https://github.com/ziolko/tunnel

DIY ngrok alternative
https://github.com/ziolko/tunnel

Last synced: about 1 month ago
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DIY ngrok alternative

• Host: GitHub
• URL: https://github.com/ziolko/tunnel
• Owner: ziolko
• License: mit
• Created: 2023-01-22T21:04:53.000Z (almost 2 years ago)
• Default Branch: main
• Last Pushed: 2024-07-02T07:52:50.000Z (6 months ago)
• Last Synced: 2024-11-08T22:37:10.330Z (about 2 months ago)
• Homepage:
• Size: 30.3 KB
• Stars: 57
• Watchers: 2
• Forks: 1
• Open Issues: 0
• Metadata Files:
  • Readme: README.md
  • License: LICENSE

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README

        
# @ziolko/tunnel - DIY tunneling solution for developers

This is an instruction on setting up a simple tunneling solution that is reliable, flexible, and low-cost. It requires a Linux server with a public IP (I use [contabo.com](https://contabo.com/) but any VPS provider would do) and a domain.

## Usage

After you configure the tunneling server (see instructions below), you can start a tunnel from your local machine using `ssh`:

```

$ ssh -TN -o ServerAliveInterval=60 -R :localhost: root@

# -TN  prevents ssh from creating an interactive session

```

Assuming your tunneling server is available at `ssh.proxy.dev.io` and your application locally is running at port 3000 you can run the following command:

```

ssh -TN -o ServerAliveInterval=60 -R 8080:localhost:3000 [email protected]

```

With this setup, your application will be publicly available at https://8080.proxy.dev.io. The `8080` part of the address directly refers to the `` part from the command above.  Additionally, you can connect to the same port with e.g. https://one.8080.proxy.dev.io, https://two.8080.proxy.dev.io, or https://awesome.8080.proxy.dev.io. The server takes care of getting valid SSL certificates for all the supported domains.

You can tunnel as many applications as you want as long as you tunnel them to different ports.

## Setting up the tunneling server

You need to follow these steps only once and they should take no more than 20 minutes.

1. Create a Linux instance with HTTP and HTTPS traffic allowed

2. [Install Caddy](https://caddyserver.com/docs/install#debian-ubuntu-raspbian)

3. Open the Caddy config file: `sudo vim /etc/caddy/Caddyfile` and paste the content of the Caddyfile from this repository

4. Reload Caddy configuration with `sudo systemctl reload caddy`

5. Create a wildcard DNS record for your domain e.g. `*.proxy.dev.io` (if you use Cloudflare disable their proxy for this DNS entry)

6. Visit your domain https://8080.proxy.dev.io - it should say that it couldn't connect to the service at this port. This means the reverse proxy server is up and running.

I highly discourage you from running any other services on the tunneling server.

### Optional configuration steps

1. Add your SSH public key to `~/.ssh/authorized_keys` on the server to start tunnels without providing passwords

2. If you want to bind to "well-known ports" on the tunneling server (ports lower than 1024 e.g. standard SMTP ports) and you connect to the tunneling server as a non-root user you need to run `sudo echo 'net.ipv4.ip_unprivileged_port_start=0' >> /etc/sysctl.conf && sudo sysctl -p` on the server.

## Exposing TCP traffic

Sometimes you need to expose the TCP port directly (e.g., temporarily expose the local database server). To enable this on the tunneling server run  `sudo echo 'GatewayPorts clientspecified' >> /etc/ssh/sshd_config && sudo systemctl restart ssh.service`. With this setup in place, you can control if a port is directly exposed by adding `*:` before ``: 

```

ssh -TN -o ServerAliveInterval=60 -R *:8080:localhost:3000 [email protected]

```

Notice that your service provider/firewall may block most of the ports so you may need to do some additional configuration.