Using the tooling container with toolkit

If you don't want to go through the hassle of installation of the tooling application on your PC (installing node.js, building the application) but just want to have it up & running quickly using Docker these are the 2 things you need to do (start the tooling container and configure one property in WAS).

Starting the tooling-web Docker container

docker run -d --env LICENSE=accept --env TXN_HOST=host.docker.internal --env ALLOW_TELEMETRY=false --env ELASTICSEARCH_ENABLED=false  --env DEPLOYMENT_TYPE=development -p 7443:7443 --name tooling-local commerce/tooling-web:9.1.15.0

TXN_HOST environment property is set to host.docker.internal and will instruct the container to use the host system (where your toolkit runs). In my case, since the toolkit is configured to run with SOLR search, I also had to set ELASTICSEARCH_ENABLED property to false.

The above command will start a tooling container named tooling-local or port 7443.

Configuring ENVTYPE environment property

Start the transaction server from your toolkit an set ENVTYPE property to 'auth' in WAS admin console.

If you don't do it your toolkit's CMC will assume that the tooling app runs on port 8000.

Setting it to 'auth' will now use that property to resolve the location of the tooling service.

Restart your transaction server. Start CMC and you should see the embedded tooling app up & running.

Summary

The above set up allows me to quickly start a tooling server (takes 2 seconds to start) and it's much more convenient to work with, especially if you do not have a need for customizing the tooling app. I tested the setup only with SOLR.