EasyHAProxy

Service discovery for HAProxy

EasyHAProxy dynamically creates the haproxy.cfg based on metadata collected from your workloads (Docker labels, Swarm service labels, or Kubernetes ingress annotations).

EasyHAProxy can detect and configure HAProxy automatically on the following platforms:

• Docker
• Docker Swarm
• Kubernetes
• Static YAML definitions (EASYHAPROXY_DISCOVER=static)

Who is using?

EasyHAProxy is part of some projects:

• Dokku
• MicroK8s
• DigitalOcean Marketplace

See detailed instructions on how to install below.

EasyHAProxy Mission

Easy to set up and low configuration to numerous features.

Features

EasyHAProxy will discover services based on Docker (or Swarm) labels and Kubernetes ingress annotations, then dynamically build the haproxy.cfg. Below, EasyHAProxy main features:

• Support Automatic Certificate Management Environment (ACME) protocol compatible with Let's Encrypt and other CAs.
• Set your custom SSL certificates
• Balance traffic between multiple replicas
• Set SSL policies (strict, default, loose) via EASYHAPROXY_SSL_MODE.
• Set up HAProxy to listen to TCP.
• Add redirects.
• Enable/disable Stats on port 1936 with a custom password.
• Enable/disable custom errors.

Also, it is possible to set up HAProxy from a simple Yaml file instead of creating haproxy.cfg file.

How Does It Work?

You don't need to change your current infrastructure and don't need to learn the HAProxy configuration.

The steps are:

• Run the EasyHAProxy container;
• Add some labels to the containers you want to be parsed by EasyHAProxy (see detailed instructions below);
• EasyHAProxy will automatically detect the containers, set up, and reload the HAProxy configurations for you without downtime.

Detailed Instructions

For detailed instructions on how to use EasyHAProxy, follow the instructions for the platform you want to use:

Or you can install using tools:

Special Topics

If you already set up the EasyHAProxy, is time to go deeper:

• Custom SSL
• Automatic Certificate Issuing (e.g. Letsencrypt)

Configuration Reference

Detailed configuration guides for advanced setups:

• Container Labels - Configure Docker/Swarm containers with labels
• Environment Variables - Configure EasyHAProxy behavior
• Volumes - Map volumes for certificates, config, and custom files
• Plugins - Extend HAProxy with plugins (Development Guide)
  • JWT Validator - JWT authentication validation
  • FastCGI - PHP-FPM and FastCGI application support
  • Cloudflare - Restore visitor IP from Cloudflare CDN
  • IP Whitelist - Restrict access to IPs/CIDR ranges
  • Deny Pages - Block access to specific paths
  • Cleanup - Automatic cleanup of temporary files
• Other Configurations - Additional configurations (ports, custom errors, etc.)
• Limitations - Important limitations and considerations

Development

Requirements

• Python 3.11 or higher
• uv package manager

Installation for Development

# Install uv (if not already installed)
curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/byjg/docker-easy-haproxy.git
cd docker-easy-haproxy

# Install dependencies (creates virtual environment automatically)
uv sync --dev

# Run tests
make test
# or directly: uv run pytest tests/ -vv

# Run linting
make lint

# Format code
make format

Installing the Package

# Install with uv
uv pip install easymapping

# Or install from source
uv pip install -e ".[dev]"

See EasyHAProxy in action

Click on the image to see the videos (use HD for better visualization)

Here is the code applied in the test examples above.

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Open source ByJG