SSH Error while trying to push static pages

[vardumper]

I am trying to push static pages (vitepress) from a Gitlab CI/CD pipeline to a projects app, that is created during job execution.

Uploading app installation
✅ getting connection data. done
✅ check if rsync is installed. done
❌ uploading app installation. error
Host key verification failed.
rsync: connection unexpectedly closed (0 bytes received so far)
[sender]
rsync error: unexplained error (code 255) at io.c(232)
[sender=3.2.7]
An error occurred during this operation:
Error: rsync exited with code 255

After seeing this error the first time, I checked to see if I had a SSH key present. There was none, so I added a pub key to my profile in mStudio, and the private key as a project variable to my Gitlab Project, then have it passed it to the job, which writes it to a temp file, sets permissions and then passes the --ssh-identity-file parameter.

The complete command looks something like this. Project is set via context, token via login commands in prior steps.

yarn --silent mw app upload "$APP_SHORTID" --source "$VITEPRESS_DIST_PATH" --ssh-identity-file /tmp/mittwald_ssh_key --ssh-user "erik.poehler@****.de@*******" 2>/dev/null

I did ssh into the app, to look around and check if I find something. All I noticed is that I do not recognize the ssh key in the .ssh/some-internal-authorized-keys file. Is the ssh key only added when the app is created?
What am I missing?

[vardumper]

Sorry for adding another question here, but I am also wondering how I can access my static app?
The project has a URL of https://p-b5yru1.project.space/ and the app says it has an installation path of /html/m****e-i***a-z8slj, so I would assume, that at https://p-b5yru1.project.space/html/m****e-i***a-z8slj I would find at least the dummy index.html that was placed in there during app creation.

[LukasFritzeDev]

how I can access my static app?

By default the project domain has no target. If you want the app to be available by this domain, you need to set the domain target to the app. You can do this in the mStudio.

If the domain has the app set as target, the app can be reached without a sub-path. The root directory is set to the app root dir. Currently there is no CLI command to do this.

[LukasFritzeDev]

To the error:

Host key verification failed.

The host key is like the fingerprint of the server. It is not connected to your user, so the identity file will not make a difference. Usually on first connect this key is stored in ~/.ssh/known_hosts. It should look something like:

ssh.fiestel.project.host ssh-rsa AAAAB3NzaC1yc2EAAAADAQABAAABAQCmLLYqOR4nTxPpUbayAdhf8BxcbjCdzllS4ERhAOb8tmvm29dKrI9RAoFBwHYZL6fh/GnO3lIXpJI0hPtFifsi7WfdtPxK2rk/D8Ijgp19fqhuVQPnDp8WDbPU6dW7xqlWHsPXLIBdfLvPdgkuyC2FBUYG705P6n048DyC8RTJOA57LZ79W5MiaEfxxSqns1l5amhky1qEUmiuW20Y/QJ3aKxliz+Gw6jdSKfM66mAH/3+JhRyB4oGSPoR3IFTjiba6PLhUYzCj1J9lyGxrNAe8vlJeu/wxFjjCqAC0BIyWE4wuxZdjeCjgCKOFIQAuB3ECFg7Qda5tGLPgG58Ni31

I’d recommend to pre-populate the known_hosts file before running the upload command:

ssh-keyscan -H [host] >> ~/.ssh/known_hosts
# for example
ssh-keyscan -H ssh.fiestel.project.host >> ~/.ssh/known_hosts

This way the upload command already knows the host.

[vardumper]

Thanks for the tips. I'll test that later. I guess this is all due to my misunderstanding of what I actually needed. I thought, I was able to deploy multiple "static" apps to a project. and then be able to have a URL per app (preferably with at least HTTP Basic Auth).

you need to set the domain target to the app
Ok, I just did that. So it's one docroot per project, right? Which makes sense.

Let's say I want to end up with a structure like this:

p-b5yru1.project.space/client1/storybook-main
p-b5yru1.project.space/client1/storybook-develop
p-b5yru1.project.space/client1/storybook-great-new-feature
p-b5yru1.project.space/client1/docusaurus-main
p-b5yru1.project.space/client2/vitepress-main
p-b5yru1.project.space/client2/vitepress-develop
...

I guess I don't need the apps at all and just ssh/scp my static build to a projects docroot. Unless you give me a different advice. Appreciated.

[martin-helmich]

Hey all.

This is getting a bit off-topic, since we're now getting a bit away from the initial SSH connection error, and more into the general way our hosting platform works. I recognize that these are definitely things that we can explain better, but I would suggest opening separate issues for those, for example in mittwald/developer-portal (which contains the relevant documentation).

Anyway, clearing up a few things that I've read while skimming this issue (in no particular order):

1. Regarding that initial error, checking if the SSH host key is already known in your system, would also be the first thing I would check. If you're on a transient CI environment, this will most likely not be the case. In that case, referring to SSH Error while trying to push static pages #1260 (comment), you can either scan the SSH host key directly before deploying (less secure, more convenient), or make the SSH host key known to your CI job (for example, using an environment variable) ahead-of-time (more secure, less convenient).

   Maybe we can extend the mw commands that do things via SSH to check for a missing host key ahead-of-time so that either the error message becomes more clear, or even retrieve the host key by ourselves...? 🤔

2. I thought, I was able to deploy multiple "static" apps to a project.

   You can; this would also be my recommended way of deploying multiple sites into the same project, since you can then directly connect different domains to those different apps.

3. All I noticed is that I do not recognize the ssh key in the .ssh/some-internal-authorized-keys file.

   Your SSH keys are added via the mStudio (either UI or directly via the API), and authentication is handled by a separate SSH gateway. Your personal SSH keys will not be mirrored into the project file system itself.