Consul Interactive Sandboxes

Experiment with HashiCorp products in a safe, pre-configured environment.

HashiCorp Sandboxes provide interactive environments where you can experiment with HashiCorp products without any installation or setup. They're perfect for:

Learning how products work in a real environment
Testing configurations and commands without affecting your systems
Exploring product features in a safe sandbox
Following along with tutorials and documentation

Each sandbox comes pre-configured with everything you need to start using the product immediately. Just click on a sandbox below to launch it in your browser.

Available Consul sandboxes

When you launch a sandbox, you'll be presented with a terminal interface where you can interact with the pre-configured environment. The sandbox runs in your browser and doesn't require any downloads or installations.

Each sandbox session lasts for up to 1 hour, giving you plenty of time to experiment. Your work isn't saved between sessions, so be sure to copy any important configurations before your session ends.

Consul Sandbox (Service discovery)
Experiment with Consul. This sandbox contains a Consul cluster (3 servers and 4 clients) and a Bastion host. It also runs HashiCups, a demo web application.
Launch Sandbox
Consul Sandbox (Service mesh)
Experiment with Consul. This sandbox contains a Consul cluster (3 servers and 4 clients) and a Bastion host. It also runs HashiCups, a demo web application.
Launch Sandbox

Sandbox documentation

Warning

This sandbox is not a production-ready environment. It is a development and testing environment with security configurations for gossip encryption, TLS, and ACLs enabled. For more information about deploying Consul in production, refer to the Consul Deployment Guide.

This sandbox provides a 3-node Consul community edition datacenter running in a Docker environment.

In addition to the server nodes, 4 client nodes are also part of the datacenter. These nodes are running HashiCups, a demo microservices web application that mimics a storefront.

The scenario also includes one extra node for a bastion host. It simulates scenarios where there is no direct access to the different nodes that make up the Consul datacenter, and a bastion host is required to access individual nodes.

Access the nodes

The recommended method to access the different nodes is using SSH. You can SSH into the bastion host using:

$ ssh -i certs/id_rsa admin@localhost -p 2222

You can also use one of the two Bastion Host tabs to get direct access into the bastion host node.

Interact with Consul

From the bastion host, you can directly interact with Consul. First, load necessary environment variables.

$ source assets/scenario/env-consul.env

After that you can directly use Consul CLI to interact with your datacenter.

$ consul members

For a full list of CLI commands, refer to the Consul CLI reference documentation.

Logs and container data

You can find container data, configuration, and logs in the var directory.

You can get an overview of the content using the tree command.

$ tree /root/repository/var

Sign in to the Consul UI

You can also use the Consul UI tab to interact with Consul, but you need an ACL token with sufficient permissions to sign in.

To view the token present in the env-consul.env file:

echo $CONSUL_HTTP_TOKEN

Enter the value in the SecretID field to sign in to the Consul UI.

This sandbox has the following architecture:

┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│    Consul Datacenter DC1                                                     │
│                                                                              │
│ ┌──────────────────────────────┐    ┌──────────────────────────────────────┐ │
│ │ SERVERS                      │    │ ┌─────────────────────────┐  CLIENTS │ │
│ │                              │    │ │                         │          │ │
│ │                              │    │ │   hashicups-nginx-0     │          │ │
│ │                              │    │ │                         │          │ │
│ │ ┌───────────────────┐        │    │ └────┬────────────┬───────┘          │ │
│ │ │                   │        │    │      │            │                  │ │
│ │ │  consul-server-0  │        │    │      │            │                  │ │
│ │ │                   │        │    │      │   ┌────────▼────────────────┐ │ │
│ │ └─▲─────────────────┘        │    │      │   │                         │ │ │
│ │   │                          │    │      │   │   hashicups-frontend-0  │ │ │
│ │   │  ┌───────────────────┐   │    │      │   │                         │ │ │
│ │   │  │                   │   │    │      │   └─────────────────────────┘ │ │
│ │   ┼──►  consul-server-1  │   │    │      │                               │ │
│ │   │  │                   │   │    │      │                               │ │
│ │   │  └───────────────────┘   │    │ ┌────▼────────────────────┐          │ │
│ │   │                          │    │ │                         │          │ │
│ │ ┌─▼─────────────────┐        │    │ │   hashicups-api-0       │          │ │
│ │ │                   │        │    │ │                         │          │ │
│ │ │  consul-server-2  │        │    │ └────────────┬────────────┘          │ │
│ │ │                   │        │    │              │                       │ │
│ │ └───────────────────┘        │    │              │                       │ │
│ │                              │    │ ┌────────────▼────────────┐          │ │
│ │                              │    │ │                         │          │ │
│ │                              │    │ │   hashicups-db-0        │          │ │
│ │                              │    │ │                         │          │ │
│ │                              │    │ └─────────────────────────┘          │ │
│ └──────────────────────────────┘    └──────────────────────────────────────┘ │
│                                                                              │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
                                                                                
                                                                                
                      ┌─────────────────────┐                               
                      │                     │                               
                      │    Bastion  Host    │                               
                      │                     │                               
                      └─────────────────────┘

The Consul nodes do not have systemd installed so Consul needs to be stopped and started manually.

The command to start Consul on each node is:

$ consul agent -config-dir=/etc/consul.d > /tmp/logs/consul-server.log 2>&1 &

The command starts Consul in the background to not lock the terminal.

Warning

This environment is not production-ready, as it does not follow our recommendations for production-ready cluster deployments. Refer to the Consul Deployment Guide for more information.

It is meant to serve as a development and testing environment. It is "production-lite" as it enables gossip encryption, TLS, and ACLs.

This is a 3-node Consul community edition datacenter running in a Docker environment.

Alongside the server nodes 4 client nodes are also added to the datacenter. The nodes are running HashiCups, a demo web application.

One extra node, Bastion Host, is also added to the scenario to simulate scenarios where there is no direct access to the different nodes composing the Consul datacenter and a bastion host is required to access the nodes.

Architecture

Click on the "Architecture" tab to find a diagram of the deployed scenario.

Configuration and logs

You can find container data, configuration, and logs in the var directory.

You can get an overview of the content using the tree command.

$ tree /root/repository/var

Access the nodes

The recommended method to access the different nodes is using SSH. You can SSH into the bastion host using:

$ ssh -i certs/id_rsa admin@localhost -p 2222

You can also use one of the two Bastion Host tabs to get direct access into the bastion host node.

Interact with Consul

From the bastion host, you can directly interact with Consul. First, load necessary environment variables.

$ source assets/scenario/env-consul.env

After that you can directly use Consul CLI to interact with your datacenter.

$ consul members

You can also use the Consul UI tab to interact with Consul.

If you want to login to the UI, use the token present in the env-consul.env file.

This sandbox has the following architecture:

┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│    Consul Datacenter DC1                                                     │
│                                                                              │
│ ┌──────────────────────────────┐    ┌──────────────────────────────────────┐ │
│ │ SERVERS                      │    │ ┌─────────────────────────┐  CLIENTS │ │
│ │                              │    │ │                         │          │ │
│ │                              │    │ │   hashicups-nginx-0     │          │ │
│ │                              │    │ │                         │          │ │
│ │ ┌───────────────────┐        │    │ └────┬────────────┬───────┘          │ │
│ │ │                   │        │    │      │            │                  │ │
│ │ │  consul-server-0  │        │    │      │            │                  │ │
│ │ │                   │        │    │      │   ┌────────▼────────────────┐ │ │
│ │ └─▲─────────────────┘        │    │      │   │                         │ │ │
│ │   │                          │    │      │   │   hashicups-frontend-0  │ │ │
│ │   │  ┌───────────────────┐   │    │      │   │                         │ │ │
│ │   │  │                   │   │    │      │   └─────────────────────────┘ │ │
│ │   ┼──►  consul-server-1  │   │    │      │                               │ │
│ │   │  │                   │   │    │      │                               │ │
│ │   │  └───────────────────┘   │    │ ┌────▼────────────────────┐          │ │
│ │   │                          │    │ │                         │          │ │
│ │ ┌─▼─────────────────┐        │    │ │   hashicups-api-0       │          │ │
│ │ │                   │        │    │ │                         │          │ │
│ │ │  consul-server-2  │        │    │ └────────────┬────────────┘          │ │
│ │ │                   │        │    │              │                       │ │
│ │ └───────────────────┘        │    │              │                       │ │
│ │                              │    │ ┌────────────▼────────────┐          │ │
│ │                              │    │ │                         │          │ │
│ │                              │    │ │   hashicups-db-0        │          │ │
│ │                              │    │ │                         │          │ │
│ │                              │    │ └─────────────────────────┘          │ │
│ └──────────────────────────────┘    └──────────────────────────────────────┘ │
│                                                                              │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
                                                                                
                                                                                
                      ┌─────────────────────┐                               
                      │                     │                               
                      │    Bastion  Host    │                               
                      │                     │                               
                      └─────────────────────┘

The Consul nodes do not have systemd installed so Consul needs to be stopped and started manually.

The command to start Consul on each node is:

$ consul agent -config-dir=/etc/consul.d > /tmp/logs/consul-server.log 2>&1 &

The command starts Consul in the background to not lock the terminal.

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