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Debug Endpoint in KrakenD API Gateway

Document updated on Nov 28, 2018

The /__debug/ endpoint is available when you start the server with the -d flag, or when you add the debug_endpoint=true in the configuration.

The endpoint can be used as a fake backend if you use as host KrakenD itself, and is very useful to see the interaction between the gateway and the backends as its activity is printed in the log using the DEBUG log level. The endpoint returns this content:

{
  "message": "pong"
}

When developing, add an additional backend pointing to KrakenD itself ("host": "http://localhost:8080") with the /__debug/ endpoint in its url_pattern, so you can see exactly what headers and query string parameters your backends are receiving.

The debug endpoint might save you much trouble, as your application might not work when specific headers or parameters are not present. Maybe you are relying upon what your client is sending, but this is not what the gateway is forwarding. Remember: this is not a proxy.

For instance, your client might be sending a Content-Type or Accept header and these are perhaps necessary for the proper functioning of your backend, but unless these are recognized headers by the gateway (they are in input_headers), they are not going to reach the backend ever. Seeing the specific headers and parameters in the log clears all the doubts, and you can reproduce the call and conditions easily.

Configuration

To enable the debug endpoint add the following in the configuration:

Fields of
* required fields
debug_endpoint

boolean
Enables the /__debug/ endpoint for this configuration. You can safely enable it in production.
Defaults to false

Or to do it during runtime, add -d when starting the server. E.g., krakend run -dc krakend.json

Debug endpoint example

The following configuration demonstrates how to test what headers and query string parameters are sent and received by the backends by using the /__debug/ endpoint.

We are going to test the following endpoints:

  • /default-behavior: No client headers, query string or cookies forwarded.
  • /optional-params: Forwards known parameters and headers
    • Recognizes a and b as a query string
    • Recognizes User-Agent and Accept as forwarded headers
  • /mandatory/{variable}: The query string parameters taken from a variable in the endpoint or other query string parameters

To test it right now, save the content of this file in a krakend-test.json and start the server:

{
  "version": 3,
  "port": 8080,
  "host": ["http://127.0.0.1:8080"],
  "debug_endpoint": true,
  "endpoints": [
    {
      "endpoint": "/default-behavior",
      "backend": [
        {
          "@comment": "IMPORTANT: Notice that the /__debug uses the KrakenD host itself",
          "host": ["http://127.0.0.1:8080"],
          "url_pattern": "/__debug/default"
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "endpoint": "/optional-params",
      "input_query_strings": [
          "a",
          "b"
        ],
      "input_headers": [
          "User-Agent",
          "Accept"
        ],
      "backend": [
        {
          "url_pattern": "/__debug/optional"
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "endpoint": "/mandatory/{variable}",
      "backend": [
        {
          "url_pattern": "/__debug/qs?mandatory={variable}"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

Start the server:

Run KrakenD with debug mode 
$krakend run -d -c krakend-test.json

Now we can test that the endpoints behave as expected:

Default behavior:

Ignore query strings by default 
$curl -i 'http://localhost:8080/default-behavior?a=1&b=2&c=3'

In the KrakenD log, we can see that a, b, and c do not appear in the backend call, neither its headers. The curl command automatically sends the Accept and User-Agent headers but they are not in the backend call either, instead we see the KrakenD User-Agent as set by the gateway:

DEBUG: Method: GET
DEBUG: URL: /__debug/default
DEBUG: Query: map[]
DEBUG: Params: [{param /default}]
DEBUG: Headers: map[User-Agent:[KrakenD Version 2.5.3] X-Forwarded-For:[::1] Accept-Encoding:[gzip]]
DEBUG: Body:
[GIN] 2018/11/27 - 22:32:44 | 200 |     118.543µs |             ::1 | GET      /__debug/default
[GIN] 2018/11/27 - 22:32:44 | 200 |     565.971µs |             ::1 | GET      /default-behavior?a=1&b=2&c=3

Now let’s repeat the same request but to the /optional-params endpoint:

Recognized and forwarded query strings 
$curl -i 'http://localhost:8080/optional-params?a=1&b=2&c=3'

In the KrakenD log we can see now that the User-Agent and Accept are present (as they are implicitly sent by curl), and that a and b are reaching the backend (but not c):

DEBUG: Method: GET
DEBUG: URL: /__debug/optional?a=1&b=2
DEBUG: Query: map[a:[1] b:[2]]
DEBUG: Params: [{param /optional}]
DEBUG: Headers: map[User-Agent:[curl/7.54.0] Accept:[*/*] X-Forwarded-For:[::1] Accept-Encoding:[gzip]]
DEBUG: Body:
[GIN] 2018/11/27 - 22:33:23 | 200 |     122.507µs |             ::1 | GET      /__debug/optional?a=1&b=2
[GIN] 2018/11/27 - 22:33:23 | 200 |     542.483µs |             ::1 | GET      /optional-params?a=1&b=2&c=3

Finally, let’s note what happens when you inject mandatory query strings in the backend definition, the /mandatory/{variable} endpoint:

Mandatory query strings 
$curl -i 'http://localhost:8080/mandatory/foo?a=1&b=2&c=3'

As we can see, the backend includes the ?mandatory=foo variable that was written manually in the backend definition:

DEBUG: Method: GET
DEBUG: URL: /__debug/qs?mandatory=foo
DEBUG: Query: map[mandatory:[foo]]
DEBUG: Params: [{param /qs}]
DEBUG: Headers: map[X-Forwarded-For:[::1] Accept-Encoding:[gzip] User-Agent:[KrakenD Version 0.7.0]]
DEBUG: Body:
[GIN] 2018/11/28 - 19:44:19 | 200 |     210.434µs |             ::1 | GET      /__debug/qs?mandatory=foo
[GIN] 2018/11/28 - 19:44:19 | 200 |    1.975103ms |             ::1 | GET      /mandatory/foo?a=1&b=2&c=3
Scarf

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