Skip to main content

Embedded Outpost

Starting with 2021.8.1, authentik comes with an embedded outpost. This has been added to simplify deployment for users using the Proxy provider.

The embedded outpost runs in the main server container, and is managed by authentik itself. The embedded outpost authenticates itself via the secret key.

You can access the embedded outpost on the same ports as authentik itself, 9000 and 9443.

If the embedded outpost doesn't make sense for your deployment, you can simply ignore it.

Configuration​

Since authentik doesn't know it's own "primary" URL, there might be some configuration required.

By default, when opening the admin dashboard on a fresh install, authentik will automatically configure the outpost to use the same URL as was used to access authentik.

If this isn't correct, or needs to be changed, click the edit button on the right of the outpost, and set the value of authentik_host to the URL you want to login with. Make sure to set it to full URL, only configuring a hostname or FQDN will not work.

Additionally, most of the other configuration options can be used as with any other outpost, except from items which are marked as "non-embedded"

# Log level that the outpost will set
# Allowed levels: trace, debug, info, warning, error
# Applies to: non-embedded
log_level: debug
# Interval at which the outpost will refresh the providers
# from authentik. For caching outposts (such as LDAP), the
# cache will also be invalidated at that interval.
# (Format: hours=1;minutes=2;seconds=3).
refresh_interval: minutes=5
########################################
# The settings below are only relevant when using a managed outpost
########################################
# URL that the outpost uses to connect back to authentik
authentik_host: https://authentik.tld/
# Disable SSL Validation for the authentik connection
authentik_host_insecure: false
# Optionally specify a different URL used for user-facing interactions
# Applies to: proxy outposts
authentik_host_browser:
# Template used for objects created (deployments/containers, services, secrets, etc)
object_naming_template: ak-outpost-%(name)s
# Use a specific docker image for this outpost rather than the default. This also applies to Kubernetes
# outposts.
# Applies to: non-embedded
container_image:
########################################
# Docker outpost specific settings
########################################
# Network the outpost container should be connected to
# Applies to: non-embedded
docker_network: null
# Optionally disable mapping of ports to outpost container, may be useful when using docker networks
# (Available with 2021.9.4+)
# Applies to: non-embedded
docker_map_ports: true
# Optionally additional labels for docker containers
# (Available with 2022.1.2)
# Applies to: non-embedded
docker_labels: null
########################################
# Kubernetes outpost specific settings
########################################
# Replica count for the deployment of the outpost
# Applies to: non-embedded
kubernetes_replicas: 1
# Namespace to deploy in, defaults to the same namespace authentik is deployed in (if available)
kubernetes_namespace: authentik
# Any additional annotations to add to the ingress object, for example cert-manager
kubernetes_ingress_annotations: {}
# Name of the secret that is used for TLS connections, leave empty to disable TLS
kubernetes_ingress_secret_name: authentik-outpost-tls
# Service kind created, can be set to LoadBalancer for LDAP outposts for example
kubernetes_service_type: ClusterIP
# Disable any components of the kubernetes integration, can be any of
# - 'secret'
# - 'deployment'
# - 'service'
# - 'prometheus servicemonitor'
# - 'ingress'
# - 'traefik middleware'
kubernetes_disabled_components: []
# If the above docker image is in a private repository, use these secrets to pull.
# NOTE: The secret must be created manually in the namespace first.
# Applies to: non-embedded
kubernetes_image_pull_secrets: []
# Optionally configure an ingress class name. If not set, the ingress will use the cluster's
# default ingress class
# (Available with 2022.11.0+)
# Applies to: proxy outposts
kubernetes_ingress_class_name: null
# Optionally apply an RFC 6902 compliant patch to the Kubernetes objects.
# For an understanding of how this works, refer to the link below:
# https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kustomize/blob/master/examples/jsonpatch.md
#
# This value expects a mapping where the key represents
# the Kubernetes component that shall be patched.
# It can be any of the same values supported by `kubernetes_disabled_components`.
#
# For example use this patch to add custom resource requests and limits
# to the outpost deployment:
#
# deployment:
#   - op: add
#     path: "/spec/template/spec/containers/0/resources"
#     value:
#       requests:
#         cpu: 2000m
#         memory: 2000Mi
#       limits:
#         cpu: 4000m
#         memory: 8000Mi
kubernetes_json_patches: null

Routing​

Routing is handled like this:

  1. Paths starting with /static, /media and /help return packaged CSS/JS files, and user-uploaded media files.
  2. Paths starting with /outpost.goauthentik.io are sent to the embedded outpost.
  3. Any hosts configured in the providers assigned to the embedded outpost are sent to the outpost.
  4. Everything remaining is sent to the authentik backend server.

Differences​

There are a few more differences between managed outposts and the embedded outpost, mainly due to the fact that authentik can't fully manage the containers.

  1. (Docker-only) No automatic traefik labels are added to the server container.

    When you deploy a managed outpost on docker, the container has several labels to automatically configure traefik. This is not done for the embedded outpost.

  2. (Kubernetes-only) An additional service is created.

    Since authentik does not know what the normal authentik Service is called, another one is created with a common set of labels that is always set.