GCE Provider Service

This service is responsible for managing the lifecycle of Google Compute Engine (GCE) Virtual Machines, primarily for use as Swarming bots.

Configuration

The service uses configuration files to define VM shapes, disk images, network settings, and swarming pool assignments.

Proto Definitions: The core configuration schema is defined in api/config/v1/config.proto. This includes messages for VM, Disk, NetworkInterface, etc.
User Configs: Current user configurations are located in the infra_superproject repository at data/config/configs/gce-provider/. Older configs can also be seen at go/gce-provider-config.

When you modify api/config/v1/config.proto, you MUST regenerate the Go bindings by running:

go generate ./...

from within the go.chromium.org/luci/gce/api/config/v1 directory. This will update the *.pb.go and *.pb.discovery.go files.

The service consists of several components:

appengine/frontend: Handles incoming API requests.
appengine/backend: Contains cron jobs and task queue handlers for:
- Creating new VM instances.
- Deleting terminated or orphaned instances.
- Auditing existing instances against the configuration.
- Managing instance deadlines and drainage.
Task Queues: The service utilizes Cloud Tasks to manage asynchronous operations like instance creation and deletion.

The service is deployed on Google App Engine in the following GCP projects: