1. Introduction
Just like any other application, software, or operating system, you can start, stop, update, delete, and restart the Edge Application Instances for better compatibility, increased security, and availability of the latest features with different devices or applications enhanced features resulting in enhanced user experience.
Let's now see how to perform different operations on the Edge Application Instance(s).
2. Operations Using ZedUI
After you log in to ZedControl, you can perform the following operations from various options as mentioned:
Option A: Home View
You can use this option to view the 'Edge App Instances' list. After you log in to ZedControl, the home page shows a widget, 'Recommended Actions,' where you can click on the 'Update Edge App Instances' action.
Option B: Edge Application Instances List View
After you log in to ZedControl, click on the 'Edge App Instances' link on the left panel, which will take you to the Edge App Instances list view screen. The top panel shows (collapsed by default) dashboard summary widgets and the bottom panel shows a table of the list of the Edge Application Instances.
Note: You can perform the operations like Start, Stop, Update, Delete, and Restart on a single Edge Application or multiple Edge Applications.
- Step 1 > Click on the checkboxes of the Edge Applications list on which the required operation needs to be performed.
- Step 2 > Click on the More (
) icon on the top right corner.
Note: Once you click on the More () icon, you can see the dropdown with the following operations: (B.1) Start, (B.2) Stop, (B.3) Update, (B.4) Delete, and (B.5) Restart.
) icon, you can see the dropdown with the following operations: (B.1) Start, (B.2) Stop, (B.3) Update, (B.4) Delete, and (B.5) Restart.Let's go through the dropdown list operations:
B.1. Start
You can start/activate the Edge Application Instance using the following steps:
- Step 1 > From the dropdown, select 'Start'.
- Step 2 > A toast message announcing the Start request appears, as shown below:
Start request to 2 App Instances was successfully submitted.
Once the start request is processed, the 'Admin Status' of selected Edge Application Instance(s) will change to 'Active.'
B.2. Stop
You can stop the Edge Application Instance using the following steps:
- Step 1 > From the dropdown, select 'Stop'.
- Step 2 > Click the 'Confirm' button on the modal dialogue, which appears as below:
You are about to deactivate 2 Edge App Instance(s). Edge App Instance(s) will stop and cannot be accessed till restarted.
Edge App Instance(s) will show up once activated again.
- Step 3 > When you click on the 'Confirm' button, a toast message appears as shown below:
Stop request to 2 App instances was successfully submitted.
Once the stop request is processed, the 'Admin Status' of selected Edge Application Instance(s) will change to 'Inactive.'
B.3. Update
You can update the Edge Application Instance using the following steps:
- Step 1 > From the dropdown, select 'Update'.
Note: A job will be created to track the activity for the 'Update' operation performed on multiple Edge Application Instances.
- Step 2 > Edit the default Job Name (if required) to track the modal dialogue activity, which appears below.
Updating the following 1 Edge App Instance(s) across 1 Projects will cause loss of availability.
Target Edge App details: goodapp1 : 32
- Step 3 > Click 'Update' button.
- Step 4 > When you click on the 'Update' button, a toast message announcing the successful submission of the Edge App Instance update appears as below:
Update request for requested Edge App instance(s) was successfully submitted.
- Step 5 > A job (
) indicator will appear on the left navigation, indicating that the requested job has been started.
- Step 6 > Click on the Jobs (
) icon on the left navigation to go to the list of jobs. The update of multiple Edge Application Instances triggers a 'Job,' which can be tracked in the 'Jobs' () section.
- Step 7 > The triggered job appears on top of the list. Click on the job name to see the details.
- Step 8 > Job details appear in the panel.
Once the job is completed, the selected Edge Application Instance(s) are updated accordingly.
B.4. Delete
If you no longer require the application instance, you could use the delete it using the following steps:
- Step 1 > From the dropdown, select 'Delete'.
- Step 2 > Click the 'Confirm' button on the modal dialogue, which appears as below:
You are about to delete 2 Edge App Instance(s). Deleting Edge App Instance(s) will cause loss of the application data on edge node as well as ZedControl.
Deleted Edge App Instance(s) cannot be restored again from ZedControl.
- Step 3 > When you click on the 'Confirm' button, a toast message announcing the successful submission of the delete request of the Edge App Instance appears.
Delete request to 2 App instances was successfully submitted.
Once the toast message appears, the Edge Application Instance(s) will be deleted from the Edge Application Instances list view.
B.5. Restart
This operation is required when the application instance is stuck in one state and needs a restart. You can restart the Edge Application Instance using the following steps:
- Step 1 > From the dropdown, select 'Restart'.
- Step 2 > Click the 'Confirm' button on the modal dialogue, which appears as below:
You are about to restart 1 Edge App Instance(s). Please confirm to proceed with the action.
- Step 3 > When you click on the 'Confirm' button, a toast message announcing the successful submission of the restart request of the Edge App Instance appears.
Restart request to 2 App instances was successfully submitted.
Once the toast message appears, the Edge Application Instance(s) will be restarted and can be seen in the Edge Application Instances list view.
Option C: Edge Application Instances Detail View
To go to the Edge App Instances Detail view, click on the 'Edge App Instances' link on the left panel, which will take you to the Edge App Instances list view screen. Click on one of the Edge App Instances to take you to the Edge App Instances Detail view of that Edge Application Instance.
Note: Apart from the 'Remote Console' and 'Restart & Purge' operations, the remaining operations mentioned in the list view of Edge Application Instances (except 'Update' operation) are the same for the detailed view as well.
C.1. Remote Console
You can go ahead with this operation to manage your Edge Application Instance in command line mode. The remote console is web-based console access to the application instance and is accessible only when VNC access is enabled. Edge Node, along with the Edge Application Instance, is online.
- Step 1 > Click on the More () icon on the top right corner.
Note: The More () icon appears with the dropdown and the same operations on all the following tabs like Status, Basic Info, Adapters, Events, and Logs.
) icon appears with the dropdown and the same operations on all the following tabs like Status, Basic Info, Adapters, Events, and Logs.- Step 2 > From the dropdown, select 'Remote Console'.
Attention: The 'Attention' message appears if the application instance runs the older version of the actual application. Click update to proceed.
- Step 3 > Once you click on the 'Remote Console,' you will be navigated to another browser tab, where you will see a message as shown below:
Please wait while we setup the remote session. It may take up to 90 seconds to establish a connection.
- Step 4 > Click on the Clear session references if you opt to come out of the remote console session, which is started in step 2. Else continue with step 5.
- Step 5 > You will now land on the 'Remote Console' window of that particular Edge Application Instance. You can continue using the command line for any further actions to be carried out.
- Step 6 > Shows the details of the active Remote Console session.
Warning Messages for Remote Console Operation:
Warning 1:
There can be only one active remote console session at any given point in time. If you try to open another remote console session for the same Edge Application Instance, an appropriate toast message appears, as shown below.
Warning 2:
The Run state of this Edge Application Instance is not online. Hence the appropriate toast message appears, as shown below.
Warning 3:
The remote console operation will show the below toast message if the Edge Node is not online, on which this application instance is running.
C.2. Restart & Purge
Whenever you want to start afresh in the same instance, go back to the initial state. You can restart and purge the Edge Application Instance using the following steps:
- Step 1 > Click on the More () icon on the top right corner.
- Step 2 > From the dropdown, select 'Restart & Purge'.
- Step 3 > Click the 'Confirm' button on the modal dialogue, which appears as below:
Restarting 1 Edge App Instance(s) along with Purge will result into loss of app data.
- Step 4 > When you click on the 'Confirm' button, a toast message appears as shown below:
Restart & Purge request to Instance vsrx-3.0 was successfully submitted.
Following these steps will get your Edge Application Instance back to its initial state. Once the restart and purge request is processed, the 'Admin Status' of selected Edge Application Instance(s) will change to 'Active.'
C.3. Edit
Once your Edge Application Instance is running on the respective Edge Node, you can go ahead and edit a couple of fields in the 'Basic Info' tab. You can see the edits as mentioned in the following steps:
- Step 1 > Click on the 'Basic Info' tab from the tertiary navigation.
- Step 2 > Click on the Edit (
) icon.
- Step 3 > Editable fields will appear as explained in the table below. Edit the field(s) accordingly.
- Step 4 > Click on 'Submit' button.
| Editable Field Name | Description |
| Title(*) | User-defined and can be changed. |
| Description | The detailed explanation of what the Edge App Instance is all about, its purpose, etc. |
| Access Logs | Check the checkbox if you want to access the logs from the 'Logs' tab. |
- Step 5 > When you click on the 'Submit' button, a toast message, announcing the successful submission of the Edge App Instance, appears below:
Edge App Instance: oxy-usb-b has been updated.
3. Operations Using zCLI
3.1. Start
You can start/activate the Edge Application Instance using the following command:
zcli> zcli edge-app-instance start <name>
3.2. Stop
You can stop/deactivate the Edge Application Instance using the following command:
zcli> zcli edge-app-instance stop <name>
3.3. Update
You can update the Edge Application Instance using the following command:
zcli> zcli edge-app-instance update <name> [--edge-app=<edge-app-name>] [--edge-node=<edge-node>] [--title=<title>] [--network-instance=<network-instance>...] [(--adapter-name=<name> --adapter-type=<type>)...]
Options:
- --edge-app=<edge-app-name>—(mandatory)Name of the Edge App
- --edge-node=<edge-node>—(mandatory)Name of the Edge Node
- --title=<title>—App instance title
- --network=<network>... | --network-instance=<network-instance>...—Depending on the type of app instance created, you may have to give the following details. You can attach a network instance to your app as below:
- --network=environment name:network name:IP Address
- --network-instance=environment name:network instance name:IP Address
- --adapter-name=<name> --adapter-type=<type>...—Depending on the type of app instance created, you may have to give the following details.
- --adapter-name=environment name:adaptor name
- --adapter-type=This depends on the adapter name specified in the adapter-name option.
The following table shows the details:
| # | Adapter name | Adapter type |
| 1 | Eth or ethernet | 1 |
| 2 | USB | 2 |
| 3 | COM | 3 |
| 4 | Audio | 4 |
| 5 | WLAN | 5 |
| 6 | WWAN | 6 |
| 7 | HDMI | 7 |
| 8 | Other | 255 |
3.4. Delete
You can delete the Edge Application Instance using the following command:
zcli> zcli edge-app-instance delete <name> [-f]
Note: -f is to forcefully make the delete request to the ZedControl, without prompting the user.
3.5. Restart
You can restart the Edge Application Instance using the following command:
zcli> zcli edge-app-instance restart <name>
3.6. Refresh
You can refresh the Edge Application Instance using the following command:
zcli> zcli edge-app-instance refresh <name> [--purge]