Setup as a Docker container
Control Room allows you to manage, orchestrate, and schedule the execution of your software robots in a central place. Control Room has Processes, which contain steps that Unattended Workers execute.
In this article we instruct you how to set up a local Docker container for running Robocorp Workforce Agent Core. This enables isolating the Robocorp Workforce Agent Core into ephemeral instances that can be easily managed.
- Docker tooling
- Robocorp Workforce Agent Core
- RCC
A Docker container does not have UI access to applications. This means you can run so-called headless operations and access the container's resources but cannot, for example, take screenshots of Windows application UI's.
Static container refers to a container linked to Control Room at build time and will be seen in Control Room as a single worker every time it is started.
Insert the Control Room worker link token and name at build time with the --build-arg argument, and then build and run the image as a container, and the worker will be visible in the cloud.
Dockerfile
# Select the base image
FROM ubuntu:18.04
ARG NAME
ARG LINK_TOKEN
# Set all variables that affect programs to follow the same encoding
ENV LANG=C.UTF-8 LANGUAGE=C.UTF-8 LC_ALL=C.UTF-8
# Install here all the software your process needs in order to execute
RUN apt-get update --fix-missing && \
apt-get install -y wget bzip2 ca-certificates curl bash chromium-browser chromium-chromedriver build-essential && \
apt-get install -y fonts-indic fonts-noto fonts-noto-cjk && \
apt-get install -y zip libdbus-glib-1-2 && \
export PATH=$PATH:/usr/lib/chromium-browser/ && \
apt-get clean && \
rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/* \
echo "Chromium Version: " && chromium-browser --product-version && chromedriver --version
# Running as non sudo user 'worker'
RUN useradd --no-log-init --system --create-home --shell /bin/bash worker
USER worker
WORKDIR /home/worker
# Create the agent inside the image
RUN mkdir -p /home/worker/bin && \
mkdir -p /home/worker/.robocorp \
mkdir -p /home/worker/bin/conda && \
mkdir -p /home/worker/instance
RUN curl --silent --show-error --fail -o /home/worker/bin/robocorp-workforce-agent-core https://downloads.robocorp.com/workforce-agent-core/releases/latest/linux64/robocorp-workforce-agent-core
RUN chmod +x /home/worker/bin/robocorp-workforce-agent-core
# initialize the Agent Core
RUN /home/worker/bin/robocorp-workforce-agent-core init --log-level TRACE --rcc-exec-path /home/worker/bin/rcc
# Link the App to Control Room
RUN /home/worker/bin/robocorp-workforce-agent-core link "$LINK_TOKEN" --name "$NAME" --instance-path /home/worker/instance
ENTRYPOINT [ "/home/worker/bin/robocorp-workforce-agent-core", "start", "--instance-path", "/home/worker/instance" ]
Commands
Build:
docker image build --tag robocorpapp_static_container:1.0 --build-arg NAME=<insert name> --build-arg LINK_TOKEN=<insert link token> path/to/Dockerfile
Run:
docker run -dit robocorpapp_static_container:1.0
Dynamic container refers to a container that is linked at run time. This means that a new worker is visible at Control Room every time the container is run.
All Unattended Processes need to be set to use this worker each time a new worker is created.
Build the image from Dockerfile and then insert the Control Room token and name at run time as an environment variable to the run command with the -e run argument to make the worker visible in Control Room.
Dockerfile
# Select the base image
FROM ubuntu:18.04
# Set all variables that affect programs to follow same encoding
ENV LANG=C.UTF-8 LANGUAGE=C.UTF-8 LC_ALL=C.UTF-8
# Install here all the software your process needs in order to execute
RUN apt-get update --fix-missing && \
apt-get install -y wget bzip2 ca-certificates curl bash chromium-browser chromium-chromedriver build-essential && \
apt-get install -y fonts-indic fonts-noto fonts-noto-cjk && \
apt-get install -y zip libdbus-glib-1-2 && \
export PATH=$PATH:/usr/lib/chromium-browser/ && \
apt-get clean && \
rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/* \
echo "Chromium Version: " && chromium-browser --product-version && chromedriver --version
# Running as non sudo user 'worker'
RUN useradd --no-log-init --system --create-home --shell /bin/bash worker
USER worker
WORKDIR /home/worker
# Create the agent inside the image
RUN mkdir -p /home/worker/bin && \
mkdir -p /home/worker/.robocorp \
mkdir -p /home/worker/bin/conda && \
mkdir -p /home/worker/instance
RUN curl --silent --show-error --fail -o /home/worker/bin/robocorp-workforce-agent-core https://downloads.robocorp.com/workforce-agent-core/releases/latest/linux64/robocorp-workforce-agent-core
RUN chmod +x /home/worker/bin/robocorp-workforce-agent-core
# initialize the Agent Core
RUN /home/worker/bin/robocorp-workforce-agent-core init --log-level TRACE --rcc-exec-path /home/worker/bin/rcc
# Set the local scripts in place
COPY ./start.sh start.sh
ENTRYPOINT [ "./start.sh" ]
Start script
#!/bin/sh
echo "Linking the Agent with name $NAME and token $LINK_TOKEN"
./bin/robocorp-workforce-agent-core link $LINK_TOKEN --name $NAME --instance-path /home/worker/instance
echo "Linking succeeded"
echo "Starting the Agent..."
./bin/robocorp-workforce-agent-core start --instance-path /home/worker/instance
Make sure the start script is executable by running:
chmod +x /path/to/start.sh
Commands
Build:
docker image build --tag robocorpapp_dynamic_container:1.0 path/to/Dockerfile
Run:
docker run -dit -e NAME=<insert name> -e LINK_TOKEN=<insert link token> robocorpapp_dynamic_container:1.0
The runtime configuration can be modified to set what commands are allowed to run by default in the instance.
If you want to modify the runtime configuration, create a rtconfig.yml (example below) file and copy it to the Docker instance by adding copy command to Docker file: COPY path/to/rtconfig.yml instance/rtconfig.yml.
#
# Robocorp Workforce Agent Core configuration
#
run:
#
# Specify commands allowed to be executed.
#
# Incoming commands are matched against allowed commands list using micromatch:
# - micromatch.isMatch(requestedCommand, allowedCommandsArray)
# - See https://www.npmjs.com/package/micromatch#ismatch for reference
#
# Recommendation: Apply the principle of least privilege. Use exact match
# with a single command when use case allows.
#
allowedCommands:
# OpenRPA convention: task runner script in scripts/
- entrypoints/(*.bat|*.sh|*.cmd)
- scripts/(*.bat|*.sh|*.cmd)
- (*.bat|*.sh|*.cmd)
# Print current date/time example.
# /T is needed on Windows to only output the current date/time.
- time
- time /T
- date
- date /T
# Allow everything. Use with caution, e.g., only within the development
# sandbox.
- '**'
dataTransfer:
# Specify what data is allowed to be sent to the cloud from the executed
# process.
#
# When data transfer is enabled, the data including build artifacts, worker
# console log, and console output are sent to the cloud.
#
# If disabled, only the operationally mandatory control messages between
# cloud and worker are sent to the cloud, and will be printed in the cloud
# run console output window. To disable data transfer set option
# 'disable: true'.
#
disable: false
- Make sure the
start.sh script uses Linux line endings (LF)
Last edit: November 22, 2022