Stretcher

Stretcher is a minimal request throttling proxy server written in Go (as a successor to Stretcher-PHP).

• Serializes requests per IP
• Throttles requests based on their consumption
• Configurable window and target
• Easy to deploy and monitor
• Built-in debug logging

Installation

Download and install the latest Stretcher release for Linux (AMD64):

curl -L -o stretcher.deb https://github.com/deemru/stretcher/releases/latest/download/stretcher_linux_amd64.deb \
    && dpkg -i stretcher.deb \
    && unlink stretcher.deb \
    && service stretcher status

• Downloads the latest .deb package.
• Installs it using dpkg.
• Deletes the downloaded package.
• Checks the status of the stretcher service.

The Debian package automatically:

• Creates a stretcher user
• Installs the binary to /usr/bin/stretcher
• Sets up a systemd service that starts automatically

Service Configuration

Edit the systemd service file for Stretcher and apply changes:

nano /etc/systemd/system/stretcher.service \
    && systemctl daemon-reload \
    && systemctl restart stretcher.service \
    && journalctl -u stretcher -f -n 100

• Opens the service file for editing.
• Reloads systemd to apply changes.
• Restarts the Stretcher service.
• Streams the last 100 log entries and follows the log output.

Configuration

Option	Description	Default Value
--listen	Listen address and port	127.0.0.1:8080
--upstream	Upstream server address and port	127.0.0.1:80
--timeout	Request timeout in seconds	36
--window	Time window for rate limiting in seconds	12
--target	Target requests per window	4
--concurrency	Maximum concurrent requests per IP	64
--maxbytes	Maximum request body size in bytes	65536
--debug	Enable debug logging	true

Example Configuration

Basic usage with custom settings:

stretcher --listen=0.0.0.0:8080 --upstream=127.0.0.1:80 --window=10 --target=6

Full configuration example:

stretcher --listen=127.0.0.1:8080 --upstream=127.0.0.1:80 --timeout=36 --window=12 --target=4 --concurrency=64 --maxbytes=65536 --debug=true

Building from Source

Build Stretcher from source code:

# Install dependencies
sudo apt update && sudo apt install golang-go git -y

# Clone and build
git clone https://github.com/deemru/stretcher.git \
    && cd stretcher \
    && go build -trimpath -ldflags "-s -w" -o stretcher stretcher.go