APP-8173: Make local testing for viam apps easier #5036

jr22 · 2025-06-05T19:19:38Z

APP-8173

Work done

Created a new CLI command for testing viam apps locally viam module local-app-testing
Running this command opens a go server that has a page where you can enter in api key info, hostname and the local address for your app.
Once youve entered this info, it redirects you to your local app so you can make sure everythings working properly

Things this doesnt do

It wont catch issues with proxying (like having the base set in your vite config) I think thats fine if that is something we only catch when you deply

Ask for reviewers

Can you please manually test with a viam app that you have? Will require the following steps:

pull this branch
run your application locally
build the CLI: go build -o ~/go/bin/viam cli/viam/main.go
run the new command: go run cli/viam/main.go module local-app-testing
enter in machine info in the browser window that is opened
ensure you can locally test your app!

jr22 · 2025-06-05T19:21:46Z

cli/local_viam_apps_setup.go

@@ -0,0 +1,82 @@
+package cli


a lot of this file is autogenerated by cursor so keep 👀 for stupid stuff

jr22 · 2025-06-05T19:22:13Z

cli/local_viam_apps_test.html

@@ -0,0 +1,470 @@
+<!DOCTYPE html>


same here. lots of vibe coding

jr22 · 2025-06-05T19:22:52Z

cli/local_viam_apps_test.html

+                const hostnameString = document.getElementById('hostname').value;
+                const machineCookie = JSON.stringify({id: apiKeyId, key: apiKey, hostname: hostnameString});
+                const machineIdCookie = `${machineIdString}=${machineCookie}; path=/; domain=localhost; SameSite=Lax`;
+                const currentMachineCookie = `currentMachine=${machineIdString}; path=/; domain=localhost; SameSite=Lax`;


NOTE FOR MANUAL TESTING: this assumes your local application is using the currentMachine cookie for testing. might have to update your application to pull that instead of the machine id from the URL

jr22 · 2025-06-09T13:29:34Z

@bashar-515 this is ready for manual testing! will move it out of "draft" mode once youve confirmed with manually testing an app of yours that this works as expected

bashar-515

So does this mean that in development I should NOT look to the path to retrieve either the hostname or machine ID but then in prod I should? Is there any way we can avoid making the developer have distinct code for different environments?

jr22 · 2025-06-20T18:12:17Z

@bashar-515 thanks for the feedback! something was wrong in my localapp that was causing this to work before when it shouldn't have. try again! will move out of draft mode once you've had a chance to test this and verify it works. then we can get into cleaning up the code :)

ohEmily · 2025-06-20T18:38:37Z

So does this mean that in development I should NOT look to the path to retrieve either the hostname or machine ID but then in prod I should? Is there any way we can avoid making the developer have distinct code for different environments?

this is exactly how Gambit is set up today and I filed a ticket in their thing to align the experiences, full circle

ohEmily · 2025-06-20T18:39:39Z

cli/app.go

@@ -2479,6 +2479,24 @@ Note: There is no progress meter while copying is in progress.
 			UsageText:       createUsageText("module", nil, false, true),
 			HideHelpCommand: true,
 			Subcommands: []*cli.Command{
+				{
+					Name:      "local-app-testing",


[nit] subcommand seems longer than necessary? e.g. local-test

ohEmily · 2025-06-20T18:45:52Z

Something I'm not understanding but want to make sure to bring up now since the CLI is shipped software and we can't hit "undo" with releases the way we can with our cloud software.

[q] What is the advantage of adding support for this UI versus a local testing environment that supports integrating into a Viam auth app? Reading from the Viam auth cookie is one of the main integration points for anyone building out a Viam App so I feel that local testing isn't all too useful without that support.

jr22 · 2025-06-20T19:03:23Z

Something I'm not understanding but want to make sure to bring up now since the CLI is shipped software and we can't hit "undo" with releases the way we can with our cloud software.

[q] What is the advantage of adding support for this UI versus a local testing environment that supports integrating into a Viam auth app? Reading from the Viam auth cookie is one of the main integration points for anyone building out a Viam App so I feel that local testing isn't all too useful without that support.

does gambit use the auth cookie and not the machine credentials? i dont think we expose any documentation or guarantees about how were storing that information etc.

ohEmily · 2025-06-20T19:19:09Z

Something I'm not understanding but want to make sure to bring up now since the CLI is shipped software and we can't hit "undo" with releases the way we can with our cloud software.
[q] What is the advantage of adding support for this UI versus a local testing environment that supports integrating into a Viam auth app? Reading from the Viam auth cookie is one of the main integration points for anyone building out a Viam App so I feel that local testing isn't all too useful without that support.

does gambit use the auth cookie and not the machine credentials?

Sorry I don't understand this question. I'll try to rephrase to see if we can get clarity.

We just cut Gambit over to extracting the API key, machine ID, and hostname stored in the cookie -- that was the message I sent over Slack. What I'm saying is that -- because they are unable to support authenticating on localhost, they instead display a page to pop in an API key ID and auth entity (key string). This has the unfortunate consequence of making it impossible to test auth changes outside of a cloud environment for them.

ohEmily · 2025-06-20T19:34:11Z

replaces the part of the Gambit onboarding flow that asks you to do this:

### 3. Start and access the frontend
1. (from a new terminal window) start the frontend by running `make dev-frontend`.
2. Put together a URL of the following format, pulling from the remote fragment overwrite above:

http://localhost:5173/?host=your-machine-dev.example.cloud&api-key=your-key&authEntity=your-entity&suffix=-dev

> Make sure the url has the `&suffix=-dev` suffix or the developer machine will not work
3. Open the URL above from your browser.

ohEmily · 2025-06-20T19:35:05Z

cli/app.go

+						&cli.StringFlag{
+							Name:     "app-url",
+							Usage:    "url where local app is running",
+							Required: true,
+						},


[q] why do we need this? why isn't it just localhost?

feedback from sync emily call: can we make them both port otherwise it seems like theyre more connected

ohEmily · 2025-06-20T19:37:42Z

cli/module_local_viam_apps_test.html

+                apiKey: document.getElementById('apiKey').value.trim(),
+                apiKeyId: document.getElementById('apiKeyId').value.trim(),


should this maybe be nested to follow the same schema as the auth cookie?

ohEmily · 2025-06-20T19:44:18Z

tl;dr from huddle is that this code will get moved out of RDK and into Viam Apps so folks can import as a library, better versioning, and allow us to be more careful with additive features

jr22 · 2025-06-20T19:53:28Z

@bashar-515 actually, no need to look at this yet. i spoke to @ohEmily and our biggest takeaway is that we probably should have most of this code live alongside viam apps and not in the CLI. then we can import the shared code and things wont get as out of sync

APP-8173: Make local testing for viam apps easier

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viambot added the safe to test This pull request is marked safe to test from a trusted zone label Jun 5, 2025

jr22 requested a review from bashar-515 June 5, 2025 19:21

jr22 commented Jun 5, 2025

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cli/local_viam_apps_test.html Outdated

@@ -0,0 +1,470 @@

<!DOCTYPE html>

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same here. lots of vibe coding

jr22 commented Jun 5, 2025

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jr22 added 2 commits June 5, 2025 16:05

some cleanup and allow optional port arg to specify where server is

c09bfac

remove some ai comments

33ac6df

viambot added safe to test This pull request is marked safe to test from a trusted zone and removed safe to test This pull request is marked safe to test from a trusted zone labels Jun 5, 2025

rename and get weird of some ai gen stuff

24b36e2

viambot added safe to test This pull request is marked safe to test from a trusted zone and removed safe to test This pull request is marked safe to test from a trusted zone labels Jun 5, 2025

use printf

e0bbcc8

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update cookies

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bashar-515 reviewed Jun 11, 2025

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make work with path

7b267e5

viambot added safe to test This pull request is marked safe to test from a trusted zone and removed safe to test This pull request is marked safe to test from a trusted zone labels Jun 20, 2025

jr22 requested a review from ohEmily June 20, 2025 18:11

ohEmily reviewed Jun 20, 2025

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		apiKey: document.getElementById('apiKey').value.trim(),
		apiKeyId: document.getElementById('apiKeyId').value.trim(),

APP-8173: Make local testing for viam apps easier #5036

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APP-8173: Make local testing for viam apps easier #5036

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jr22 commented Jun 5, 2025 • edited Loading Uh oh! There was an error while loading. Please reload this page.

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Work done

Things this doesnt do

Ask for reviewers

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