Getting Started with Private Locations

Overview

Private locations allow you to monitor internal-facing applications or private URLs that aren’t accessible from the public internet.

Architecture diagram of how a private location works in Synthetic Monitoring

You can also use private locations to:

  • Create custom locations in mission-critical areas of your business.
  • Verify the application performance in your internal testing environment before you release new features to production with Synthetic tests in your CI/CD pipelines.
  • Compare the application performance from inside and outside your internal network.

Private locations are Docker containers or Windows services that you can install anywhere inside your private network. Retrieve the docker image on Google Container Registry or download the Windows installer.*

* Use and operation of this software is governed by the End User License Agreement available here.

Once you’ve created and installed your private location, you can assign Synthetic tests to your private location just like you would with a managed location.

Your private locations test results display identically to your managed location test results.

Assign a Synthetic test to private locations

Create your private location

  1. In the Datadog site, hover over Digital Experience and select Settings > **Private Locations**.

  2. Click Add Private Location.

  3. Fill out your private location details. Only Name and API key fields are mandatory.

  4. Click Save Location and Generate Configuration File to generate the configuration file associated with your private location on your worker.

  5. Depending on where you installed your private location, you may need to input additional parameters to your configuration file:

    • If you are using a proxy, input the URL as http://<YOUR_USER>:<YOUR_PWD>@<YOUR_IP>:<YOUR_PORT>.
    • If you want to block reserved IPs, toggle Block reserved IPs and enter the IP ranges.

    For more information, see Private Locations Configuration Options and Run Synthetic Tests from Private Locations.

  6. Copy and paste your private location configuration file to your working directory.

    Note: The configuration file contains secrets for private location authentication, test configuration decryption, and test result encryption. Datadog does not store the secrets, so store them locally before leaving the Private Locations creation form. You need to be able to reference the secrets again in order to add more workers to your private location.

  7. When you are ready, click View Installation Instructions.

  8. Follow the installation instructions based on the environment you want to run the Private Location worker in.

  9. If you are using Docker, launch your worker as a standalone container using the Docker run command and your configuration file:

    docker run --rm -v $PWD/worker-config-<LOCATION_ID>.json:/etc/datadog/synthetics-check-runner.json datadog/synthetics-private-location-worker

    This command starts a Docker container and prepares your private location to run tests. Datadog recommends running the container in detached mode with proper restart policy.

    You can use another container runtime such as Podman. For more information, see the Private Locations documentation.

    If you are using Windows, run the Synthetics Private Location Installer with a GUI or run the msiexec command on the command line inside the directory where you downloaded the installer:

    msiexec /i datadog-synthetics-worker-<version-number>.amd64.msi

  10. If your private location reports correctly to Datadog, an OK health status displays under Private Location Status and on the Private Locations list in the Settings page:

    Private Location Health

    Additionally, you can see private location logs in your terminal:

    2022-02-28 16:20:03 [info]: Fetching 10 messages from queue - 10 slots available
2022-02-28 16:20:03 [info]: Fetching 10 messages from queue - 10 slots available
2022-02-28 16:20:04 [info]: Fetching 10 messages from queue - 10 slots available

  11. Once you’re done testing your internal endpoint, click OK.

Run Synthetic tests with your private location

Use your new private location just like a managed location in your Synthetic tests.

  1. Create an API test, multistep API test, or browser test on any internal endpoint or application you want to monitor.

  2. Under Private Locations, select your new private location:

    Assign a Synthetic test to a private location

  3. Continue filling out your test!

Further Reading

Additional helpful documentation, links, and articles:

Monitor your Synthetic private locations with DatadogBLOG more more Create your first API testDOCUMENTATION more more Create your first browser testDOCUMENTATION more more Learn more about private locationsDOCUMENTATION more more