Consul services updated realtime in background

[daveblack93]

Hello,
We are using Hashicorp Consul in order to communicate between microservices and Ocelot to route api call from Frontend webpages to api services. Till now our api services where deployed on "static" VMs with a fixed dns/ip, so at api service startup we retrieve our third parties services URL and store them into a dictionary and this was enough until the end of life of the microservice.
Some weeks ago, We started migrating microservice from "static" IIS VM deploy, to Hashicorp Nomad cluster.
Now we need to keep updated the third parties services URL real-time because our services are deployed in a cluster of VMs, so we don't know every deploy where the orchestrator will put the service and the corresponding URL.

Now, after some scouting, we found that Consul Service catalogue support Blocking Queries (based on long polling architecture) in order to keep update third parties services URL without calling every time Consul service catalogue or polling with a delay of X seconds. (https://developer.hashicorp.com/consul/api-docs/features/blocking)

My question here is: do you think this could be a new GlobalConfiguration.GlobalConfiguration.Type useful in your project?

Benefits are that the Service URL is kept updated real-time without overloading Consul service Catalogue and without configure a PollInterval.

Thanks,
Dave.

[raman-m]

Hi Dave!
Welcome to Ocelot world! 🐯

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Some weeks ago, We started migrating microservice from "static" IIS VM deploy, to Hashicorp Nomad cluster.

Lol Good luck! Do you have DevOps engineer? 😉

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My question here is: do you think this could be a new GlobalConfiguration.GlobalConfiguration.Type useful in your project?

Sorry? Didn't get it! Probably you've meant GlobalConfiguration.ServiceDiscoveryProvider.Type?! Or?... Why do you need new type of service discovery? What's the goal?

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Benefits are that the Service URL is kept updated real-time without overloading Consul service Catalogue and without configure a PollInterval.

Cannot get it... What's wrong here?
Ocelot pools the services based on "PollingInterval" property.
Consul is responsible for keeping all services configs. Why do you think that Ocelot should manage Consul Catalogue or moreover Consul cluster?

@ggnaegi Correct me if I'm wrong please, or you will have better understanding of this user scenario with Consul.

[daveblack93]

Hi @raman-m sorry if I do not reply to your message. I could help you and @ggnaegi developing this feature. I have to know a bit better how Ocelot and Consul interact one another. But sure I can help you :)

[ggnaegi]

@daveblack93 Unfortunately, I will not have much time during the next two weeks. So, do you know xunit? Could we agree on something, I create the issue, create the PR, authorize you on my forked repo and then you work on the unit and acceptance tests? I'm curious, where are you from? I will explain you, where the code has been modified and why.

[daveblack93]

I'm from Italy ;) yes sure we could do something like that. I will find some times in my free time ;)

[raman-m]

@ggnaegi I believe @daveblack93 can fork Ocelot to his account and invite you.
@daveblack93 Please fork the repo!

[ggnaegi]

@raman-m I prefer to go the way I described, it's easier for me.

[ggnaegi]

@daveblack93 Great idea!

[raman-m]

OK, maybe it is great.
Why not to review our current design where we refresh the services list by GetAsync() method being called by ILoadBalancerCreator objects in Create method and appropriate LoadBalancer constructors have no injectable scoped services except maybe attached Func delegates.