Alike A3/V7 Documentation

Welcome to the Alike documentation

A3 Networking and Protocols

This section describes what protocols the A3 uses, proxy options, and how to customize if needed.

Proxy Settings

If you are running your A3 behind a proxy, you will need to configure your it to use your proxy settings. This is done via a Docker proxy configuration file. The A3 ships with an example proxy file at /home/alike/.docker/proxy-config.json. You will need to rename it to config.json and then configure it appropriately via Docker proxy documentation.

A3 HTTP and SSL Support

Your A3 is equipped with SSL support out-of-the-box. You can connect to your A3 either on port 80 using the HTTP protocol (unencrypted) or port 443 using the HTTPS protocol (with SSL). To disable HTTP access, you can change your docker-compose.yml file to remove port 80 from the "ports" section. (see Docker for more information about the yaml file).

Your A3 ships with a SSL certificate that can be used for proof-of-concept and testing. You can replace this sample cert with your own for added security.

You will need some understanding of NGINX configuration in order to do so.

Add your cert to to "certs" subdir of your A3 docker host area (this is /home/alike on A3 VMs). After changing add the cert, change the NGINX configuration file. This is available under the "configs" subdir.

Information about how to configure your certificate on NGINX is available here.

SSH and SCP

The A3 offers SSH and SCP access to both the A3 VM itself, which is the Docker host, and the Docker container running inside it. Typically, there is no need to connect to the Docker container directly via SSH, unless instructed to do so by support. It's easy to confuse one for ther other, as both have console menus, so it's best to be deliberate about your SSH usage to avoid confusion. The A3 VM uses port 22 and the A3 docker container is bound to port 222 by default (you can change this in the Docker yaml, if needed).

Connecting to your Docker container via SCP is a good way to access the restoreFS in an emergency whenever CIFS/SMB access is inconvenient or impossible. Please see the restore section for more details.

Remember that your Docker container and A3 VM may have different passwords for the "alike" user. Your VM's password is set via the "passwd" command on the shell. If you lose this password, there is no way for support to replace it. You will have to download a new A3 VM and reconnect your Data Store.

NFS and SMB (CIFS)

You can also access certain A3 features over a Windows share (CIFS). See Restore for more details on using the restoreFS. The A3 also provides an "ADS" share, which has additional logs that support may request.