Dialogporten

Getting started with local development

Mac

Prerequisites

• .NET 9 SDK (see global.json for the currently required version)

Installing Podman (Mac)

1. Install Podman

2. Install dependencies:

brew tap cfergeau/crc
# https://github.com/containers/podman/issues/21064
brew install vfkit
brew install docker-compose

3. Restart your Mac

4. Finish setup in Podman Desktop

5. Check that Docker Compatility mode is enabled, see the bottom left corner

6. Enable privileged testcontainers-dotnet
   echo "ryuk.container.privileged = true" >> $HOME/.testcontainers.properties

Windows

Prerequisites

• Git
• .NET 9 SDK
• WSL2 (To install, open a PowerShell admin window and run wsl --install)
• Virtual Machine Platform (Installs with WSL2, see the link above)

Installing Podman (Windows)

1. Install Podman Desktop.

2. Start Podman Desktop and follow instructions to install Podman.

3. Follow instructions in Podman Desktop to create and start a Podman machine.

4. In Podman Desktop, go to Settings → Resources and run setup for the Compose Extension. This will install docker-compose.

Running the project

You can run the entire project locally using podman compose. (This uses docker-compose behind the scenes.)

podman compose up

The following GUI services should now be available:

• WebAPI/SwaggerUI: localhost:7124/swagger
• GraphQl/BananaCakePop: localhost:7215/graphql
• Redis/Insight: localhost:7216

The WebAPI and GraphQl services are behind a nginx proxy, and you can change the number of replicas by setting the scale property in the docker-compose.yml file.

Running the WebApi/GraphQl in an IDE

If you need do debug the WebApi/GraphQl projects in an IDE, you can alternatively run podman compose without the WebAPI/GraphQl.
First, create a dotnet user secret for the DB connection string.

dotnet user-secrets set -p .\src\Digdir.Domain.Dialogporten.WebApi\ "Infrastructure:DialogDbConnectionString" "Server=localhost;Port=5432;Database=Dialogporten;User ID=postgres;Password=supersecret;Include Error Detail=True;"

Then run podman compose without the WebAPI/GraphQl projects.

podman compose -f docker-compose-no-webapi.yml up 

DB development

This project uses Entity Framework core to manage DB migrations. DB development can either be done through Visual Studios Package Manager Console (PMC) or through the CLI.

DB development through PMC

Set Digdir.Domain.Dialogporten.Infrastructure as the startup project in Visual Studio's solution explorer, and as the default project in PMC. You are now ready to use EF core tools through PMC. Run the following command for more information:

Get-Help about_EntityFrameworkCore

DB development through CLI

Install the CLI tool with the following command:

dotnet tool install --global dotnet-ef

You are now ready to use EF core tools through CLI. Run the following command for more information:

dotnet ef --help

Remember to target Digdir.Domain.Dialogporten.Infrastructure project when running the CLI commands. Either target it through the command using the -p option, i.e.

dotnet ef migrations add -p .\src\Digdir.Domain.Dialogporten.Infrastructure\ TestMigration

Or change your directory to the infrastructure project and then run the command.

cd .\src\Digdir.Domain.Dialogporten.Infrastructure\
dotnet ef migrations add TestMigration

Restoring a database from an Azure backup

See docs/RestoreDatabase.md

Testing

Besides ordinary unit and integration tests, there are test suites for both functional and non-functional end-to-end tests implemented with K6.

See tests/k6/README.md for more information.

Health Checks

The project includes integrated health checks that are exposed through standard endpoints:

• /health/startup - Dependency checks
• /health/liveness - Self checks
• /health/readiness - Critical service checks
• /health - General health status
• /health/deep - Comprehensive health check including external services

These health checks are integrated with Azure Container Apps' health probe system and are used to monitor the application's health status.

Observability with OpenTelemetry

This project uses OpenTelemetry for distributed tracing, metrics collection, and logging. The setup includes:

Core Features

• Distributed tracing across services
• Runtime and application metrics
• Log aggregation and correlation
• Integration with Azure Monitor/Application Insights
• Support for both OTLP and Azure Monitor exporters
• Automatic instrumentation for:
  • ASP.NET Core
  • HTTP clients
  • Entity Framework Core
  • PostgreSQL
  • FusionCache

Configuration

OpenTelemetry is configured through environment variables that are automatically provided by Azure Container Apps in production environments:

{
    "OTEL_SERVICE_NAME": "your-service-name",
    "OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT": "http://your-collector:4317",
    "OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_PROTOCOL": "grpc",
    "OTEL_RESOURCE_ATTRIBUTES": "key1=value1,key2=value2",
    "APPLICATIONINSIGHTS_CONNECTION_STRING": "your-connection-string"
}

Local Development

For local development, the project includes a docker-compose setup with:

• OpenTelemetry Collector (ports 4317/4318 for OTLP receivers)
• Grafana (port 3000)
• Jaeger (port 16686)
• Loki (port 3100)
• Prometheus (port 9090)

To run the local observability stack:

podman compose -f docker-compose-otel.yml up

Accessing Observability Tools

Once the local stack is running, you can access the following tools:

Distributed Tracing with Jaeger

• URL: http://localhost:16686
• Features:
  • View distributed traces across services
  • Search by service, operation, or trace ID
  • Analyze timing and dependencies
  • Debug request flows and errors

Metrics with Prometheus

• URL: http://localhost:9090
• Features:
  • Query raw metrics data
  • View metric targets and service discovery
  • Debug metric collection

Log Aggregation with Loki

• Direct URL: http://localhost:3100
• Grafana Integration: http://localhost:3000 (preferred interface)
• Features:
  • Search and filter logs across all services
  • Correlate logs with traces using trace IDs
  • Create log-based alerts and dashboards
  • Use LogQL to query logs:

    # Example: Find all error logs
    {container="web-api"} |= "error"
    
    # Example: Find logs with specific trace ID
    {container=~"web-api|graphql"} |~ "trace_id=([a-f0-9]{32})"
    

Metrics and Dashboards in Grafana

• URL: http://localhost:3000
• Features:
  • Pre-configured dashboards for:
    • Application metrics
    • Runtime metrics
    • HTTP request metrics
  • Data sources:
    • Prometheus (metrics)
    • Loki (logs)
    • Jaeger (traces)
  • Create custom dashboards
  • Set up alerts

OpenTelemetry Collector Endpoints

• OTLP gRPC receiver: localhost:4317
• OTLP HTTP receiver: localhost:4318
• Prometheus metrics: localhost:8888
• Prometheus exporter metrics: localhost:8889

Request Filtering

The telemetry setup includes smart filtering to:

• Exclude health check endpoints from tracing
• Filter out duplicate traces from Azure SDK clients
• Only record relevant HTTP client calls

For more details about the OpenTelemetry setup, see the ConfigureTelemetry method in AspNetUtilitiesExtensions.cs.

Updating the SDK in global.json

When RenovateBot updates global.json or base image versions in Dockerfiles, make sure they match. The global.json file should always have the same SDK version as the base image in the Dockerfiles. This is to ensure that the SDK version used in the local development environment matches the SDK version used in the CI/CD pipeline. global.json is used when building the solution in CI/CD.

Development in local and test environments

To generate test tokens, see https://github.com/Altinn/AltinnTestTools. There is a request in the Postman collection for this.

Local development settings

We are able to toggle some external resources in local development. This is done through the appsettings.Development.json file. The following settings are available:

"LocalDevelopment": {
    "UseLocalDevelopmentUser": true,
    "UseLocalDevelopmentResourceRegister": true,
    "UseLocalDevelopmentOrganizationRegister": true,
    "UseLocalDevelopmentNameRegister": true,
    "UseLocalDevelopmentAltinnAuthorization": true,
    "UseLocalDevelopmentCloudEventBus": true,
    "UseLocalDevelopmentCompactJwsGenerator": true,
    "DisableCache": true,
    "DisableAuth": true,
    "UseInMemoryServiceBusTransport": true,
    "DisableSubjectResourceSyncOnStartup": false,
    "DisablePolicyInformationSyncOnStartup": true
}

Toggling these flags will enable/disable the external resources. The DisableAuth flag, for example, will disable authentication in the WebAPI project. This is useful when debugging the WebAPI project in an IDE. These settings will only be respected in the Development environment.

Using appsettings.local.json

During local development, it is natural to tweak configurations. Some of these configurations are meant to be shared through git, such as the endpoint for a new integration that may be used during local development. Other configurations are only meant for a specific debug session or a developer's personal preferences, which should not be shared through git, such as lowering the log level below warning.

The configuration in the appsettings.local.json file takes precedence over all other configurations and is only loaded in the Development environment. Additionally, it is ignored by git through the .gitignore file.

If developers need to add configuration that should be shared, they should use appsettings.Development.json. If the configuration is not meant to be shared, they can create an appsettings.local.json file to override the desired settings.

Here is an example of enabling debug logging only locally:

// appsettings.local.json
{
    "Serilog": {
        "WriteTo": [
            {
                "Name": "Console",
                "Args": {
                    "outputTemplate": "[{Timestamp:HH:mm:ss.fff} {Level:u3}] {Message:lj}{NewLine}{Exception}"
                }
            }
        ],
        "MinimumLevel": {
            "Default": "Debug"
        }
    }
}

Adding appsettings.local.json to new projects

Add the following to the Program.cs file to load the appsettings.local.json file:

var builder = WebApplication.CreateBuilder(args);
// or var builder = CoconaApp.CreateBuilder(args);
// or var builder = Host.CreateApplicationBuilder(args);
// or some other builder implementing IHostApplicationBuilder

// Left out for brevity
builder.Configuration
    // Add local configuration as the last configuration source to override other configurations
    //.AddSomeOtherConfiguration()
    .AddLocalConfiguration(builder.Environment);

// Left out for brevity

Pull requests

For pull requests, the title must follow Conventional Commits. The title of the PR will be used as the commit message when squashing/merging the pull request, and the body of the PR will be used as the description.

This title will be used to generate the changelog (using Release Please) Using fix will add to "Bug Fixes", feat will add to "Features", chore will add to "Miscellaneous Chores". All the others, test, ci, trivial etc., will be ignored. (Example release)

Deployment

This repository contains code for both infrastructure and applications. Configurations for infrastructure are located in .azure/infrastructure. Application configuration is in .azure/applications.

Deployment process / GitHub actions

See docs/CI-CD.md

Infrastructure

Infrastructure definitions for the project are located in the .azure/infrastructure folder. To add new infrastructure components, follow the existing pattern found within this directory. This involves creating new Bicep files or modifying existing ones to define the necessary infrastructure resources.

For example, to add a new storage account, you would:

• Create or update a Bicep file within the .azure/infrastructure folder to include the storage account resource definition.
• Ensure that the Bicep file is referenced correctly in .azure/infrastructure/infrastructure.bicep to be included in the deployment process.

Refer to docs/Infrastructure.md for more detailed information.

Applications

All application Bicep definitions are located in the .azure/applications folder. To add a new application, follow the existing pattern found within this directory. This involves creating a new folder for your application under .azure/applications and adding the necessary Bicep files (main.bicep and environment-specific parameter files, e.g., test.bicepparam, staging.bicepparam).

For example, to add a new application named web-api-new, you would:

• Create a new folder: .azure/applications/web-api-new
• Add a main.bicep file within this folder to define the application's infrastructure.
• Use the appropriate Bicep-modules within this file. There is one for Container apps which you most likely would use.
• Add parameter files for each environment (e.g., test.bicepparam, staging.bicepparam) to specify environment-specific values.

Refer to the existing applications like web-api-so and web-api-eu as templates.