docs/community/samples/serving/helloworld-r

title	linkTitle	weight	type
Hello World - R	R	1	docs

A simple web app that executes an R script. The R script reads an env variable TARGET and prints Hello ${TARGET}!. If the TARGET environment variable is not specified, the script uses World.

Follow the steps below to create the sample code and then deploy the app to your cluster. You can also download a working copy of the sample, by running the following commands:

git clone -b "{{< branch >}}" https://github.com/knative/docs knative-docs
cd knative-docs/docs/serving/samples/hello-world/helloworld-r

Before you begin

• A Kubernetes cluster with Knative installed. Follow the installation instructions if you need to create one.
• Docker installed and running on your local machine, and a Docker Hub account configured (we'll use it for a container registry).

Recreating the sample code

1. Create a new file named HelloWorld.R and paste the following script:

   #!/usr/bin/Rscript
   TARGET <- Sys.getenv("TARGET", "World")
   
   message = paste("Hello ", TARGET, "!", sep = "")
   print(message)
   

2. Create a new file named app.py and paste the following code. We use a basic web server written in Python to execute the R script:

   import os
   import subprocess
   
   from flask import Flask
   
   app = Flask(__name__)
   
   @app.route('/')
   def hello_world():
       try:
           output = subprocess.check_output('/usr/bin/Rscript HelloWorld.R', shell=True)
           print(output)
       except subprocess.CalledProcessError:
           return "Error in R script.", 500
   
       return output
   
   
   if __name__ == "__main__":
       app.run(debug=True,host='0.0.0.0',port=int(os.environ.get('PORT', 8080)))
   

3. Create a new file named Dockerfile and copy the code block below into it.

   # Use the official Python image.
   # https://hub.docker.com/_/python
   FROM python:3.7
   
   # Copy local code to the container image.
   ENV APP_HOME /app
   WORKDIR $APP_HOME
   COPY . .
   
   # Install production dependencies.
   RUN pip install Flask gunicorn
   
   # Install R
   RUN apt-get update && \
       apt-get install -y r-base
   
   # Run the web service on container startup. Here we use the gunicorn
   # webserver, with one worker process and 8 threads.
   # For environments with multiple CPU cores, increase the number of workers
   # to be equal to the cores available.
   CMD exec gunicorn --bind :$PORT --workers 1 --threads 8 app:app
   

4. Create a new file, service.yaml and copy the following service definition into the file. Make sure to replace {username} with your Docker Hub username.

   apiVersion: serving.knative.dev/v1alpha1
   kind: Service
   metadata:
     name: helloworld-r
     namespace: default
   spec:
     template:
       spec:
         containers:
           - image: docker.io/{username}/helloworld-r
             env:
               - name: TARGET
                 value: "R Sample v1"
   

Building and deploying the sample

Once you have recreated the sample code files (or used the files in the sample folder) you're ready to build and deploy the sample app.

1. Use Docker to build the sample code into a container. To build and push with Docker Hub, run these commands replacing {username} with your Docker Hub username:

   # Build the container on your local machine
   docker build -t {username}/helloworld-r .
   
   # Push the container to docker registry
   docker push {username}/helloworld-r
   

2. After the build has completed and the container is pushed to docker hub, you can deploy the app into your cluster. Ensure that the container image value in service.yaml matches the container you built in the previous step. Apply the configuration using kubectl:

   kubectl apply --filename service.yaml
   

3. Now that your service is created, Knative performs the following steps:

   • Create a new immutable revision for this version of the app.
   • Network programming to create a route, ingress, service, and load balance for your app.
   • Automatically scale your pods up and down (including to zero active pods).

4. Run the following command to find the external IP address for your service. The ingress IP for your cluster is returned. If you just created your cluster, you might need to wait and rerun the command until your service gets asssigned an external IP address.

   kubectl get svc knative-ingressgateway --namespace istio-system
   

   Example:

   NAME                     TYPE           CLUSTER-IP     EXTERNAL-IP      PORT(S)                                      AGE
   knative-ingressgateway   LoadBalancer   10.23.247.74   35.203.155.229   80:32380/TCP,443:32390/TCP,32400:32400/TCP   2d
   
   

5. Run the following command to find the domain URL for your service:

   kubectl get ksvc helloworld-r  --output=custom-columns=NAME:.metadata.name,URL:.status.url
   

   Example:

   NAME                URL
   helloworld-r    http://helloworld-r.default.example.com
   

6. Test your app by sending it a request. Use the following curl command with the domain URL helloworld-r.default.example.com and EXTERNAL-IP address that you retrieved in the previous steps:

   curl -H "Host: helloworld-r.default.example.com" http://{EXTERNAL_IP_ADDRESS}
   

   Example:

   curl -H "Host: helloworld-r.default.example.com" http://35.203.155.229
   [1] "Hello R Sample v1!"
   

   Note: Add -v option to get more detail if the curl command failed.

Removing the sample app deployment

To remove the sample app from your cluster, delete the service record:

kubectl delete --filename service.yaml