How does 3scale API Gateway communicate with portal?

[4integ...@gmail.com]

I am trying out 3Scale API Management. I would like to have the API gateway running on-premise in Docker container and test with 3Scale API Portals by Red Hat evaluation.

A few questions:
* How are the communication done between API Gateway and API Portal?
* Is it the API gateway that request the configuration at startup from API Portal and/or is it API Portal that pushes the configuration to the gateway?

Reason of thinking is that the API Gateway is behind firewall(s) and requirements on port openings etc

/ Joacim

[Nicolas Massé]

Hi Joacim,

The communication between the API Gateway and the API Manager uses two APIs : 

 - the Service Management API to ask for authorization and report usage

 - the Account Management API (read-only) to get the list of available APIs and their configuration

The Service Management API is at su1.3scale.net (port 443) whereas the Account Management API is at <TENANT>-admin.3scale.net (port 443). 

The configuration is retrieved by polling the Account Management API. 

Best regards,

Nicolas

[4integ...@gmail.com]

Hi Nicolas,

Thanks for your reply.

Sounds good - then it's only outbound traffic and a lot easier to manage :)

Do you know how often the polling is done?

Regards

Joacim

[4integ...@gmail.com]

I think I found the answer :)

From: https://github.com/3scale/apicast 

Auto updating

The gateway is able of checking the configuration from time to time and self update, you can enable this by adjusting the APICAST_CONFIGURATION_CACHE (seconds) to some value greater than 60:

-e APICAST_CONFIGURATION_CACHE=300

This variable is set to 0 by default.

But default = 0, what does that mean? Disabled or 60 sec?

/ Joacim

[Nicolas Massé]

Hi Joacim,

Yes, this parameter controls the polling frequency. 

According to https://github.com/3scale/apicast/blob/a41b3fb90a9c9250711aa63de78eed4c5e1253d5/.env#L19 : 

"Cache the configuration for N seconds. Empty means forever and 0 means don't cache at all."

For instance, the 0 value is used on staging apicast in conjunction with APICAST_CONFIGURATION_LOADER=lazy so that configuration is always up-to-date. 

Best regards,

Nicolas

[Jan van Zoggel]

Hi Nicolas,

If you don't override/set the APICAST_CONFIGURATION_CACHE value, what is the default value / behaviour ?

Is it 0 (don't cache) for staging and 60 seconds cache for production ? 

kind regards,

Jan