bubble-flexrouter/README-release.md

Bubble Flex Router

bubble-flexrouter provides HTTP/HTTPS proxy services for Bubble.

Some websites and apps refuse to respond to requests originating from a cloud IP address. Thus, when a user is connected to their Bubble, some sites and apps will not work.

With flex routing, Bubble can route these requests through a device connected to the Bubble that is running bubble-flexrouter. Now, from the perspective of the website or app, these requests will originate from a “clean” IP, and so a valid response will be sent.

Note that using flex routing does remove some privacy protection - sites and apps that are flex-routed will see one of your device’s real IP addresses.

Required software

To use the flex_init.sh and flex_register.sh tools, you’ll need to have some software installed:

• bash
• curl
• jq
• htpassword

On Windows, use Cygwin to install these. htpasswd is not available from Cygwin. See below for a workaround.

Overview

In order to use bubble-flexrouter, you must:

• Initialize the flex router
• Connect to your Bubble
• Run bubble-flexrouter
• Register the flex router with your Bubble

We’ll walk through each of these steps next.

Initialize the flex router

This step only needs to be done once. After that, bubble-flexrouter will re-use the initialization settings.

On Mac OS and Linux, start by opening a Terminal window.

If you’re using Windows, start by opening a Cygwin bash shell. That’s what you’ll use to run these commands.

If you have htpasswd installed

To initialize your bubble-flexrouter, run the init script:

flex_init.sh

You will be prompted to enter a master password for the flex router. Remember this password.

You can also set this password using an environment variable

export BUBBLE_FR_PASS=some-plaintext-password
flex_init.sh

The above command will read the password from the BUBBLE_FR_PASS environment variable and will not prompt for a password.

If you don’t have htpasswd installed

If you don’t have htpasswd on your system, then you will need to manually bcrypt the password. You can do this online at https://bcrypt-generator.com/ -- ensure that “Rounds” is set to 12.

Then set the BUBBLE_FR_PASS environment variable to the bcrypted password and run flex_init.sh with the --bcrypt flag:

export BUBBLE_FR_PASS=some-bcrypted-password
flex_init.sh --bcrypt

Connect to your Bubble

Start the Bubble app and login. On Linux, run wg-quick up wg0 to connect.

Running Flex Router

You’ll need to run bubble-flexrouter as root (on Linux/MacOS) or Administrator (on Windows).

Set Environment

Set environment variables required to run the flex router.

These defaults should work, where ${HOME} is the home directory of the user who ran flex_init.sh:

export BUBBLE_FR_SSH_KEY=${HOME}/.ssh/flex
export BUBBLE_FR_PASS=${HOME}/.bfr_pass
export BUBBLE_FR_TOKEN=${HOME}/.bfr_token

On Windows, if you are using the standard Windows cmd program, replace export with set and ${HOME} with C:\cygwin64\home\<username> where <username> is the name of the user who ran flex_init.sh

Run the router

Now that you have your environment variable set, you can run the router.

On Linux and Mac OS:

sudo bubble-flexrouter

On Windows, use runas to run bubble-flexrouter as Administrator:

runas /user:domainname\username bubble-flexrouter

To see all available options:

bubble-flexrouter --help

Register the flex router with your Bubble

This step can be done as a regular user (non-root, non-Administrator).

Register the router

Run:

flex_register.sh your-bubble-hostname.example.com

Where your-bubble-hostname.example.com is the hostname of your Bubble.

If you’re not sure what the hostname is, click on “My Bubble” in the Bubble App and copy the hostname from your browser’s location bar.

On Linux, the hostname is not easily accessible, but you can use the IP address of your Bubble just the same. To get the IP address of your Bubble on Linux, run:

cat /etc/wireguard/wg0.conf | grep Endpoint | awk -F':' '{print $1}' | awk '{print $NF}'

Using Environment Variable to Register

When you run flex_register.sh, you’ll be prompted for your flex router password, your Bubble account email, and your Bubble account password.

If you don’t want to enter these every time, you can set environment variables instead.

Set the BUBBLE_FR_PASS environment variable to the actual plaintext password for your flex router. This is what you used when running flex_init.sh to set up the router.

Set the BUBBLE_USER and BUBBLE_PASS environment variables to your Bubble account email and password.

For example:

export BUBBLE_FR_PASS=the-password-you-used-when-running-flex_init.sh
export BUBBLE_USER=your-bubble-email@example.com
export BUBBLE_PASS=your-bubble-password

On Windows, replace export with set if you are using the standard Windows cmd program.

Running the router

You can sit back and let the router do its work. It will periodically check to make sure that its secure tunnel to the Bubble is OK. If it finds and problems, it will re-establish the tunnel.

On the other side, your Bubble will be monitoring the router to ensure it is available and properly functioning.

Re-register every time your start bubble-flexrouter

Every time you start the bubble-flexrouter, you need to register it with your Bubble using flex_register.sh

If you start bubble-flexrouter and never run flex_register.sh, then your Bubble will not know the router is available and it will not be used for flex routing.