F5 Application Services Templates

F5 Application Services Templates (FAST) are an easy and effective way to deploy applications on the BIG-IP system using AS3.

The FAST Extension provides a toolset for templating and managing AS3 Applications on BIG-IP.

Documentation

For more information about FAST, including installation and usage information, see the FAST Documentation

Filing Issues and Getting Help

If you come across a bug or other issue, please use GitHub Issues to submit an issue for our team. You can also see current known issues on that page.

Installing the RPM

Prerequisites

• BIG-IP, TMOS v13.1 or later.
• AS3 version 3.16 or later must be installed (see the AS3 Documentation for details on installing AS3).

Installing the FAST Extension

1. Download the FAST extension RPM the GitHub Release Assets.

2. From the BIG-IP system, install the extension by navigating to iApps > Package Management LX. Click Import and then select the RPM you downloaded.

   • If you are using a BIG-IP version prior to 14.0, before you can use the Configuration utility, you must enable the framework using the BIG-IP command line. From the CLI, type the following command: touch /var/config/rest/iapps/enable. You only need to run this command once (per BIG-IP system). This is not necessary with 14.0 and later.

   Once the package is imported, you should see f5-appsvcs-templates in the list of installed extensions.

3. Click iApps > Application Services > Applications LX.

4. Click F5 Application Services Templates to start using FAST.

Development

Various script used during development are accessed through npm:

• To check for lint errors run npm run lint
• To run unit tests use npm test

Both of these are also run as part of the CI pipeline for this project.

Building

rpmbuild is required to build the RPM. All other dependencies are handled by NPM (make sure to do an npm install before trying to build).

To build everything (recommended), run:

npm run build

To build just the GUI layer, run:

npm run buildgui

To build just the RPM package, run:

npm run buildrpm

The built RPM package and associated sha256 hash will be placed in the dist directory. The package can be installed on a BIG-IP using the usual mechanisms for installing iApp LX packages. There is also an install-rpm script provided in scripts that installs the latest RPM found in dist to a target BIG-IP via the REST API.

Logging

All log messages should contain the worker name (FAST Worker) for easier filtering.

The following logging levels are used (from low priority to high):

• fine - lower priority informational messages
• info - higher priority informational messages
• error - recoverable error (e.g., bad requests)
• severe - unrecoverable error

A finest is also available, but already gets spammed with a lot of socket information, which makes it a common log level to disable.

All requests and responses are logged at a fine log level by default. Any response that contains an error status code (>=400) will default to an error.

License

Apache License 2.0

Copyright

Copyright 2014-2020 F5 Networks Inc.

F5 Networks Contributor License Agreement

Before you start contributing to any project sponsored by F5 Networks, Inc. (F5) on GitHub, you will need to sign a Contributor License Agreement (CLA).

If you are signing as an individual, we recommend that you talk to your employer (if applicable) before signing the CLA since some employment agreements may have restrictions on your contributions to other projects. Otherwise by submitting a CLA you represent that you are legally entitled to grant the licenses recited therein.

If your employer has rights to intellectual property that you create, such as your contributions, you represent that you have received permission to make contributions on behalf of that employer, that your employer has waived such rights for your contributions, or that your employer has executed a separate CLA with F5.

If you are signing on behalf of a company, you represent that you are legally entitled to grant the license recited therein. You represent further that each employee of the entity that submits contributions is authorized to submit such contributions on behalf of the entity pursuant to the CLA.