Option to run Application without UUID input

[engageub]

Hi,
Could you please update the Docker image so that it can run without UUID as an input parameter, in line with the behavior of the latest version?

I would also appreciate clarification on whether any issues could arise if two users are assigned the same UUID. Specifically, does EarnApp validate whether a UUID is already associated with an existing user? If such validation is in place, it may be preferable to allow EarnApp to generate and manage the UUID automatically.

For newly created instances, it would be better to let EarnApp generate the UUID. If a device has already been mapped, we can reuse the previously assigned UUID, as was done earlier via the docker run command.

This functionality was already available in the latest branch referenced below:

https://hub.docker.com/r/fazalfarhan01/earnapp

Thank you

[madereddy]

@engageub You bring up some valid concerns

UUID collision is an issue, if two users independently generate the same UUID (unlikely but possible with md5sum), EarnApp would likely associate both devices with the same account node, causing silent earning conflicts. Letting EarnApp generate it eliminates that risk entirely.

Auto-generation is more user-friendly. Removing the mandatory EARNAPP_UUID env var lowers the barrier to entry, especially for less technical users who just want to run docker run madereddy/earnapp and go.

---

The current entrypoint hard-fails without UUID:

bashif [[ -z "${EARNAPP_UUID:-}" ]]; then
    echo "[ERROR] EARNAPP_UUID not set!"
    exit 1
fi

This was an intentional design choice to prevent users from accidentally running without registering their device and losing earnings.
Persistence becomes critical. If EarnApp generates its own UUID internally, it writes it somewhere in /etc/earnapp. If the user doesn't mount that volume, every container restart generates a new UUID and creates a new unregistered device on their account. That's arguably worse than the current behaviour.

The upstream fazalfarhan01 image referenced uses a privileged container with /sys/fs/cgroup mounted to run a full init system. A very different architecture that allows EarnApp more control over its own environment. Giving privileged access to containers is not a good idea and will not be implemented in this image.

We do have some options though

---

My current thought process is potentially updating the container to handle both modes. Make UUID optional, but warn loudly that a volume mount is required when running this way.

While this lowers the barrier to entry, the chances of a user not registering the node is much higher wasting their earnings. I have already been making a lot of changes on the test branch, so I will start working on these changes as they are pretty straight forward. Would you be able to perform some testing on new nodes to validate the workflow?

[madereddy]

@engageub Ready for you to test to UUID generation. Specified its for new installs as well in the Readme. Let me know how testing goes.

Tested the older method with EARNAPP_UUID as an env var and it works as normal. Did some quick testing with UUID generation and it worked, but with this kinda change I would like some further testing.

Just remember its only pushed to the test branch. You will need to change your image to madereddy/earnapp:test

[engageub]

Hi,
Thank you for the update.

The command to retrieve the UUID from the EarnApp Docker container has already been provided. For your convenience, please find it below:

docker exec -it earnapp earnapp showid

To address the UUID validation requirement, you may consider removing the entrypoint logic that enforces the UUID check. Alternatively, you could introduce an additional environment variable to allow users to bypass this validation when appropriate. For example:

-e ALLOW_UUID_GENERATION=true

The UUID check can remain mandatory by default. Users who are familiar with this functionality and intentionally wish to bypass the check can do so by explicitly setting the parameter above. Introducing this optional parameter would not affect the existing default behavior.

Thank you

[engageub]

Hi,
You will need to set a delay in the code before printing the UUID in the logs.
The log shows undefined device ID while the container has UUID generated.
I ran the application without internet to the docker container. Based on this, it can be confirmed that earnapp generates UUID without checking if an existing user has already been allocated with that UUID.

laborant@docker-01:InternetIncome-test$ docker container logs earnapp5f3f730e4e1ab5a58fdf6f5007457e131
[WARN] EARNAPP_UUID not set — EarnApp will generate its own UUID.
[WARN] Ensure /etc/earnapp is mounted as a volume or your UUID will be lost on restart.

------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] Device ID: undefined
[INFO] If this device is not yet registered, visit:
[INFO] https://earnapp.com/r/undefined
------------------------------------------------------------

[INFO] Starting EarnApp...
Failed registration: check internet connection and try again

laborant@docker-01:InternetIncome-test$ docker exec earnapp5f3f730e4e1ab5a58fdf6f5007457e131 earnapp showid
sdk-node-badbfa182e1a4fb8af8c65aa4b486033

[engageub]

Here is the complete log where the ID is being displayed as undefined on first run and it displayed the ID on the second run.
This appears to be related to the execution time.

laborant@docker-01:~$ docker run -d \
  --name earnapp \
  -v /etc/earnapp:/etc/earnapp \
  madereddy/earnapp:test
Unable to find image 'madereddy/earnapp:test' locally
test: Pulling from madereddy/earnapp
e2a57fe6a2c5: Pull complete 
550daf8ca5ee: Pull complete 
3641b3da886c: Pull complete 
2c701f843a0f: Pull complete 
16fa4b32f6eb: Download complete 
Digest: sha256:0bfd6e1f7cd3d47aadf417eab3882e2642140ae76a026fa4fe932e1ee0197b8a
Status: Downloaded newer image for madereddy/earnapp:test
3199cf5552e38d02a9bdd876a3f7f57d5f443da3cedebfc36d786d2caf72b365
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker container logs earnapp
[WARN] EARNAPP_UUID not set — EarnApp will generate its own UUID.
[WARN] Ensure /etc/earnapp is mounted as a volume or your UUID will be lost on restart.

------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] Device ID: undefined
[INFO] If this device is not yet registered, visit:
[INFO] https://earnapp.com/r/undefined
------------------------------------------------------------

[INFO] Starting EarnApp...
Failed registration: check internet connection and try again
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker exec earnapp earnapp showid
sdk-node-cf2ac9a0f51f4a49a94502248573d632
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker rm -f earnapp
earnapp
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker run -d   --name earnapp   -v /etc/earnapp:/etc/earnapp   madereddy/earnapp:test
21e469e09e6f1f1395cf3b15f4bb838443fb28098ba3c021ad1a95dc026b6abb
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker container logs earnapp
[WARN] EARNAPP_UUID not set — EarnApp will generate its own UUID.
[WARN] Ensure /etc/earnapp is mounted as a volume or your UUID will be lost on restart.

------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] Device ID: sdk-node-cf2ac9a0f51f4a49a94502248573d632
[INFO] If this device is not yet registered, visit:
[INFO] https://earnapp.com/r/sdk-node-cf2ac9a0f51f4a49a94502248573d632
------------------------------------------------------------

[INFO] Starting EarnApp...
Failed registration: check internet connection and try again
laborant@docker-01:~$ 

[engageub]

I ran it for the third time. It is strange that the ID generated is same all the 3 times, which should not usually happen.
The ID generated yesterday was different. But today it generated the same ID all the 3 times.

laborant@docker-01:~$ docker run -d   --name earnapp   -v /etc/earnapp:/etc/earnapp   madereddy/earnapp:test
9d08555cb8d1a0e475775409542cd2fc55bdcd029628ab6466d64d7f67399732
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker container logs earnapp
[WARN] EARNAPP_UUID not set — EarnApp will generate its own UUID.
[WARN] Ensure /etc/earnapp is mounted as a volume or your UUID will be lost on restart.

------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] Device ID: sdk-node-cf2ac9a0f51f4a49a94502248573d632
[INFO] If this device is not yet registered, visit:
[INFO] https://earnapp.com/r/sdk-node-cf2ac9a0f51f4a49a94502248573d632
------------------------------------------------------------

[INFO] Starting EarnApp...
Failed registration: check internet connection and try again

[madereddy]

@engageub

Thanks for the detailed testing and logs it was really helpful.

The undefined Device ID on first run is a timing bug on our end. The entrypoint calls earnapp showid before EarnApp has had a chance to generate and write its UUID file. We'll add a short retry loop to wait for the file to be ready before printing the registration info. This will be fixed in the next build.

The same UUID across restarts is actually expected behavior. You're mounting -v /etc/earnapp:/etc/earnapp, which persists the UUID to your host at /etc/earnapp. When you remove and recreate the container with the same volume mount, EarnApp finds the existing UUID file and reuses it. This is intentional as it means your device registration survives container restarts and upgrades without needing to reregister.

If you specifically want a fresh UUID, you'd need to clear the volume contents first: rm -rf /etc/earnapp/*

Though for normal use you'd never want to do this, as it would orphan your previously registered device on the EarnApp dashboard.
Fix for the timing issue is coming shortly.

[madereddy]

@engageub New test build has been released. Let me know if you run into the same issues

[engageub]

Thank you for the update. Will there be a chance anytime that the manual input UUID is overridden by earnapp or the manual input ID overrides after the earnapp starts with its own UUID.

[madereddy]

No override can happen in either direction. When you provide a UUID via EARNAPP_UUID, the entrypoint writes it to /etc/earnapp/uuid before EarnApp starts, so EarnApp reads from that file and has no mechanism to change it at runtime.

In the other direction, if EarnApp generates its own UUID on first run and writes it to the volume, the entrypoint detects the existing file on all subsequent runs and leaves it untouched. A persisted UUID will never be overwritten by a newly generated one.

The /etc/earnapp/uuid file is the single source of truth in both cases. As long as the volume is mounted correctly, the UUID stays stable across restarts and container recreations.

[madereddy]

@engageub One final push for the test version. I cleaned up some of the logic for UUID generation so I just want another sanity check

[engageub]

Hi,
Thank you for the update. It's taking more time than the default limit.

You can try on the following host. Don't mount any volumes when using docker run command.

https://labs.iximiuz.com/

laborant@docker-01:~$ docker run -d --name earnapp madereddy/earnapp:test
eaa97767f426e6237443791a0712e681b8e7a137e5c16179e9f830f3d518a267
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker run -d   --name earnapp   madereddy/earnapp:test^C
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker exec earnapp earnapp showid
undefined
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker exec earnapp earnapp showid
undefined
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker exec earnapp earnapp showid
undefined
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker exec earnapp earnapp showid
undefined
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker container logs earnapp
[WARN] EARNAPP_UUID not set — EarnApp will generate its own UUID.
[WARN] Ensure /etc/earnapp is mounted as a volume or your UUID will be lost on restart.
[INFO] Starting EarnApp...
Failed registration: check internet connection and try again

------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] Waiting for UUID to be generated... (attempt 1/5, retrying in 1s)
[INFO] Waiting for UUID to be generated... (attempt 2/5, retrying in 2s)
[INFO] Waiting for UUID to be generated... (attempt 3/5, retrying in 4s)
[INFO] Waiting for UUID to be generated... (attempt 4/5, retrying in 8s)
[INFO] Waiting for UUID to be generated... (attempt 5/5, retrying in 16s)
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker exec earnapp earnapp showid
undefined
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker exec earnapp earnapp showid
undefined
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker exec earnapp earnapp showid
undefined
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker exec earnapp earnapp showid
undefined
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker exec earnapp earnapp showid
undefined
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker exec earnapp earnapp showid
undefined
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker exec earnapp earnapp showid
sdk-node-9c66323355304d1fbb3e3bfc58ce9ab0
laborant@docker-01:~$ docker container logs earnapp
[WARN] EARNAPP_UUID not set — EarnApp will generate its own UUID.
[WARN] Ensure /etc/earnapp is mounted as a volume or your UUID will be lost on restart.
[INFO] Starting EarnApp...
Failed registration: check internet connection and try again

------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO] Waiting for UUID to be generated... (attempt 1/5, retrying in 1s)
[INFO] Waiting for UUID to be generated... (attempt 2/5, retrying in 2s)
[INFO] Waiting for UUID to be generated... (attempt 3/5, retrying in 4s)
[INFO] Waiting for UUID to be generated... (attempt 4/5, retrying in 8s)
[INFO] Waiting for UUID to be generated... (attempt 5/5, retrying in 16s)
/entrypoint.sh: line 88: /etc/earnapp/uuid: No such file or directory
[WARN] UUID not ready yet. Run 'docker exec earnapp earnapp showid' once the container is running.
------------------------------------------------------------

[madereddy]

Two things to note from your output:

"Failed registration: check internet connection"
This is EarnApp itself failing to reach BrightData's servers, likely a network restriction on that host. Not a container issue, the fact that showid eventually returned a valid UUID (sdk-node-9c66...) confirms EarnApp started and initialized correctly.

/etc/earnapp/uuid: No such file or directory
This is a real bug we've fixed. When EarnApp takes longer than expected to generate its UUID, the entrypoint falls back to reading the uuid file directly. A set -euo pipefail interaction was causing the file not found error to surface even though it was redirected.

Overall the container is behaving correctly UUID generates, EarnApp starts, restart loop is working. The error message was just noise from the fallback path. Fix will be in the next test build.