Remote Workers

🌐 Remote Workers

Remote workers distribute monitoring across multiple locations or networks.

⚠️ Note: Remote workers are not available in demo mode. You must run all services independently.

🏗️ Architecture Overview

Main Uptimer components:

Server

• 🌐 UI - Web interface for configuration and monitoring
• 🔌 gRPC - Communication endpoint for workers (must be accessible from worker locations)
• ⚙️ API - REST API for external integrations and data access
• 📊 Availabilities - Background job to process results from workers

Worker Services

• 🤖 Remote Workers - Distributed monitoring agents that perform checks

🚀 Quick Setup

This example shows a basic Docker Compose setup for remote workers. For production deployments, see the Production Configuration guide.

1. Prepare Your Environment

# Clone the documentation repository
git clone https://github.com/myuptime-info/uptimer-docs.git
cd uptimer-docs/examples/multiple-worker-local

2. Initialize Services

# Initialize server data
docker compose run uptimer-ui server init

# Initialize worker1 (copy the output for later use)
docker compose run worker1 worker init
# Files created: data/worker1/worker.pem, data/worker1/worker.uid

# Initialize worker2 (copy the output for later use)  
docker compose run worker2 worker init
# Files created: data/worker2/worker.pem, data/worker2/worker.uid

# Start all services
docker compose up

3. Configure Workers in UI

1. Open http://127.0.0.1:2517 in your browser

2. Navigate to Server → Workers in the sidebar

3. Click Add Worker and fill in:

   • UID: Value from docker compose run worker1 worker init output
   • Name: Descriptive name (e.g., “Worker 1”)
   • Public Key: Full public key from the init command output

4. Repeat for the second worker

4. Create a Check

1. Create a new check in the UI
2. Select multiple workers from the Regions menu
3. Set your desired interval
4. Save the check

Results will now come from all selected workers! 🎉

📋 Docker Compose Configuration

Here’s the complete docker-compose.yml for a multi-worker setup:

services:
  uptimer-ui:  # service website
    image: myuptime/uptimer
    command: ["server", "--services", "ui"]
    ports:
      - "2517:2517"
    volumes:
      - ./data/server:/data
  uptimer-grpc:  # grpc server
    image: myuptime/uptimer
    command: ["server", "--services", "grpc"]
    environment:
      UPTIMER__GRPC__PORT: 2518
    ports:
      - "2518:2518"
    volumes:
      - ./data/server:/data
  uptimer-jobs:  # background jobs
    image: myuptime/uptimer
    command: ["server", "--services", "availabilities"]
    volumes:
      - ./data/server:/data

  worker1:  # worker1
    image: myuptime/uptimer
    volumes:
      - ./data/worker1:/data
    environment:
      UPTIMER__WORKER__GRPC_SERVER: uptimer-grpc:2518
      UPTIMER__WORKER__GRPC_USE_TLS: false
    command: worker
    depends_on:
      - uptimer-grpc

  worker2:  # worker2
    image: myuptime/uptimer
    volumes:
      - ./data/worker2:/data
    environment:
      UPTIMER__WORKER__GRPC_SERVER: uptimer-grpc:2518
      UPTIMER__WORKER__GRPC_USE_TLS: false
    command: worker
    depends_on:
      - uptimer-grpc

🔒 Production SSL Configuration

SSL Termination with Load Balancer

If you’re using an API gateway or load balancer with SSL termination:

1. Configure workers to use SSL:

   environment:
     UPTIMER__WORKER__GRPC_USE_TLS: true  # Enable TLS
   

2. Set up nginx reverse proxy for SSL termination:

   • See our nginx configuration example for reference
   • Configure routes to forward gRPC traffic to the gRPC server
   • Ensure proper SSL certificate configuration

Direct SSL Configuration

For direct SSL without termination:

• Configure SSL certificates on the gRPC server
• Set UPTIMER__WORKER__GRPC_USE_TLS: true on all workers
• Ensure proper certificate validation

⚠️ Security Note: Never use GRPC_USE_TLS: false in production environments.

🔧 Troubleshooting

Common Issues

Debug Commands

# Check worker logs
docker compose logs worker1

# Verify gRPC server is accessible
telnet your-grpc-server 2518

# Test worker connectivity
docker compose exec worker1 ping uptimer-grpc

➡️ Next Steps

• Production Configuration - Learn about production deployment patterns
• Authentication Setup - Secure your installation
• Storage Configuration - Configure persistent data storage

For advanced deployment patterns, check out our Docker Swarm examples in the production configuration guide.