digitalocean-labs/do-app-platform-skills

Overview

This skill configures DigitalOcean Managed MySQL, MongoDB, Valkey (Redis), Kafka, and OpenSearch for App Platform applications. It guides cluster creation, trusted-source setup, bindable environment variables, and engine-specific connection patterns. Use it to attach non-Postgres managed databases to App Platform components and to troubleshoot common connectivity and permission issues.

How this skill works

The skill inspects the target engine and generates the correct databases: block for the app spec, ensuring production: true when bindable variables are required. It advises doctl commands for cluster/user/db creation and firewall rules, and explains how bindable variables map to runtime environment variables and connection strings. It also flags engine-specific constraints (trusted sources, build-time access, naming rules) and recommends VPC vs public rules where appropriate.

When to use it

• Attaching MySQL, MongoDB, Redis (Valkey), Kafka, or OpenSearch clusters to App Platform services.
• Setting trusted sources so apps can connect to managed database clusters.
• Running migrations or PRE_DEPLOY jobs when build-time DB access is blocked by firewall rules.
• Configuring bindable environment variables for runtime credentials and TLS certificates.
• Troubleshooting connection errors, permission issues, or TLS/URL formatting problems.

Best practices

• Set production: true in the databases: block to ensure bindable variables are populated.
• Use VPC CIDR ip_addr rules for simpler, consistent trusted-source setup when possible.
• Avoid relying on build-time DB access; use PRE_DEPLOY jobs for migrations when trusted sources block builds.
• Remember Kafka only supports IP-based trusted-source rules; app: rules are not supported.
• For VPC deployments, create separate private env vars if you need private hostnames; bindables return public hostnames.

Example use cases

• Add a DigitalOcean Managed MySQL cluster to an API service and expose DATABASE_URL as a RUN_TIME env var.
• Attach a MongoDB cluster, ensure db_user exists, and set MONGODB_URI from ${db.DATABASE_URL}.
• Configure Valkey (Redis) for session caching using rediss:// URL and ${cache.DATABASE_URL}.
• Deploy Kafka for eventing with VPC-based trusted sources and supply broker details via ${kafka.HOSTNAME}:${kafka.PORT}.
• Provision OpenSearch for search indexing and provide basic-auth URL to the app while disabling logging to it if trusted sources are enabled.