With all this talk of home lab cluster provisioning, you might be wondering if I am actually doing any software development at home. As a matter of fact, I am. Just because it is in support of my home lab provisioning does not mean it is not software development!
Keeping the Lab Tidy
One of the things that has bothered me in my home lab management is the DNS management. As I provision and remove Linux VMs, having appropriate DNS records for them makes it easy to find them. Generally it makes for a more tidy environment, as I have a list of my machines and their IPs in one place. I have a small Powershell module that uses the DnsServer module in Windows. What I wanted was an API that would allow me to manage my DNS.
Now, taking a cue from my Hyper-V wrapper, I created a small API that uses the DnsServer module to manage DNS entries. It was fairly easy, and works quite well on my own machine, which has the DnsServer module installed because I have the Remote Server Administrative Toolset installed.
Location, Location, Location
When I started looking at where I could host this service, I realized that I could not host it on my hypervisor as I did with the Hyper-V service. My server is running Windows Server 2019 Hyper-V edition, which is a stripped down version of Windows Server meant for hypervisors. That means I am unable to install the DNS Server role on it. Admittedly, I did not try installing RSAT on it, but I have tendency to believe that would not work.
Since the DnsServer module would be installed by default on my domain controller, I made the decision to host the DNS API on that server. I went about creating an appropriate service account and installed it as a service. Just like the Hyper-V API, the Windows DNS API is available on Github.
Return to API Management
At this point, I have API hosted on a few different machines plus the APIs hosted in my home lab clusters. This has forced me to revisit installing an API Management solution at home. Sure, no one else uses my lab, but that is not the point. Right now, I have a “service discovery” problem: where are my APIs, how do I call them, what is their authentication mechanism, etc. This is part of what API Management can solve: I can have a single place to locate and call my APIs. Over the next few weeks I may delve back into Gravitee.io in an effort to re-establish a proper API Management service.
Going Public, Going Github
While it may seem like I am “burying the headline,” I am going to start making an effort to go public with more of my code. Why? Well, I have a number of different repositories that might be of use to some folks, even as reference. Plus, well, it keeps me honest: Going public with my code means I have to be good about my own security practices. Look for posts on migration updates as I get to them.
Going public will most likely mean going Github. Yes, I have some public repositories out in Bitbucket, but Github provides a bit more community and visibility for my work. I am sure I will still keep some repositories in Bitbucket, but for the projects that I want public feedback on, I will shift to Github.
Pop Culture Reference Section
The title is a callout to Pitch Perfect 2. You are welcome.
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