Cloud Providers and Kubernetes#

This guide explains how to deploy the Argilla Server on different cloud providers and Kubernetes.

Kubernetes#

The Kubernetes (k8s) folder in the repo holds several files for a minimal config on deploying Argilla to Kubernetes. These files also contain some resource requirement recommendations for hosting. For a more robust config, we recommend using Helm charts.

argilla-server-deployment.yaml: deploy main Argilla server,
argilla-server-hpa.yaml: scaler to scale the server from 1 to 3 pods.
argilla-server-ingress.yaml: server ingress config.
argilla-server-service.yaml: server service config.
elasticsearch-deployment.yaml: a minimal Elastic Search config.
elasticsearch-pvc.yaml: a persistent volume claim to dynamically scale and retain data.
elasticsearch-service.yaml: an Elastic service config.

Helm charts#

For a more robust and modern set-up, we recommend using official Kubernetes helm charts in combination with the Argilla server Kubernetes yaml. Argilla itself doesn’t have any helm support but it can still be used together with Helm-deployed ElasticSearch by setting the ARGILLA_ELASTICSEARCH environment variable to the endpoint where ElasticSearch is hosted.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)#

Setup an AWS profile#

The aws command cli must be installed. Then, type:

aws configure --profile argilla

and follow command instructions. For more details, visit AWS official documentation.

Once the profile is created (a new entry should appear in file ~/.aws/config), you can activate it via setting environment variable:

export AWS_PROFILE=argilla

Create docker machine#

docker-machine create --driver amazonec2 \
--amazonec2-root-size 60 \
--amazonec2-instance-type t2.large \
--amazonec2-open-port 80 \
--amazonec2-ami ami-0b541372 \
--amazonec2-region eu-west-1 \
argilla-aws

Available Amazon Machine Instance (AMI) depends on region. The provided AMI is available for eu-west regions and is an ubuntu-16.04-server image. To find available recent images, go to the AWS AMI Marketplace, choose “Launch instance” and filter by ubuntu (don’t forget to choose your targeted region).

If you already have multiple instances and VPC in the targeted region, creating a new VPC before creating the Argilla instance is recommended. Add the following parameter to specify the VPC you want to use for the instance:

--amazonec2-vpc-id vpc-1234abcd  # Replace vpc-1234abcd with the created VPC id

Verify machine creation#

$>docker-machine ls

NAME                   ACTIVE   DRIVER      STATE     URL                        SWARM   DOCKER     ERRORS
argilla-aws             -        amazonec2   Running   tcp://52.213.178.33:2376           v20.10.7

Save assigned machine ip#

In our case, the assigned ip is 52.213.178.33

Connect to remote docker machine#

To enable the connection between the local docker client and the remote daemon, we must type the following command:

eval $(docker-machine env argilla-aws)

Define a docker-compose.yaml#

# docker-compose.yaml
version: "3"

services:
 argilla:
   image: argilla/argilla-server:v1.28
   ports:
     - "80:80"
   environment:
     ARGILLA_ELASTICSEARCH: <elasticsearch-host_and_port>
     ARGILLA_AUTH_SECRET_KEY: Please generate a 32 character random string with: openssl rand -hex 32
   restart: unless-stopped

Pull image#

docker-compose pull

Launch docker container#

docker-compose up -d

Accessing Argilla#

In our case http://52.213.178.33

Azure#

The easiest way to deploy Argilla on Azure is using the Azure Container Instances (ACI) service. This service allows you to run containers in a serverless way, without the need to manage the underlying infrastructure. This guide will take you through deploying Argilla using the Azure CLI tool, and is based on the Azure documentation for the same service.

🚒 At the time of writing, it is still possible to deploy Argilla using the docker run command and docker context integration with Azure, but this method is soon to be deprecated in the docker cli.

1. Authenticate to Azure#

First, you need to authenticate to Azure using the az CLI:

az login

2. Setup an Azure resource group#

Create a resource group where you want to deploy the Argilla Server:

az group create --name <resource-group> --location <location>

3. Create an Azure Container Instance#

Create an Azure Container Instance with the az container create command:

az container create --resource-group <resource-group> --name <deployment-name> --image argilla/argilla-quickstart:latest --dns-name-label <dns-name> --ports 6900

Once the container is deployed you can check the deployment with:

az container show --resource-group <resource-group> --name argilla --query "{FQDN:ipAddress.fqdn,ProvisioningState:provisioningState}" --out table

Argilla should now be accessible at the FQDN provided in the output, on the port 6900.

Google Cloud Platform (GCP) via Cloud Run#

First, we will deploy Argilla using Cloud Run, a managed platform that scales stateless containers. To deploy Argilla on GCP, you can use Cloud Run, a managed platform that scales stateless containers. This guide will take you through deploying Argilla using the gcloud CLI tool, and is based on the GCP documentation.

🚒 We will deploy the Argilla quickstart image for simplicity which means we have a pre-packaged storage layer, and cannot use Cloud Run’s horizontal scaling features.

1. Authenticate to GCP#

First, you need to authenticate to GCP using the gcloud CLI:

gcloud auth login

2. Build and deploy the container#

We will use the gcloud run deploy command to deploy the Argilla container directly from the Docker Hub. We can point the cloud run url to the container’s default port (6900) and define relevant compute resouces.

gcloud run deploy <deployment-name> \
--region <region> \
--image argilla/argilla-quickstart:latest \
--allow-unauthenticated \
--port 6900 \
--cpu 2 \
--memory 4Gi \
--max-instances 1 \
--min-instances 1

Now you can access Argilla at the URL provided in the output or by running:

gcloud run services describe <deployment-name> \
--region <region> \
--format 'value(status.url)'

Google Cloud Platform (GCP) on a Dedicated Virtual Machine#

If deploying via Cloud Run is not suitable for your use case, you can deploy Argilla on a dedicated virtual machine via Cloud Compute. Deploying Argilla Server to Cloud Compute involves creating a compute instance, setting up Docker and Docker Compose, and configuring network settings for external traffic. Follow these steps:

1. Create an Instance#

Create a new Google Cloud VM instance with the necessary specifications:

gcloud compute instances create "argilla-instance" \
  --machine-type "n1-standard-2" \
  --image-family "debian-10" \
  --image-project "debian-cloud" \
  --boot-disk-size "50GB" \
  --zone "asia-south2-a"

2. SSH into the Instance#

Once the instance is running, connect to it using SSH:

gcloud compute ssh argilla-instance --zone asia-south2-a

3. Install Dependencies#

Update the package manager and install necessary dependencies:

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install apt-transport-https ca-certificates curl software-properties-common gnupg2 lsb-release

4. Install Docker and Docker Compose#

Install Docker Engine and Docker Compose on the instance:

curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/debian/gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /usr/share/keyrings/docker-archive-keyring.gpg

echo "deb [arch=$(dpkg --print-architecture) signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/docker-archive-keyring.gpg] https://download.docker.com/linux/debian $(lsb_release -cs) stable" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/docker.list > /dev/null

sudo apt update

sudo apt-get install docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io docker-compose-plugin

5. Launch Argilla with Docker Compose#

Grab the docker-compose.yaml file from the repository and start the Argilla Server:

mkdir argilla && cd argilla

wget -O docker-compose.yaml https://raw.githubusercontent.com/argilla-io/argilla/main/docker/docker-compose.yaml

sudo docker compose up -d

6. Allow External Traffic#

Configure the firewall rules to allow incoming traffic on the required ports:

gcloud compute instances add-tags argilla-instance --zone asia-south2-a --tags=argilla-instance

gcloud compute firewall-rules create allow-6900 --allow tcp:6900 --target-tags argilla-instance --description "Allow incoming traffic on port 6900"

7. Assign a Static IP Address#

Reserve and assign a static IP address to ensure that the server can be consistently accessed via the same IP:

gcloud compute addresses create my-static-ip --region asia-south2

8. Configure Instance with Static IP#

Bind the static IP address to the instance:

STATIC_IP=$(gcloud compute addresses list --format="value(address)" --filter="name=my-static-ip")

gcloud compute instances delete-access-config argilla-instance --zone asia-south2-a --access-config-name "external-nat"

gcloud compute instances add-access-config argilla-instance --zone asia-south2-a --address $STATIC_IP

9. Test Connection#

Confirm the server is accessible by making an HTTP request to the Argilla server:

curl -vI $STATIC_IP:6900

Now you can access the Argilla instance in your browser using the URL http://[STATIC_IP]:6900.