Doberman WebApp

Author: L. Bütikofer

Date: 18. July 2016

Brief

Doberman WebApp is an application based on Django in order to display, monitor and extract recorded data from the Doberman slow control software. It is not a prerequisite to run the Doberman slow control, but allows for online visually inspection of the monitored system or analyze/extract data at a later time.

Prerequisites

The code is based on python 3 on linux. Doberman WebApp does not have to be running on the same machine as Doberman slow control. However Doberman slow control has to be installed somewhere and should be accessible from the machine you are going to install Doberman WebApp.

Installation

Installation guide tested for linux ubuntu 16.04 LTS

This installation guide assumes that you already fully completed the installation guide for Doberman slow control.

• Install pip3: sudo apt install python3-pip.

• Install Django web framework: pip3 install django.

• Install django-dbarray0.2:

  • sudo apt-get install postgresql
  • sudo apt-get install python3-psycopg2
  • sudo apt-get install libpq-dev
  • Download django-dbarray0.2 from here.
  • Extract file: tar -xzvf django-dbarray-0.2.tar.gz.
  • Install django-dbarray: sudo python3 setup.py install.

• Download Doberman WebApp to a directory of your choice: git clone https://Doberman_slowcontrol@bitbucket.org/Doberman_slowcontrol/webapp.git

• In your Web-app folder open the file slow/settings.py and go to the section below and change the settings according to the database you would like to connect to (i.e. the database you set up during the installation of Doberman slow control):

#!python
DATABASES = {
    'default': {
        'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.postgresql_psycopg2',
        'NAME': 'your_DB_name',
        'USER': 'your_DB_username',
        'PASSWORD': 'your_password',
        'HOST': 'your_DB_host',
        'PORT': 'your_DB_port',
    }
}

• You should also add your host to the setting file option ALLOWED_HOSTS = ['yourhost.com']. (if you run the app only locally this could be 'localhost', see also the documentation here).
• After you modified the setup.py file run python3 manage.py migrate

Set up the WebApp with apache

• sudo apt-get install apache2
• sudo apt-get install apache2-dev
• sudo apt-get install libapache2-mod-wsgi-py3
• Add the following lines to the apache2.conf file (located in /etc/apache2):
  • replace /paht/to/your/app with the directory where you installed Doberman WebApp, but leave the rest of the path as it already is in the file.

#!python
WSGIScriptAlias / /paht/to/your/app/slow/wsgi.py
WSGIPythonPath /paht/to/your/app
 
Alias /static/ /paht/to/your/app/static/
 
<Directory /paht/to/your/app/static>
Require all granted
</Directory>
 
<Directory /paht/to/your/app/slow>
	<Files wsgi.py>
		Require all granted
	</Files>
</Directory>

• Inside the file /directory to WebApp/slow/wsgi.py replace the line /directory/path/to/your/WebApp/location with the directory you installed Doberman WebApp (don't replace /slow)
• Enable “wsgi mod” by typing: sudo a2enmod wsgi
• Restart the server sudo service apache2 restart.
• Now you should be able to reach the Web-app at http://localhost/display (or http://your_IP_address/display).

Optional: set up password log in

There are ways to add simple single user/password protection to your Doberman WebApp. See for example these instructions here https://github.com/plumdog/django-password-protect