Add Interceptor (Carrier Agent) to the Carrier Platform

Overview

This guide provides step-by-step instructions on how to add Interceptor (Carrier Agent) to the Carrier Platform. By Adding an interceptor to the Carrier platform allows you to enhance monitoring and interception capabilities for your performance testing environment. Follow these straightforward steps to seamlessly integrate the interceptor into your setup.

Prerequisites

To add Interceptor successfully you should use Docker so your machine must meet the following hardware requirements (CPU, RAM, Disk space):

Minimal Hardware requirements
CPU	4 cores
RAM	4 GB
Disk space	30 GB

Before you begin configuring Interceptor in Carrier, ensure that you have completed the following:

• Installed and set up Carrier successfully
• Had access to a project in Carrier
• Installed Docker

Step 1: Obtain Secrets Parameters from Carrier Platform

1. Go to your Carrier platform by visiting - https://${CARRIER_HOST}/
   (${CARRIER_HOST} is not a real URL it is just a template of the URL you should have after a successful Carrier installation)
   • From the project dropdown menu, select the project you want.
   • Click “Go!” to navigate to the project’s configuration page.
   • Select CONFIGURATION option from the top left dropdown menu.
   • Click on “Secrets” option in the top menu

Also you can go to “Configuration” > “Secrets” on your Carrier platform by visiting
https://${CARRIER_HOST}/-/configuration/secrets/

1. Copy the values of the following parameters:
   • auth_token (used as ${AUTH_TOKEN} parameter)
   • rabbit_project_password (used as ${RABBIT_PWD} parameter)
   • rabbit_project_user (used as ${RABBIT_USER} parameter)
   • rabbit_project_vhost (used as ${PROJECT_VHOST} parameter)

For your convenience, you can temporarily paste the values into Notepad or another text editor, but don’t save it on your machine!

Step 2: Run the Interceptor Docker Container

Execute the following Docker command with parameters from “Secrets” to run the interceptor container:

docker run -d --rm -v /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock \
  -e RAM_QUOTA=4g -e CPU_QUOTA=2 -e CPU_CORES=2 \
  -e RABBIT_HOST=${CARRIER_HOST} \
  -e RABBIT_USER=${RABBIT_USER} -e RABBIT_PASSWORD=${RABBIT_PWD} \
  -e VHOST=${PROJECT_VHOST}
  -e QUEUE_NAME=my_new_QUEUE -e TOKEN=${AUTH_TOKEN} \
  -e LOKI_HOST=https://${CARRIER_HOST} getcarrier/interceptor:latest

Ensure to replace the placeholders ${CARRIER_HOST}, ${RABBIT_USER}, ${RABBIT_PWD}, ${PROJECT_VHOST}, and ${AUTH_TOKEN} with your specific values. Also don’t forget to remove all ${ }.

Note: You must set CPU_CORES=2 in the interceptor configuration. This is essential because one CPU core will be allocated for running the performance test, and the other core will be used for post-processing. If only one core is allocated, the test will start, but the post-processing phase won’t. Ensure that both cores are available for smooth task execution.

Additionally, make sure that the interceptor version matches across configurations (e.g., getcarrier/interceptor:latest or another version you have installed). Mismatched versions, such as getcarrier/interceptor:beta-1.0 and getcarrier/interceptor:latest, could cause inconsistencies in behavior and task execution.

Step 3: Run Rabbit Queue Checker Task

1. Navigate to “Configuration” > “Tasks” on your Carrier platform using the following URL: https://${CARRIER_HOST}/-/configuration/tasks/
2. Run the “rabbit_queue_checker” task.

Please be patient Rabbit Queue Checker Task can take from 3-5 minutes to make new pool avaliable.

Step 4: Select Load configuration in a test

1. In the project configuration page, click on the “Performance” tab located in the left menu.
2. Select test type tab (Backend or UI, depends on which test you configured before).
3. Open Test settings by clicking on the More options button (3 dots menu).
4. Scroll down to the Load configuration section and click on Engine location dropdown.
5. Select Project pool with name ${QUEUE_NAME} from Docker command in Step 2
6. Click on Update And Start button.

During the test execution you can run another Docker command:

docker ps

In order to see 2 Docker containers, one for interceptor and another for test execution.

By following these simple steps, you can seamlessly integrate the interceptor into your Carrier platform, enhancing your performance testing capabilities with advanced monitoring and interception features.