OpenFlare/docs/en/design/index.md

Product Boundary

You will learn: What OpenFlare is, what problems it solves, who the target users are, what the current stable capabilities are, and which design boundaries cannot be bypassed during implementation.

OpenFlare is a self-hosted OpenResty control plane oriented toward single-team or single-organization internal operation and maintenance (O&M) scenarios. It resolves the issues of scattered management in reverse proxy configuration, node synchronization, certificate hosting, configuration release/rollback, and basic observability.

Project Positioning

OpenFlare is suitable for teams that need to centrally manage multiple OpenResty proxy nodes:

• Want to maintain reverse proxy site configurations using a management console.
• Want every configuration change to have a complete version, preview, activation, and rollback.
• Want nodes to actively sync configuration, rather than having the control plane SSH into nodes to execute commands.
• Want to manage TLS certificates, domain assets, node statuses, and basic access analytics within the same system.

OpenFlare is currently not positioned as a general-purpose log platform, service mesh, Kubernetes Ingress Controller, or multi-tenant cloud platform.

Target Users

User	Needs
Self-hosted users	Quickly deploy a visual OpenResty control plane
Internal O&M teams	Manage multiple reverse proxy nodes, certificates, and configuration versions
Development teams	Provide a unified entry point and basic access analytics for internal services
Contributors	Fix defects, strengthen tests, and improve documentation within clear boundaries

Current Stable Capabilities

Capability	Description
Reverse Proxy Rule Management	Uses site configuration as the aggregation boundary, supporting multi-domain and origin configuration
Site-level Configuration	One rule corresponds to one site, which can bind one or more domains and share site-level configuration
Origin Management	Maintains a lightweight origin directory and allows sites to save renderable origin snapshots
Configuration Versioning	Supports preview, publishing, activation, immutable history, and rollback
Agent Synchronization	Supports registration, heartbeat, synchronization, application result reporting, and self-updating
OpenResty Hosting	Manages main configuration templates, performance parameters, cache parameters, and Lua resources
HTTPS/TLS	Hosts certificates and domain assets, and binds certificates on a per-domain basis
WAF	Maintains IP/IP ranges black/whitelists and country-level geographical black/whitelists with global and website-customized rule groups
Basic Observability	Aggregates node requests, resource snapshots, health events, and access analytics
Node Management	Node status, token systems, deployment, and update links
Console Frontend	Next.js-based official management console
Auth Source Login	Supports configuring GitHub and standard OIDC login entries as authentication sources, allowing third-party accounts to bind to existing local users

Default working method:

• All nodes consume the same globally activated version.
• The Server saves configuration and status, and does not directly manage nodes via SSH.
• The Agent is the only controlled landing entry point on the node side.

Typical Use Cases

Scenario	Description
Unified Entry for Internal Services	Expose multiple internal HTTP services through a unified domain and certificate
Config Sync for Multi-node Reverse Proxy	Multiple OpenResty nodes consume the same activated configuration
Config Change Review	View preview or diff before publishing, and retain immutable history after publishing
Quick Rollback	Reactivate an older version, letting the Agent pull and apply it
Certificate Hosting	Bind TLS certificates for different domains
Basic Observability	View node status, request aggregation, access analytics, and health events

Core Objects

Currently active entities:

• proxy_routes
• origins
• config_versions
• nodes
• auth_sources
• external_accounts
• node_system_profiles
• apply_logs
• tls_certificates
• managed_domains
• node_request_reports
• node_access_logs
• node_metric_snapshots
• traffic_analytics_rollups
• node_health_events
• waf_rule_groups
• waf_rule_group_bindings

Site Configuration Constraints

proxy_routes is upgraded from a "single-domain rule" to a "site configuration" aggregate object. One record corresponds to one website, which can bind one or more domains and share a set of site-level configurations.

Constraints:

• proxy_routes.site_name is the unique business identifier of the website.
• proxy_routes.domains contains at least one domain, and domains[0] is used as the primary domain.
• Any domain can globally belong to only one proxy_routes.
• During the migration period, proxy_routes.domain can be kept as a mirror field of domains[0], but business read/write and subsequent extensions must be based on site_name + domains.
• Site-level rate limits, reverse proxies, and cache configurations are currently shared by site and are not configured differently on a per-domain basis within the same website.
• HTTPS allows binding certificates per domain within the same site.

Origin Constraints

origins only saves the origin address, display name, and remarks, and does not carry protocols, ports, paths, weights, or health check policies.

proxy_routes can optionally associate an origins record to reuse the origin address; the rule still saves a complete origin_url snapshot to participate in rendering and version snapshots.

Upstream constraints:

• proxy_routes must contain at least one upstream address.
• To maintain compatibility with historical data, the origin_url main upstream field is retained, and multiple upstreams are allowed to be added within the same rule for load balancing.
• Upstreams are rendered uniformly as a named upstream with keepalive.
• A single upstream can carry a base path or query and append it in proxy_pass.
• Multiple upstreams are restricted to pure scheme://host[:port].
• proxy_routes.origin_host is an optional field, used to override the Host request header when back-origin.
• All upstream addresses must be legal http:// or https://.

HTTPS Constraints

proxy_routes.domain_cert_ids is used to record domain-certificate bindings parallel to domains; a value of 0 indicates that HTTPS is not enabled for the domain, retaining only HTTP.

During publishing rendering:

• Domains with certificates are output as separate 443 ssl server blocks grouped by certificate.
• Domains not bound to a certificate must not be automatically brought into HTTPS.
• All domains in proxy_routes.domains must be included in the same site configuration to avoid the same site being split in version snapshots.

WAF Constraints

WAF uses rule groups as configuration boundaries. The system fixes a global rule group, which is applied to all websites by default; websites can overlay multiple custom rule groups.

Phase 1 supports:

• IP / IP range whitelists and blacklists.
• Country-level region whitelists and blacklists.
• Rule group-level blocking status codes and response pages, defaulting to 418 and an empty page.

Evaluation order:

• Whitelists are bypass exceptions; if any enabled rule group matches a whitelist, the request is allowed.
• If no whitelist is matched, blacklists continue to be evaluated.
• When multiple blacklists match, the global rule group takes precedence, followed by custom rule groups in ascending order of their IDs.

Region recognition is based on the MaxMind mmdb maintained locally on the node by the Agent, and the OpenResty Lua reads the local database during the request path. When GeoIP dependencies are unavailable, region rules must be skipped, without affecting IP rules and the reverse proxy main link.

Authentication Source Constraints

auth_sources is the configuration object for third-party login entries on the management console, currently supporting only two types: github and oidc. Enabled authentication sources will be displayed on the login page.

external_accounts saves the binding relationship between external accounts of authentication sources and local users. When a third-party account logs in for the first time:

• If it is bound to a local user, it logs in directly.
• If there is an existing local login session, it binds to the current user.
• If it is not bound and registration is allowed, a normal user is automatically created and bound.
• If it is not bound and registration is closed, the user is only allowed to enter an existing local account and password to complete the binding.

The old users.github_id only serves as a source for upgrade migration; new third-party account login and binding relationships must be based on external_accounts.

Version and Observability Constraints

• config_versions must save complete snapshots, rendering results, and checksum.
• There can only be one activated version globally at a time.
• Rollback is achieved by reactivating older versions.
• nodes only carries control plane status and low-frequency summaries, not high-frequency observability facts.
• Metrics, trends, and access analytics prioritize server-side aggregation results, rather than temporary frontend statistics.
• Access details are only retained for controlled time windows, not evolving into a general-purpose log platform.

Documentation Maintenance Principles

• Update this document when the product scope or system boundary changes.
• Update System Architecture when the system structure or module responsibilities change.
• Update Release Model when the release, synchronization, or rollback model changes.
• Update Development Constraints when development constraints, code specifications, or interface conventions change.
• Update Deployment Guide and README when deployment methods change.
• Update Configuration Reference when configuration items change.
• Completed phases will no longer be backfilled in the form of "version plans".
• Before starting a new phase, complete the design first, then enter implementation.