# Cockpit Packages

Cockpit is separated into various packages, each of which brings specific features and/or code.

Warning | In addition, any APIs or behavior not explicitly documented here is an internal API and can be changed at any time.

## Layout of Package Files

A package consists of one or more files placed in a directory or its subdirectories. It must have a `manifest.json` file and follow certain naming conventions.

The name of a package is the name of the directory.

The name of the package must be ASCII alphanumeric, and may contain an underscore. Names of directories and files in the package must consist of ASCII alphanumeric along with dash, underscore, dot, and comma. No spaces are allowed.

Cockpit uses the data directories from the XDG Base Directory Specification to locate packages. The `$XDG_DATA_DIRS` represents a colon separate list of system data directories, and `$XDG_DATA_HOME` is a user specific data directory. If the environment variables are not set, defaults are used, according to the spec. If cockpit has been built with an alternate `--prefix=/path` then the `$prefix/share/cockpit` is used by default.

A `cockpit/` subdirectories in any of these data directories is the location where packages are loaded by Cockpit. If Cockpit finds a package with the same name, in multiple data directories, then the first one wins. According to the spec the first data directory is `$XDG_DATA_HOME` and then `$XDG_DATA_DIRS` in order.

This means that, by default the following directories are searched for cockpit packages, and in this order:

- `~/.local/share/cockpit/`

- `/usr/local/share/cockpit/`

- `/usr/share/cockpit/`

Packages placed in `$XDG_DATA_HOME` are not cached by Cockpit or the web browser. Other packages are cached aggressively, and are accessed using a checksum of the files in the packages and their names.

You can use the following command to list the packages installed on a server. You’ll note that it’s output may change when you run the command as different users, if there are packages installed in the user’s home directory.

    $ cockpit-bridge --packages
    ...

To further clarify things, here is an example package called "my-package" and its file layout:

    /usr/share/cockpit/
        my-package/
            manifest.json
            file.html
            some.js

Place or symlink packages in your `~/.local/share/cockpit` directory (or appropriate `$XDG_DATA_HOME` location) that you would like to modify and develop. System installed packages should not change while Cockpit is running.

## Package Manifest

Each package has a `manifest.json` file. It is a JSON object. The following fields may be present in the manifest:

content-security-policy

  By default Cockpit serves packages using a strict Content Security Policy, which among other things does not allow inline styles or scripts. This can be overridden on a per-package basis, with this setting. + If the overridden content security policy does not contain a `default-src`, `connect-src`, `base-uri`, `form-action`, `object-src`, or `block-all-mixed-content` then these will be added to the policy from the manifest.

name

  An optional string that changes the name of the package. Normally packages derive their name from the directory that they are located in. This field overrides that name.

priority

  An optional number that specifies which package is preferred in cases where there are conflicts. For example given two packages with the same `name` a package is chosen based on its priority.

conditions

  An optional list of `{"predicate": "value"}` objects. Cockpit will only consider the package if all conditions are met. This is preferable to using `priority`.
  Currently supported predicates are `path-exists` and `path-not-exists` (since Cockpit 286) and `any` (since Cockpit 348). `any` accepts a list of conditions and evaluates to true if at least one of the nested conditions is met. Unknown predicates are ignored.

requires

  An optional JSON object that contains a `"cockpit"` string version number. The package will only be usable if the Cockpit bridge and javascript base are equal or newer than the given version number.

version

  An informational version number for the package.

preload

  A list of identifiers of the components that should be preloaded. Normally, the files of a component are loaded when the user navigates to it for the first time. The files of a preloaded component are loaded immediately after the user logs in, and the initialization code of the component is invoked. + The value of this field is an array of strings, where each string is one of the keys used in the `dashboard`, `menu`, or `tool` fields that are explained below.

parent

  This option is used when module does not have its own menu item but is a part of a different module. This is described by JSON object with properties `component` which takes name of the superordinate component and `docs` with list of documentation URLs for the given page. See below for structure of `docs` property.

In addition, the following keys contain information about where components of the package should appear in Cockpit’s user interface. Each of these keys is optional and contains an object mapping unique identifiers to menu items, which are described below. (The naming of these fields doesn’t perfectly match the current user interface for historical reasons.)

dashboard

  Dashboard items appear in the menu under the section Apps.

menu

  These items appear in the menu under the section System. This section is roughly ordered into these categories (with their order in parentheses): +

  - System Information (10)

  - Logs (20)

  - Configuring major subsystems (30-40)

  - Things running on the machine (VMs, Containers - 50-60)

  - Implementation Details (Accounts, Services - 70-100)

tools

  These items appear in the menu under the section Tools.

Menu items and tools are registered using JSON objects that have the following properties:

label

  The label for the menu item or tool.

order

  An optional order number to place this menu item or tool. Lower numbers are listed first.

path

  The relative path to the HTML file within the package that implements the menu item or tool.

docs

  List of documentation URLs for the given page. Each item is an object containing `label` and `url`.

keywords

  Keywords that describe the page and which are used for searching. These keywords should be lowercase. Keywords is a list containing keyword items as described below. Page label is prepended as first keyword in the first keyword item.

Keyword items are registered using JSON objects that have the following properties:

matches

  List of keywords to be matched.

goto

  Optional path that is used for all keywords in this item. When this argument starts with slash, then it is used as pathname, otherwise it is used as hash. Defining `goto:"page_hash"` in page with `path:"/page_path"` would redirect to `/page_path#page_hash`, while `goto:"/page_path"` would redirect to `/page_path` ignoring default page path.

weight

  How much keywords are prioritized over others. Default is 3.

translate

  `false` when keywords should not be localized. Default is `true`.

An example manifest.json with some optional properties set:

    {
      "version": 0,
      "require": {
          "cockpit": "120"
      },
      "tools": {
         "mytool": {
            "label": "My Tool",
            "path": "tool.html"
         }
      }
    }

    {
      "version": 0,
      "require": {
        "cockpit": "120"
      },
      "conditions": [
        {"path-exists": "/usr/bin/mytool"},
        {"path-exists": "/etc/mytool.conf"},
        {"path-not-exist": "/etc/incompatible-tool"}
      ],
      "tools": {
         "mytool": {
            "label": "My Tool",
            "path": "tool.html"
         }
      }
    }

The following example shows how to use disjunctive conditions with `any` to specify alternative requirements (available since Cockpit 348). This package will be available if either `/usr/bin/alt1` or `/usr/bin/alt2` exists. In any case, `/etc/incompatible-tool` must not exist.

    "conditions": [
      {"any": [{"path-exists": "/usr/bin/alt1"}, {"path-exists": "/usr/bin/alt2"}]},
      {"path-not-exists": "/etc/incompatible-tool"}
    ]

## Manifest overrides

To change a manifest system-wide, a file `<package-directory-name>.override.json` may be placed into `/etc/cockpit/`, or below `$XDG_CONFIG_DIRS` if set (see cockpit.conf). To change it for a particular user only, put the override into `~/.config/cockpit`.

These override the information in the manifest in the simple JSON Merge Patch format.

This can be used to hide or modify menu items of an existing package. For example `/etc/cockpit/systemd.override.json` or `~/.config/cockpit/systemd.override.json` could hide the Logs menu item and move the Services menu item to the top of the menu.

    {
      "menu": {
        "logs": null,
        "services": {
          "order": -1
        }
      }
    }

## Package Links and Paths

When referring to files in your package, such as in a hyperlink or a `<style>` tag or `<script>` tag, simply use a relative path, and refer to the files in the same directory. When you need to refer to files in another package use a relative link.

For example here’s how to include the base `cockpit.js` script in your HTML from the `latest` package:

    <script src="../base1/cockpit.js"></script>

Do not assume you can link to any file in any other package. Refer to the list of API packages for those that are available for use.

## Content Negotiation

In order to support gzipped and/or minified data, the files in a package are loaded using content negotiation logic. A HTTP request for the file `test.js` in the package named `mypackage` will return `mypackage/test.js` or `mypackage/test.js.gz` (in undefined preference). If neither exists, then it returns `mypackage/test.js.min` or `mypackage/test.js.min.gz` (again in undefined preference).

When packages are loaded from a system directory, Cockpit optimizes the file system lookups above, by pre-listing the files. This is one of the reasons that you should never change packages installed to a system directory while Cockpit is running.

## Using Cockpit API

Cockpit has API available for writing packages. There is no API available for external callers to invoke via HTTP, REST or otherwise.

API from various packages can be used to implement Cockpit packages. Each package listed here has some API available for use. Only the API explicitly documented should be used.

- API Listing

To include javascript from the API, simply load it into your HTML using a script tag. Alternatively you can use an javascript loader.

## Bridges for specific tasks

On the server side the `cockpit-bridge` connects to various system APIs that the front end UI requests it to. There are additional bridges for specific tasks that the main `cockpit-bridge` cannot handle, such as using the PCP C library API.

These additional bridges can be registered in a `"bridges"` section of a package’s `manifest.json` file. Building such a bridge is a complex tasks, and we will skip over that here. However it is useful to adjust how these additional bridges are called, and so we’ll look at how they are registered.

An example `manifest.json` with a bridges section:

    {
        "bridges": [
            {
                "match": { "payload": "metrics1" },
                "spawn": [ "/usr/libexec/cockpit-pcp" ]
            }
        ]
    }

The bridges are considered in the order they are listed in the array. Use the `manifest.json``"priority"` field to control order between packages. The bridges are registered using JSON objects that have the following properties:

environ

  Optional, additional environment variables to pass to the bridge command.

match

  The `"match"` object describes which channel open command options need to match for a given channel to be handed over to this bridge.

privileged

  If set to `true`, this marks the bridge as a superuser bridge. Cockpit will start one of these explicitly when trying to escalate the privileges of a session. A privileged bridge can not have a `"match"` property.

label

  Setting this enables selection of privileged bridges in the UI. When no privileged bridge has a `label`, then Cockpit will start the bridge that runs `sudo`. This is the case in a default Cockpit installation. When at least one privileged bridge has a `label` then the user can select one of them when escalating privileges. As a special case, if only one bridge has a `label`, then the step of selecting a bridge is omitted in the UI and that one bridge is always started. + Thus, if you add a privileged bridge with a `label` in a new manifest, Cockpit will use that bridge the next time a user opens the "Administrative access" dialog. If you want the user to choose between the `sudo` method and your new one, you need to duplicate the `sudo` bridge definition in your manifest and give it a label.

problem

  If a problem is specified, and this bridge fails to start up then channels will be closed with this problem code. Otherwise later bridges or internal handlers for the channel will be invoked.

spawn

  The command and arguments to invoke.

The `spawn` and `environ` values can be dynamically taken from a matching open command values. When a value in either the `spawn` or `environ` array contains a named variable wrapped in `${}`, the variable will be replaced with the value contained in the matching open command. Only named variables are supported and name can only contain letters, numbers and the following symbols: `._-`

For example a bridges section like:

    {
      "bridges": [
        {
          "match": { "payload": "example" },
          "environ": [ "TAG=${tag}" ],
          "spawn: [ "/example-bridge", "--tag", "${tag}" ],
          "problem": "access-denied"
        }
      ]
    }

when a open command is received with a payload of `example` with `tag` value of `tag1`. The following command will be spawned

    TAG=tag1 /example-bridge --tag tag1

Processes that are reused so if another open command with a "tag" of `tag1` is received. The open command will be passed to existing process, rather than spawning a new one. However a open command with an tag of `tag2` will spawn a new command:

    TAG=tag2 /example-bridge --tag tag2

If you need to include `${}`, as an actual value in your arguments you can escape it by prefixing it with a `\`

## Replacing an existing package

If the functionality in a package replaces that of another package then it can replace that package by claiming the same `name` and a higher `priority`.

For example, a package in the `/usr/share/cockpit/disks` directory could replace Cockpit’s storage package with a `manifest.json` like this:

    {
      "version": 0,
      "name": "storage",
      "priority": 10,
      "menu": {
         "index": {
            "label": "Disk Storage",
            "order": 15
         }
      }
    }