Service Defaults

v1.8.4+: On Kubernetes, the ServiceDefaults custom resource is supported in Consul versions 1.8.4+.
v1.5.0+: On other platforms, this config entry is supported in Consul versions 1.5.0+.

The service-defaults config entry kind (ServiceDefaults on Kubernetes) controls default global values for a service, such as its protocol.

Sample Config Entries

Default protocol

Set the default protocol for a service in the default namespace to HTTP:

Kind      = "service-defaults"
Name      = "web"
Namespace = "default"
Protocol  = "http"

Available Fields

• Kind - Must be set to service-defaults

• Name (string: <required>) - Set to the name of the service being configured.

• Namespace (string: "default")

  Enterprise

  - Specifies the namespace the config entry will apply to.

• Meta (map<string|string>: nil) - Specifies arbitrary KV metadata pairs. Added in Consul 1.8.4.

• Protocol (string: "tcp") - Sets the protocol of the service. This is used by Connect proxies for things like observability features and to unlock usage of the service-splitter and service-router config entries for a service. It also unlocks the ability to define L7 intentions via service-intentions. Supported values are one of tcp, http, http2, or grpc.

• MeshGateway (MeshGatewayConfig: <optional>) - Controls the default mesh gateway configuration for this service. Added in v1.6.0.

  • Mode (string: "") - One of none, local, or remote.

• ExternalSNI (string: "") - This is an optional setting that allows for the TLS SNI value to be changed to a non-connect value when federating with an external system. Added in v1.6.0.

• Expose (ExposeConfig: <optional>) - Controls the default expose path configuration for Envoy. Added in v1.6.2.

  Exposing paths through Envoy enables a service to protect itself by only listening on localhost, while still allowing non-Connect-enabled applications to contact an HTTP endpoint. Some examples include: exposing a /metrics path for Prometheus or /healthz for kubelet liveness checks.

  • Checks (bool: false) - If enabled, all HTTP and gRPC checks registered with the agent are exposed through Envoy. Envoy will expose listeners for these checks and will only accept connections originating from localhost or Consul’s advertise address. The port for these listeners are dynamically allocated from expose_min_port to expose_max_port. This flag is useful when a Consul client cannot reach registered services over localhost. One example is when running Consul on Kubernetes, and Consul agents run in their own pods.

  • Paths (array<Path>: []) - A list of paths to expose through Envoy.

    • Path (string: "") - The HTTP path to expose. The path must be prefixed by a slash. ie: /metrics.

    • LocalPathPort (int: 0) - The port where the local service is listening for connections to the path.

    • ListenerPort (int: 0) - The port where the proxy will listen for connections. This port must be available for the listener to be set up. If the port is not free then Envoy will not expose a listener for the path, but the proxy registration will not fail.

    • Protocol (string: "http") - Sets the protocol of the listener. One of http or http2. For gRPC use http2.

ACLs

Configuration entries may be protected by ACLs.

Reading a service-defaults config entry requires service:read on the resource.

Creating, updating, or deleting a service-defaults config entry requires service:write on the resource.