This page describes how to create a simple web proxy for an instance.

Important: Make sure you have set up your security groups properly before attempting to create a web proxy.

Creating a web proxy

You must be a projectadmin of the project that contains the instance you wish to proxy.

1. In the left menu, open the “Labs Projectadmins” section.
2. Click on “Manage Web Proxies”.
3. For the project containing your instance, click on the “Create proxy” link
4. In the "DNS hostname" field, enter the hostname that you wish to have as the publicly-visible name for your instance. Important: Enter just the hostname (e.g. 'webtastic'), not the fully qualified name (e.g. 'webtastic.wmflabs.org').
5. Specify the domain for your instance using the “DNS domain” menu. If you want a domain that is not already present in the menu, a Labs Cloudadmin (most likely a staff member) will need to create it for you.
6. Select the instance that you're creating a proxy for in the “Instance” menu
7. Leave the “Instance Port” set to 80. You almost certainly don't want to change this!
8. Click “Submit”.

If all goes well, you will see two separate confirmation messages -- one indicating that the new proxy name has been associated with our proxy host, and one indicating that the proxy itself has been configured.

Important: DNS changes are gradual. After you create a new proxy, it will typically not become visible to outside browsers for 30 to 60 minutes.

You'd also likely need to update your security group settings as well before you can access your instance on an external browser.

1. Navigate to "Manage Security Groups", and select the project you want to make available externally.
2. Add a new rule to open up a specific port for outside access.
3. Add the start and end port in the rule form
4. Select "tcp" as the protocol
5. CIDR range: 10.0.0.0/8
6. Click "Submit"

Deleting a web proxy

Once your instance is no longer in use, please clean up after yourself by clicking the “delete” link next to your unused proxy entry.