edX forum mongodb authentication

Tutor
#1

In tutor v10.2.2, forum is built with
ENV MONGOID_AUTH_MECH “”
Does that mean no authentication is needed for forum to connect to mongodb?

In my environment, forum cannot connect to mongodb as my mongodb needs authentication.
Is there a way to set MONGOID_AUTH_MECH through configration?

#2

I haven’t looked into this, but you might try:
Check the value:
tutor config printvalue MONGOID_AUTH_MECH ?

Configure the value:
tutor config save --set MONGOID_AUTH_MECH="yourvalue"

#3

I’m not quite familiar with mongodb authentication mechanisms, but this value was set there to avoid a crash when it is undefined. This variable describes just the authentication mechanism, not the credentials. The latter are defined by the MONGODB_USERNAME and MONGODB_PASSWORD Tutor settings.

#4

sorry to refer that I am running on k8s.
Seems that MONGOID_AUTH_MECH is not passed as env in deployments.yaml.

#5

@regis yes, username and password can be passed in.
I am running on k8s and using a mongdb service, and in previsous tutor version, forum can connect to mongodb. With v10.2.2 built image, mongodb cannot be connected util I set
MONGOID_AUTH_MECH env to “:scram” in deployments.yml.

#6

Interesting. I suggest you pass the MONGOID_AUTH_MECH environment variable to the forum container. You can do this by defining a custom docker-compose.override.yml file:

$ cat "$(tutor config printroot)/env/local/docker-compose.override.yml"
version: "3.7"
services:
  forum:
    environment:
      - "MONGOID_AUTH_MECH=:scram"