Local Vault using docker-compose - docker

Question

I'm having big trouble running Vault in docker-compose.
My requirements are :
running as deamon (so restarting when I restart my Mac)
secret being persisted between container restart
no human intervention between restart (unsealing, etc.)
using a generic token
My current docker-compose
version: '2.3'
services:
vault-dev:
image: vault:1.2.1
restart: always
container_name: vault-dev
environment:
VAULT_DEV_ROOT_TOKEN_ID: "myroot"
VAULT_LOCAL_CONFIG: '{"backend": {"file": {"path": "/vault/file"}}, "default_lease_ttl": "168h", "max_lease_ttl": "720h"}'
ports:
- "8200:8200"
volumes:
- ./storagedc/vault/file:/vault/file
However, when the container restart, I get the log
==> Vault server configuration:
Api Address: http://0.0.0.0:8200
Cgo: disabled
Cluster Address: https://0.0.0.0:8201
Listener 1: tcp (addr: "0.0.0.0:8200", cluster address: "0.0.0.0:8201", max_request_duration: "1m30s", max_request_size: "33554432", tls: "disabled")
Log Level: info
Mlock: supported: true, enabled: false
Storage: file
Version: Vault v1.2.1
Error initializing Dev mode: Vault is already initialized
Is there any recommendation on that matter?

Answer 1

I'm going to pseudo-code an answer to work around the problems specified, but please note that this is a massive hack and should NEVER be deployed in production as a hard-coded master key and single unseal key is COLOSSALLY INSECURE.
So, you want a test vault server, with persistence.
You can accomplish this, it will need a little bit of work because of the default behavior of the vault container - if you just start it, it will start with a dev mode container, which won't allow for persistence. Just adding persistence via the environment variable won't solve that problem entirely because it will conflict with the default start mode of the container.
so we need to replace this entrypoint script with something that does what we want it to do instead.
First we copy the script out of the container:
$ docker create --name vault vault:1.2.1
$ docker cp vault:/usr/local/bin/docker-entrypoint.sh .
$ docker rm vault
For simplicity, we're going to edit the file and mount it into the container using the docker-compose file. I'm not going to make it really functional - just enough to get it to do what's desired. The entire point here is sample, not something that is usable in production.
My customizations all start at about line 98 - first we launch a dev-mode server in order to record the unseal key, then we terminate the dev mode server.
# Here's my customization:
if [ ! -f /vault/unseal/sealfile ]; then
# start in dev mode, in the background to record the unseal key
su-exec vault vault server \
-dev -config=/vault/config \
-dev-root-token-id="$VAULT_DEV_ROOT_TOKEN_ID" \
2>&1 | tee /vault/unseal/sealfile &
while ! grep -q 'core: vault is unsealed' /vault/unseal/sealfile; do
sleep 1
done
kill %1
fi
Next we check for supplemental config. This is where the extra config goes for disabling TLS, and for binding the appropriate interface.
if [ -n "$VAULT_SUPPLEMENTAL_CONFIG" ]; then
echo "$VAULT_SUPPLEMENTAL_CONFIG" > "$VAULT_CONFIG_DIR/supplemental.json"
fi
Then we launch vault in 'release' mode:
if [ "$(id -u)" = '0' ]; then
set -- su-exec vault "$#"
"$#"&
Then we get the unseal key from the sealfile:
unseal=$(sed -n 's/Unseal Key: //p' /vault/unseal/sealfile)
if [ -n "$unseal" ]; then
while ! vault operator unseal "$unseal"; do
sleep 1
done
fi
We just wait for the process to terminate:
wait
exit $?
fi
There's a full gist for this on github.
Now the docker-compose.yml for doing this is slightly different to your own:
version: '2.3'
services:
vault-dev:
image: vault:1.2.1
restart: always
container_name: vault-dev
command: [ 'vault', 'server', '-config=/vault/config' ]
environment:
VAULT_DEV_ROOT_TOKEN_ID: "myroot"
VAULT_LOCAL_CONFIG: '{"backend": {"file": {"path": "/vault/file"}}, "default_lease_ttl": "168h", "max_lease_ttl": "720h"}'
VAULT_SUPPLEMENTAL_CONFIG: '{"ui":true, "listener": {"tcp":{"address": "0.0.0.0:8200", "tls_disable": 1}}}'
VAULT_ADDR: "http://127.0.0.1:8200"
ports:
- "8200:8200"
volumes:
- ./vault:/vault/file
- ./unseal:/vault/unseal
- ./docker-entrypoint.sh:/usr/local/bin/docker-entrypoint.sh
cap_add:
- IPC_LOCK
The command is the command to execute. This is what's in the "$#"& of the script changes.
I've added VAULT_SUPPLEMENTAL_CONFIG for the non-dev run. It needs to specify the interfaces, it needs to turn of tls. I added the ui, so I can access it using http://127.0.0.1:8200/ui. This is part of the changes I made to the script.
Because this is all local, for me, test purposes, I'm mounting ./vault as the data directory, I'm mounting ./unseal as the place to record the unseal code and mounting ./docker-entrypoint.sh as the entrypoint script.
I can docker-compose up this and it launches a persistent vault - there are some errors on the log as I try to unseal before the server has launched, but it works, and persists across multiple docker-compose runs.
Again, to mention that this is completely unsuitable for any form of long-term use. You're better off using docker's own secrets engine if you're doing things like this.

Answer 2

I'd like to suggest a simpler solution for local development with docker-compose.
Vault is always unsealed
Vault UI is enabled and accessible at http://localhost:8200/ui/vault on your dev machine
Vault has predefined root token which can be used by services to communicate with it
docker-compose.yml
vault:
hostname: vault
container_name: vault
image: vault:1.12.0
environment:
VAULT_ADDR: "http://0.0.0.0:8200"
VAULT_API_ADDR: "http://0.0.0.0:8200"
ports:
- "8200:8200"
volumes:
- ./volumes/vault/file:/vault/file:rw
cap_add:
- IPC_LOCK
entrypoint: vault server -dev -dev-listen-address="0.0.0.0:8200" -dev-root-token-id="root"