Self-hosted Sputnik server: specifying the network interface used with Core

By default, self-hosted Sputnik servers have their external / public-facing IP address reported to the Core management system by an external service.

There are instances where this automatically-reported IP address may not match the desired IP address that should be shown in the Core dashboard; as some examples:

• A self-hosted Sputnik server has multiple configured network interfaces, and the IP address from an internal interface is being reported to Core instead of the network interface intended for streaming traffic.
• An external router/firewall has multiple public IP addresses available, and the router/firewall is reporting one public address to the Core management system, instead of a separate public IP address that was set aside for use by the Sputnik server behind that router/firewall.

The following steps allow you to determine which interface on the Sputnik server is used to report the IP address shown in the Core Dashboard.

Step 1: Use your preferred command-line (nano, vi, etc.) or GUI-based text editor to modify the /etc/proton.toml configuration file; for example, the following command uses the vi editor with a user account that has sudo privileges:

sudo vi /etc/proton.toml

Step 2: Add the following three lines to the top of the proton.toml configuration file: 

## Define interface name to obtain mac address and host from
Interface = ""
Ipv6 = false

Step 3: Insert the network interface name between the double quotes on the Interface = line.

This interface name should utilize the IP address that should be reported to Core management system by the self-hosted Sputnik server.

In the below example, the internal network interface is defined by the Linux system as em1, but it could be en01, ens1, or eth0 as just a few examples.

## Define interface name to obtain mac address and host from 
Interface = "em1"
Ipv6 = false

Step 4: Restart the Sputnik process

sudo systemctl restart sputnik.service sputnik-ui.service proton.service

The  dashboard in the Core management system should update and show the new IP address associated with the self-hosted Sputnik server.


NOTE: You could also put the IP for your Self-hosted Sputnik manually, if needed:

E.g.

Host = "1.0.3.1"

and reboot after.