Operations & Maintenance¶

Running VortexUI in production: HTTPS, monitoring, scaling, database maintenance, and performance tuning.

HTTPS Setup¶

Option 1: Built-in ACME (Recommended)¶

New in 1.3.0

Automatic Let's Encrypt via Cloudflare DNS-01:

VORTEX_ACME_EMAIL=admin@example.com
CLOUDFLARE_API_TOKEN=cf_token_with_dns_edit
VORTEX_DOMAIN=panel.example.com

Certificates issue and renew automatically. No port 80 needed.

Option 2: Caddy (Auto HTTPS)¶

The default Docker setup includes Caddy, which handles HTTPS automatically:

panel.example.com {
    reverse_proxy api:8080
}

Option 3: Manual Certificate¶

sudo certbot certonly --standalone -d panel.example.com

Then configure in Nginx (see Manual Install).

Monitoring with Prometheus¶

Enable Metrics¶

VORTEX_METRICS_ENABLED=true
VORTEX_METRICS_LISTEN=:9090

Available Metrics¶

Metric	Description
vortex_users_total	Total users by status
vortex_nodes_online	Online node count
vortex_traffic_bytes	Traffic counters
vortex_connections_active	Active connections
vortex_api_requests_total	API request count
vortex_api_duration_seconds	Request latency
vortex_node_cpu	Per-node CPU
vortex_node_ram	Per-node RAM

Prometheus Config¶

scrape_configs:
  - job_name: vortexui
    static_configs:
      - targets: ['panel.example.com:9090']
    metrics_path: /metrics

Grafana Dashboard¶

Import the ready-made dashboard:

Grafana → Import
Use dashboard ID or paste JSON from docs/grafana-dashboard.json
Select Prometheus data source

Includes panels for: - User growth - Traffic trends - Node health - API performance

Database Maintenance¶

PostgreSQL + TimescaleDB¶

VortexUI uses TimescaleDB for time-series traffic data.

Backup¶

# Manual
vortexui backup

# Or direct pg_dump
pg_dump -U vortex vortexui | gzip > backup.sql.gz

Vacuum & Analyze¶

TimescaleDB auto-vacuums, but for manual optimization:

VACUUM ANALYZE;

Data Retention¶

Configure how long to keep detailed traffic data:

SELECT add_retention_policy('traffic_stats', INTERVAL '90 days');

Older data is automatically dropped, keeping the database lean.

Continuous Aggregates¶

TimescaleDB pre-computes hourly/daily rollups for fast analytics:

-- Hourly traffic aggregate (auto-maintained)
SELECT * FROM traffic_hourly WHERE time > now() - INTERVAL '24 hours';

Scaling¶

Vertical Scaling¶

For most deployments, add resources to the panel host:

Users	RAM	CPU
< 1,000	2 GB	2 vCPU
1,000-5,000	4 GB	4 vCPU
5,000-20,000	8 GB	8 vCPU
20,000+	16 GB+	8+ vCPU

Horizontal Scaling (Nodes)¶

Add more nodes to handle traffic: - Each node handles its own proxy traffic - Panel only manages coordination - Use load balancers to distribute users

Federation for Scale¶

New in 1.3.0

Split load across multiple panels: - One panel per region - Peers sync counts - Reduces single-panel load

Database Scaling¶

For very large deployments: - Move PostgreSQL to dedicated host - Use connection pooling (PgBouncer) - Consider read replicas for analytics

Performance Tuning¶

Panel Performance¶

# Increase DB connection pool
VORTEX_DB_MAX_CONNS=50

# Redis for session caching
VORTEX_REDIS_URL=redis://localhost:6379/0

# Worker concurrency
VORTEX_WORKERS=4

Node Performance¶

Enable BBR congestion control on nodes:

echo "net.core.default_qdisc=fq" >> /etc/sysctl.conf
echo "net.ipv4.tcp_congestion_control=bbr" >> /etc/sysctl.conf
sysctl -p

Increase file descriptor limits:

echo "* soft nofile 1000000" >> /etc/security/limits.conf
echo "* hard nofile 1000000" >> /etc/security/limits.conf

Redis Optimization¶

maxmemory 512mb
maxmemory-policy allkeys-lru

Log Management¶

Panel Logs¶

# Systemd
journalctl -u vortexui -f

# Docker
docker compose logs -f api

Log Levels¶

VORTEX_LOG_LEVEL=info  # debug, info, warn, error

Structured Logging¶

Logs are JSON-formatted for parsing:

{
  "level": "info",
  "time": "2026-01-15T14:32:05Z",
  "msg": "user created",
  "user_id": "abc123",
  "actor": "admin"
}

Log Rotation¶

For file logs, configure logrotate:

/var/log/vortexui/*.log {
    daily
    rotate 14
    compress
    missingok
}

Health Checks¶

Endpoint Monitoring¶

curl https://panel.example.com/api/health

Set up external monitoring: - UptimeRobot - Prometheus Blackbox Exporter - Healthchecks.io

Diagnostics¶

vortexui doctor

Checks: - ✅ Database connection - ✅ Redis connection - ✅ Node reachability - ✅ Port availability - ✅ Certificate validity - ✅ Disk space

Upgrade Procedures¶

Standard Upgrade¶

vortexui update

Zero-Downtime (Advanced)¶

For critical deployments: 1. Deploy new version to staging 2. Run migrations on replica 3. Switch traffic via load balancer 4. Verify, then decommission old

Rollback¶

# Restore from backup
vortexui restore backup-before-upgrade.sql.gz

# Or pin to previous version
git checkout v1.3.0
go build -o vortexui ./cmd/panel

Security Maintenance¶

Regular Tasks¶

Task	Frequency
Review audit log	Weekly
Rotate API tokens	Quarterly
Update dependencies	Monthly
Test backups	Monthly
Check certificate expiry	Automated
Review admin access	Quarterly

Certificate Renewal¶

With built-in ACME, renewal is automatic at T-30 days. Verify:

vortexui doctor  # checks cert validity

Disaster Recovery¶

Backup Strategy (3-2-1)¶

3 copies of data
2 different media types
1 off-site (S3, Telegram)

Recovery Steps¶

Provision new host
Install VortexUI
Restore database:
```
vortexui restore latest-backup.sql.gz
```
Verify nodes reconnect
Test user connectivity

RTO/RPO Targets¶

Metric	Target
RPO (data loss)	≤ 24h (with daily backup)
RTO (recovery time)	≤ 1h

Capacity Planning¶

Monitoring Growth¶

Track these metrics over time: - User count growth rate - Traffic per user - Peak concurrent connections - Database size growth

When to Scale¶

Signal	Action
CPU > 80% sustained	Add vCPU
RAM > 90%	Add RAM
DB > 50% disk	Add disk / retention policy
Node CPU > 80%	Add nodes
Panel slow	Consider federation