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Unable to skip login page

Open kallisti5 opened this issue 2 years ago • 353 comments

Describe the bug Suddenly unable to skip the login page.

To Reproduce Steps to reproduce the behavior:

  1. Open application

Expected behavior Able to skip. I can't even close the window given the lack of a close button :-1:

Workaround Use OpenLens found here: https://github.com/MuhammedKalkan/OpenLens

Screenshots no-skip

Environment (please complete the following information):

  • Lens Version: Lens-5.4.6-latest.20220428.1.x86_64
  • OS: Linux
  • Installation method (e.g. snap or AppImage in Linux): AppImage

kallisti5 avatar May 25 '22 13:05 kallisti5

Same problem here.

alex-berger avatar May 25 '22 13:05 alex-berger

Here's a workaround. Add the following to your /etc/hosts file:

127.0.0.1       app.k8slens.dev

That will break the login page, and let you click the skip button in Lens 5.4.x

Lens 5.4, last known version to allow skipping login page with hack above: https://gateway.pinata.cloud/ipfs/QmVVpMtbecfsyofgKZ2buHM7Xd6Shcr6HFJWNciRLeMPVx

kallisti5 avatar May 25 '22 13:05 kallisti5

@kallisti5 Thanks for the workaround. After getting past the login page with your workaround and then configuring lens to not show the login page, I could remove the entry in my /etc/hosts file and no login screen is showed.

Guess it will only be a matter of time before the option to disable the login page is removed as well.

davidspek avatar May 25 '22 13:05 davidspek

Here's a workaround. Add the following to your /etc/hosts file:

127.0.0.1       app.k8slens.dev

That will break the login page, and let you click the skip button.

I'm afraid this doesn't work, you get this error screen with no way to skip or close, only retry:

image

PeteH-SeriouslyRAD avatar May 25 '22 13:05 PeteH-SeriouslyRAD

Oof. Maybe it only works for the older 5.4 version.

Lens developers, hear me. You are accepting pull requests for your project.

The community is helping develop the application... going anti-user like this is a huge mistake if it's on purpose.

EDIT. It's on purpose, confirmed via Tweet. Take a look at k9s, kubenav, or octant for alternatives.

kallisti5 avatar May 25 '22 13:05 kallisti5

As someone who tested the latest beta, this was not present and I don't see any issue referenced that should have caused this. Maybe we give them a chance to respond before assuming? I too am disappointed the release version seems to force me to be stuck at this screen, but I have to believe this was not their intent.

npasken avatar May 25 '22 13:05 npasken

@npasken that's fair, I updated my comment to include "if it's on purpose" :-)

kallisti5 avatar May 25 '22 14:05 kallisti5

We do need a better way to fall back to the prior version we were using when things like this happen. @nevalla @Nokel81 @jim-docker - users who updated today with prompt are unable to use Lens. I found the last beta I was using: https://api.k8slens.dev/binaries/Lens%20Setup%205.5.0-beta.2.20220520.2.exe and without any modification to hosts file, am back up and running.

npasken avatar May 25 '22 14:05 npasken

Oof. Maybe it only works for the older 5.4 version.

Lens developers, hear me. You are accepting pull requests for your project.

The community is helping develop the application... going anti-user like this is a huge mistake if it's on purpose.

Ok I found an old 5.4 windows installer still available (grab it while it's there! https://api.k8slens.dev/binaries/Lens%20Setup%205.4.6-latest.20220421.1.exe). I've installed this version with the hosts file modification in place, and been able get past the login.

PeteH-SeriouslyRAD avatar May 25 '22 14:05 PeteH-SeriouslyRAD

Can I skip the Lens Spaces login dialog on the application start-up? Yes, you can. Click the Skip button in the lower-right corner of the dialog. You can also disable the login dialog. See Preferences for details.

Where is the skip button?

bpd1069 avatar May 25 '22 14:05 bpd1069

macOS: M1: https://api.k8slens.dev/binaries/Lens-5.4.6-latest.20220428.1-arm64.dmg Intel: https://api.k8slens.dev/binaries/Lens-5.4.6-latest.20220428.1.dmg

source: https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-cask/blob/HEAD/Casks/lens.rb

b2un0 avatar May 25 '22 14:05 b2un0

Seems it is intentional https://twitter.com/k8slens/status/1529470612380344321?s=21&t=yvydstNYJkrBPcKI_PTrwQ

harryjms avatar May 25 '22 14:05 harryjms

I had login page disabled in settings and looks like it was forcefully disabled after update. Now i'm getting kicked to login page with no ability to skip it.

rlex avatar May 25 '22 14:05 rlex

I believe, that the twitter post and the "you are not online, you cant use lens" screen confirm that, with the new version, a lens ID is in fact required.

jhoelzel avatar May 25 '22 14:05 jhoelzel

Next twitter announcement would say we are taking lens out of github and starting to charge users $$ for license fee.

zerowebcorp avatar May 25 '22 15:05 zerowebcorp

Yeah.. it feels like it's time to fork Lens. Any nodejs developers interested?

kallisti5 avatar May 25 '22 15:05 kallisti5

Kinda sad - the login screen doesn't even work for me. It just spins and spins...

npasken avatar May 25 '22 15:05 npasken

https://www.boatsafe.com/boating-glossary-terms/ Fun nautical terms for a fork rebrand :laughing:

kallisti5 avatar May 25 '22 15:05 kallisti5

Just adding to the voices, this is leading to an immediate removal of lens from my system.

opsydev avatar May 25 '22 15:05 opsydev

Yup bad move. The reasons are not justified IMHO what does me making an account have anything to do with collaboration, I work alone.

taz77 avatar May 25 '22 15:05 taz77

Rendered completely useless. Tried logging in with Github, I get a "Invalid credentials" against the cluster. Registered a new account, same "Invalid credentials" error. What a shame. I use Lens to do my work. I guess it's back to kubectl for me.

d3clan avatar May 25 '22 15:05 d3clan

Having a look for alternatives, I found https://github.com/vmware-tanzu/octant (through https://twitter.com/disconn3ct/status/1529487362828509184) - not yet into the details and unsure whether it's a good replacement, but I think it should be somewhere here that anyone can find it to try.

lenalebt avatar May 25 '22 15:05 lenalebt

k9s is another good option, if you're OK with cli interface https://github.com/derailed/k9s

rlex avatar May 25 '22 15:05 rlex

Here's another option which is pretty good: https://kubenav.io/

HighWatersDev avatar May 25 '22 15:05 HighWatersDev

why can't we just fork the Lens repository?

PhilippKuntschik avatar May 25 '22 15:05 PhilippKuntschik

It's getting SaaSified, the writing's been on the wall a while now.

I recommend the k9s alternative for anyone looking for a similar product.

0dragosh avatar May 25 '22 15:05 0dragosh

why can't we just fork the Lens repository?

We definitely can.. however we need someone well versed in nodejs to step up to maintaining it. It's probably a moderate project to maintain, but whomever did would have a lot of support via pull requests and community contribution.

I jokingly forked it, but pretty quickly realized there are a bunch of weird node requirements (really old nodejs 14.x, etc) to even build it. You would think the developers would be more focused on maintaining the app instead of just trying to turn it into a profit center... but here we are.

Hell, if someone steps up and maintains it without a login page and the SaaS crap, i'd gladly donate $5 - $10 a month.

Here's another option which is pretty good: https://kubenav.io/

I just installed it and gave it a try. Definitely a solid competitor (and it's written in go which is nice). The UI definitely needs some work though, and the "open a quick shell in a pod" feature is missing.

kallisti5 avatar May 25 '22 15:05 kallisti5

Based on this I have uninstalled and looks like Octant is a better fit for me anyways.

respectTheCode avatar May 25 '22 16:05 respectTheCode

Mandatory accounts are a dealbreaker for me. If this is the way Lens is taking things, I'll be ditching Lens.

asmith-v avatar May 25 '22 17:05 asmith-v

Mandatory accounts are a dealbreaker for me. If this is the way Lens is taking things, I'll be ditching Lens.

I agree

in the latest version you can press CTRL + Shift + I to open the chromium dev tools since this is an electron app.

From there you can open the elements tab and find the body->div element with the role presentation and right click it and choose hide element to bypass the login page.

I still need to verify a way to make it not auto-update again

image

Just wanted to add my voice to the list of users calling foul here. I have downgraded back to the previous version while I check out alternatives and will not continue using Lens if this requirement is not removed promptly.

matslarson avatar May 25 '22 17:05 matslarson

I too want to add my name to the list of dissatisfied users. I do not want to be forced to create yet another account. Period! Good bye Lens.

kaiwetlesen avatar May 25 '22 18:05 kaiwetlesen

from what I have found this Lens ID login page is not actually part of this repository, but rather part of an extension that is part of the official builds.

The login page is a webview iframe that opens up https://app.k8slens.dev/signin/realms/lensCloud/protocol/openid-connect/auth?client_id=lens-extension&redirect_uri=http%3A%2F%2Flocalhost...&inApp=true and I cannot find the code to change anywhere in this repo. image

~~the good news is that once you delete or hide the div role=presentation element and bypass the page, then you can go into the application preferences and disable this~~

removed the setting in the latest version

image

https://docs.k8slens.dev/main/getting-started/preferences/#disable-the-lens-spaces-login-screen

~~ah ha! I found another maybe better workaround.~~

Update 6-29-2022: no longer works in latest version

the lenscloud extension preferences on my windows machine are stored here

"%appdata%\Lens\extension-store\lenscloud-lens-extension\startup-store.json"

change the line to

{"skipSignup":true}

ah ha! I found another maybe better workaround.

the lenscloud extension preferences on my windows machine are stored here

"%appdata%\Lens\extension-store\lenscloud-lens-extension\startup-store.json"

change the line to

{"skipSignup":true}

I just tried this on macOS and it works well. The file location is ~/Library/Application\ Support/Lens/extension-store/lenscloud-lens-extension/startup-store.json

msnelling avatar May 25 '22 19:05 msnelling

I take it back, I forgot I was still signed in. If I sign out and, even with this flag set to true, I'm still prompted.

msnelling avatar May 25 '22 19:05 msnelling

try closing out of lens before setting it to true, just in case the preference gets overwritten on close.

Having a look for alternatives, I found https://github.com/vmware-tanzu/octant (through https://twitter.com/disconn3ct/status/1529487362828509184) - not yet into the details and unsure whether it's a good replacement, but I think it should be somewhere here that anyone can find it to try.

Lens was my replacement to Octant already 😥 , I dont want to go back to Octant really , It s not bad but Lens is far better , too sad .

nicohouillon avatar May 25 '22 19:05 nicohouillon

Can anyone explain why these additional extensions come pre-bundled with lens?

lenscloud-lens-extension
license-menu-item
survey
telemetry

image

Since they are not part of this file, how do they get added to the build? https://github.com/lensapp/lens/blob/master/.bundled-extensions.json#L3

.bundled-extensions.json

the good news is that once you delete or hide the div role=presentation element and bypass the page, then you can go into the application preferences and disable this image

https://docs.k8slens.dev/main/getting-started/preferences/#disable-the-lens-spaces-login-screen

no such option on 5.5.0 as well as "%appdata%\Lens\extension-store\lenscloud-lens-extension\startup-store.json" is not present ... they lock us down hard !

nicohouillon avatar May 25 '22 19:05 nicohouillon

no such option on 5.5.0 as well as "%appdata%\Lens\extension-store\lenscloud-lens-extension\startup-store.json" is not present ... they lock us down hard !

uh oh, is there a way to stop it from updating? maybe putting in a bad proxy address in the proxy setting?

Update: it seems that installing with the CLI includes a way to block updates. https://docs.k8slens.dev/main/getting-started/#installing-with-cli command line switch /disableAutoUpdates on windows according to the documentation.

Legit thought this was an unintentional bug.. I was okay having an optional login/signup page but this change has clearly gone too far and I am considering switching to alternatives at this point.

nitinsh99 avatar May 25 '22 20:05 nitinsh99

I've tried building Lens straight from git and got OpenLens without login page etc.

Here's an .AppImage I'll continue using if anybody wants to try it

https://file.io/MLJo7cM3vntW

btw. linux x86_64 only

ps. if you don't trust this file I recommend you build it yourself, it's safer anyway..

bvujnovac avatar May 25 '22 21:05 bvujnovac

We all understand the need to get the value for our labor. I don't bemoan that, but as many others have pointed out the community has improved this product. I think it's disrespectful to force an account creation. I actually have an account. Having to skip login every-time was enough soft pressure. I've just downloaded this on my work laptop and am immediately uninstalling. I now cant suggest this to anyone in our organization.

This was a bad move

rlewkowicz avatar May 25 '22 21:05 rlewkowicz

At our company, we have been encouraging everyone to install Lens as a way to view information about development and testing pods on our development cluster. We were hoping that this could be a teaching mechanism for introducing our workforce to the concepts of Kubernetes.

For people that are intimidated or hesitant to adopt Kubernetes and learn how it works, having this extra hurdle to make an account (and have internet access?) raises the minimum barrier to entry unnecessarily.

We are now scrambling to make a custom version where updates are disabled as well as the login screen, so that everyone brave enough to take the plunge into Kubernetes with Lens does not immediately say, "Oh what am I supposed to do here? Do I have to make an account just to check my pod's logs? I didn't realize I would have to do all that. So how do I cancel this? Where is the X in the corner to even close this screen?"

I've been using lens for quite a few years now and been loving it. I'm going to be downgrading to a previous version and looking at alternatives (probably k9s). I used to suggest lens to tons of people but not anymore.

The new version doesn't even work.. Kept freezing up on me

eric-engberg avatar May 25 '22 21:05 eric-engberg

i use asdf (https://github.com/asdf-vm/asdf) to manage local version of node, python and etc, so my guide will be using it. With asdf you don't need to install nodejs globally - it goes to your homedir and you can have as many versions as you want. I assume everyone working with k8s have enough knowledge of CLI, but just in case i will provide step-by-step instruction. This instruction should work on both osx and linux. Install asdf using their instruction (http://asdf-vm.com/guide/getting-started.html#_1-install-dependencies - steps 1,2,3), then build lens:

#install nodejs plugin for asdf
asdf plugin add nodejs
#latest version of 16.x nodejs which is required by lens
asdf install nodejs 16.16.0
#checkout lens 
git clone https://github.com/lensapp/lens.git
#go to lens dir
cd lens
#checkout tag
git checkout v6.0.0
#instruct asdf to use nodejs 16.16.0 for this directory, in case you have other versions of node installed
asdf local nodejs 16.16.0
#finally, launch build
make build

Go brew some coffee, that will take some time. Then look in dist/ directory for your crap-free build! In case of OSX, it will be both .zip and .dmg - use what you want.

❯ ls -la dist                                                                                                                                                                                                                  
total 691464
drwxr-xr-x  12 lex  staff        384 May 26 00:54 ./
drwxr-xr-x  45 lex  staff       1440 May 26 00:50 ../
drwxr-xr-x   3 lex  staff         96 May 26 00:50 .icon-icns/
-rw-r--r--   1 lex  staff  168309415 May 26 00:51 OpenLens-5.5.0-latest.1653515314271-arm64-mac.zip
-rw-r--r--   1 lex  staff     175040 May 26 00:51 OpenLens-5.5.0-latest.1653515314271-arm64-mac.zip.blockmap
-rw-r--r--@  1 lex  staff  174862239 May 26 00:51 OpenLens-5.5.0-latest.1653515314271-arm64.dmg
-rw-r--r--   1 lex  staff     182721 May 26 00:51 OpenLens-5.5.0-latest.1653515314271-arm64.dmg.blockmap
drwxr-xr-x   3 lex  staff         96 May 26 00:50 OpenLens.app/
-rw-r--r--   1 lex  staff        750 May 26 00:51 builder-debug.yml
-rw-r--r--   1 lex  staff       2066 May 26 00:50 builder-effective-config.yaml
-rw-r--r--   1 lex  staff        592 May 26 00:51 latest-mac.yml
drwxr-xr-x   3 lex  staff         96 May 26 00:50 mac-arm64/

Obviously, it won't support autoupdates, so you will need to subscribe for releases and build every version yourself. As for features, i hasn't noticed any differences between openlens and lens.

rlex avatar May 25 '22 21:05 rlex

I would really like to know whose genius idea was this at Mirantis?

nitinsh99 avatar May 25 '22 22:05 nitinsh99

seriously, wtf? who thought this was a good idea?

slin1237 avatar May 25 '22 22:05 slin1237

The change that caused this was done to a private repo. There is nothing in this open source codebase that uses the lenscloud-lens-extension.

here is the package.json showing the extension that is included by default in the build that the Mirantis installer installs.

  "name": "lenscloud-lens-extension",
  "publisher": "k8slens.dev",
  "version": "5.4.5-latest.20220405.1",
  "description": "Extension for getting access to Lens Spaces",
  "homepage": "",
  "repository": {
    "type": "git",
    "url": "https://github.com/lensapp/lenscloud-lens-extension"
  },
  "bugs": {
    "url": "https://github.com/lensapp/lenscloud-lens-extension/issues"
  },
  "engines": {
    "lens": 

So as @rlex has shown. If you clone the repo and build the app from source yourself. there is no issue. But if you leave this GitHub repo and go find the "official" installer, it will include more than just the opensource code in this repo and thus will have the lenscloud-lens-extension enabled by default.

It does seem a tad shady to package up additional private extensions that are enabled by default in what we thought was an open source tool, but I guess if you are taking the time and effort to build binaries for installers for different platforms and host them online, then you can just do whatever you want.

Well I see that corporate analytics and greed win in another "community" supported project. Please reconsider this, you are taking commits and code from the community and locking them behind something that they may not support.

TheSp1der avatar May 25 '22 22:05 TheSp1der

I think the fact that this bug currently has 76 :+1: 's shows it was a pretty unpopular move. Lens should seriously reconsider this change or risk losing a large amount of their user base.

kallisti5 avatar May 26 '22 01:05 kallisti5

time to say goodbye , and time to another fork

lengxugz avatar May 26 '22 01:05 lengxugz

We were getting ready to effectively roll this tool out to all our developers as a means for interacting with our environments. I do not work for a small org. Not only can we no longer recommend this tool as we have no certainty over its future with this stunt, but we are effectively 100% locked out of new installations due to corporate network configuration preventing the login screen from reaching the internet. Bummer.

Ugenx avatar May 26 '22 02:05 Ugenx

On MacOS, I've found you can bypass this by just nuking the extension directory at /Applications/Lens.app/Contents/Resources/extensions/lenscloud-lens-extension (with the app closed)

*For good measure, deleting the line from ~/Library/Application Support/Lens/package.json and deleting the alias at ~/Library/Application Support/Lens/node_modules/lenscloud-lens-extension doesn't hurt either

Cooksauce avatar May 26 '22 05:05 Cooksauce

Was recommending this tool pretty much every time I made introduction sessions to Kubernetes. The first time I saw login screen, it was obvious where it was going. Knowing how big organizations work, I would guess it was a decision not from engineering department.

About the fork (if there will be one):

I am up to putting some private development hours into development, I have a bit of Electron development and some more frontend development experience. Becoming a single maintainer will be unlikely possible, but I would certainly join the effort if there are more people joining.

asinitson avatar May 26 '22 07:05 asinitson

Farewell Lens, it was good times.

Danpiel avatar May 26 '22 07:05 Danpiel

so long, and thanks for all the fish

alecunsolo avatar May 26 '22 08:05 alecunsolo

I just wanted to leave this small message, I may be just one user but I convinced multiple people to use Lens at my company to the point that it was an essential part of our technology stack but today I explained what happened with Lens and why I will stop using Lens from this day on.

This decision was not the best, I still do not understand the need for this. I manage clusters that generate the wealth of our clients, I cannot trust Lens to manage them anymore with this mandatory change, even if the LensID is not something that could affect us in a direct way. This feels like a violation of privacy.

I hope that Lens takes the right turn at some point in time but at least for now I cannot feed this pattern. This, for me, feels like the changes Docker made to pricing and the usage of Docker Desktop.

Best luck to the Lens team!

RafaelMoreira1180778 avatar May 26 '22 10:05 RafaelMoreira1180778

Joining all the "uninstallers" and sending a company wide recommendation to do the same...

Can anyone share any impressions on the "Octant" alternative?

tmeltser avatar May 26 '22 10:05 tmeltser

FYI: I've managed to download Lens v4.2.5 from chocolatey. Versions 5.4.x all forced login, not sure about versions within the 5.x range but v4 asked to upgrade (umm... nope!) but let me in ok

grahambunce avatar May 26 '22 12:05 grahambunce

i believe this is a regression of https://github.com/lensapp/lens/issues/5116 - but this is the 3rd time by my calculations. @Nokel81 fixed it the last time

its just that this time the regression has made lens totally unusable

marafa-sugarcrm avatar May 26 '22 12:05 marafa-sugarcrm

i believe this is a regression of #5116 - but this is the 3rd time by my calculations. @Nokel81 fixed it the last time

its just that this time the regression has made lens totally unusable

We confirmed early on it was on purpose per the Lens team's twitter.

lens https://twitter.com/k8slens/status/1529470612380344321

kallisti5 avatar May 26 '22 12:05 kallisti5

i just fixed it on mac as per https://github.com/lensapp/lens/issues/5444#issuecomment-1138156962

make sure lens is NOT running

rm -rf /Applications/Lens.app/Contents/Resources/extensions/lenscloud-lens-extension  ~/Library/Application\ Support/Lens/node_modules/lenscloud-lens-extension
sed -i 's/lenscloud-lens-extension.*//g'  ~/Library/Application\ Support/Lens/package.json

start lens

but yeah .. will have to start thinking about alternatives

marafa-sugarcrm avatar May 26 '22 12:05 marafa-sugarcrm

i believe this is a regression of #5116 - but this is the 3rd time by my calculations. @Nokel81 fixed it the last time its just that this time the regression has made lens totally unusable

We confirmed early on it was on purpose per the Lens team's twitter.

lens https://twitter.com/k8slens/status/1529470612380344321

I think it should be rephrased into "... it establishes a foundation for Lens to MAKE SOME MONEY DOWN THE ROAD!"

namgk avatar May 26 '22 14:05 namgk

This is... unfortunate.

Happily though, I've just discovered Octant. From playing with it for the past 5 minutes, it's actually better designed and more responsive than the Lens UI ever was. Goodbye Lens.

keith-f avatar May 26 '22 14:05 keith-f

This is... unfortunate.

Happily though, I've just discovered Octant. From playing with it for the past 5 minutes, it's actually better designed and more responsive than the Lens UI ever was. Goodbye Lens.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I thought it was established that Octant was a dead project (no longer maintained/updated)

eric-engberg avatar May 26 '22 14:05 eric-engberg

Correct me if I'm wrong but I thought it was established that Octant was a dead project (no longer maintained/updated)

Its time to revive)

hardenchant avatar May 26 '22 14:05 hardenchant

k9s to go

namgk avatar May 26 '22 15:05 namgk

Twitter suggested kubenav, which at a glance looks like a good cross between Lens and the "stock" dashboard. Lots of options for install (in-cluster web, mobile, electron-desktop)

disconn3ct avatar May 26 '22 15:05 disconn3ct

So...

127.0.0.1       app.k8slens.dev

...and...

IgnorePkg = lens-bin

...for now.

Joining all the uninstallers.

greguz avatar May 26 '22 15:05 greguz

I now cant suggest this to anyone in our organization.

👋🏻 . and I'm sad, because I happily pay developers for good software like this. But I'm not tolerating coercive features..

samrees avatar May 26 '22 15:05 samrees

Word to the developers - If you want this project to continue being successful, then forcing logins is not the way to do it!

For everybody else, can confirm the deleting the Cloud Plugin fixed it for me on a MacOS:

rm -rf /Applications/Lens.app/Contents/Resources/extensions/lenscloud-lens-extension

projx avatar May 26 '22 15:05 projx

This causes an issue with being unable to use lens with local clusters when testing in an offline state. As soon as the internet connection is lost, lens becomes completely useless, even though I can still communicate with my local clusters directly via kubectl. Having an always required internet connection for lens is going to be a significant roadblock for justifying its continue use in my toolset.

ak185158 avatar May 26 '22 15:05 ak185158

This causes an issue with being unable to use lens with local clusters when testing in an offline state. As soon as the internet connection is lost, lens becomes completely useless, even though I can still communicate with my local clusters directly via kubectl. Having an always required internet connection for lens is going to be a significant roadblock for justifying its continue use in my toolset.

We are actively investigating these issues. This is not intended behavior. The intended behavior is that Lens ID is associated with Lens Desktop application just once. The intention is for Lens to continue to work without internet connection.

Eionel avatar May 26 '22 16:05 Eionel

As JoelBirlingmairBeastCode commented earlier, this appears to be an issue with the packaged versions of Lens.

I can confirm that the extension that is causing the login prompt is NOT included when built directly from this repository. While this is giving us a platform to voice our disagreements about the change in policy, it has little to do with this repository. You can easily build this in a node container and reap the rewards of a fully functional ~~death star~~ OpenLens application.

I would like to recommend that we automate the building of release binaries of this repository as an alternative.

TheSp1der avatar May 26 '22 16:05 TheSp1der

I would like to recommend that we automate the building of release binaries of this repository as an alternative.

This sounds like a good alternative, i think VSCode had builds with "open" and "proprietary" parts available. Not sure if this is still the case.

rlex avatar May 26 '22 17:05 rlex

This causes an issue with being unable to use lens with local clusters when testing in an offline state. As soon as the internet connection is lost, lens becomes completely useless, even though I can still communicate with my local clusters directly via kubectl. Having an always required internet connection for lens is going to be a significant roadblock for justifying its continue use in my toolset.

We are actively investigating these issues. This is not intended behavior. The intended behavior is that Lens ID is associated with Lens Desktop application just once. The intention is for Lens to continue to work without internet connection.

No, you guys are not getting the point. What we really care about is not login once or twice. The point is that we need make our own decision to log in or not. NOT just forcing us to login with Lens ID.

tuzkiyoung avatar May 26 '22 17:05 tuzkiyoung

I think showing up in here to address another issue while ignoring the elephant in the room is not a great look either...

bo0tzz avatar May 26 '22 17:05 bo0tzz

Something like a "Steam offline mode" would be really nice for the hybrid/edge cloud. The reason why the login is rated as a bug is that the repo installation guide refers to k8slens.dev where the extended AppImages are offered, which mixes open source and extension.

I still want to emphasize what a great application Lens is!

docker run -it ubuntu:jammy bash

# In container:
ln -sf /usr/bin/python3 /usr/bin/python
apt update && apt install git make curl g++ rpm -y
curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_14.x | bash -
apt update && apt install nodejs -y
npm install --global yarn
git clone https://github.com/lensapp/lens.git && cd lens && rm node_modules
git checkout v5.5.1 && make build
# This will crash with rpm saying something like it can't build rpms with converted dashes
# But AppImage works fine:
# Result is like:
ls dist/
#OpenLens-5.5.1-latest.1653583816293.x86_64.AppImage
#OpenLens-5.5.1-latest.1653585604059.amd64.deb

# On your host:
# Fetch running container id
docker ps
# Copy AppImage to host
docker cp <container_id>:/lens/dist/OpenLens-5.5.1-latest.1653583816293.x86_64.AppImage ~/
chmod +x OpenLens-5.5.1-latest.1653583816293.x86_64.AppImage
./OpenLens-5.5.1-latest.1653583816293.x86_64.AppImage

FischerLGLN avatar May 26 '22 17:05 FischerLGLN

Well i. have moved on to Octant. So far so good. Goodbye Lens.

MuhammedKalkan avatar May 26 '22 18:05 MuhammedKalkan

Lens is owned by my ISP i think. i have to be on internet to use Lens. might just charge me some money so i can use it offline. it is useless for me now. Thanks for everything until this point.

dzou-hpe avatar May 26 '22 19:05 dzou-hpe

ah ha! I found another maybe better workaround.

the lenscloud extension preferences on my windows machine are stored here

"%appdata%\Lens\extension-store\lenscloud-lens-extension\startup-store.json"

change the line to

{"skipSignup":true}

You Sir are the real MVP

ysma500 avatar May 26 '22 19:05 ysma500

ah ha! I found another maybe better workaround. the lenscloud extension preferences on my windows machine are stored here "%appdata%\Lens\extension-store\lenscloud-lens-extension\startup-store.json" change the line to

{"skipSignup":true}

You Sir are the real MVP

This isn't working for me with Lens on MacOS. ("skipSignup": true was already set from the last time I skipped signing up.)

Is anyone else having a different result with this on MacOS?

programmablemike avatar May 26 '22 21:05 programmablemike

I would be happy to pay for the Enterprise/Pro version with the skip button

adeptg avatar May 27 '22 02:05 adeptg

The change that caused this was done to a private repo. There is nothing in this open source codebase that uses the lenscloud-lens-extension.

here is the package.json showing the extension that is included by default in the build that the Mirantis installer installs.

  "name": "lenscloud-lens-extension",
  "publisher": "k8slens.dev",
  "version": "5.4.5-latest.20220405.1",
  "description": "Extension for getting access to Lens Spaces",
  "homepage": "",
  "repository": {
    "type": "git",
    "url": "https://github.com/lensapp/lenscloud-lens-extension"
  },
  "bugs": {
    "url": "https://github.com/lensapp/lenscloud-lens-extension/issues"
  },
  "engines": {
    "lens": 

So as @rlex has shown. If you clone the repo and build the app from source yourself. there is no issue. But if you leave this GitHub repo and go find the "official" installer, it will include more than just the opensource code in this repo and thus will have the lenscloud-lens-extension enabled by default.

It does seem a tad shady to package up additional private extensions that are enabled by default in what we thought was an open source tool, but I guess if you are taking the time and effort to build binaries for installers for different platforms and host them online, then you can just do whatever you want.

So you're saying we don't have to maintain a fork? Just maintain a distribution of the opensource repo? That's a lot easier.

MattGson avatar May 27 '22 02:05 MattGson

I switched to k9s and it worked really well for me probably because I used Vim before. https://github.com/derailed/k9s

Thanks for everything until this update.

ShaoyiZhang avatar May 27 '22 04:05 ShaoyiZhang

For Windows (Windows 10 for my case) remove the folder %localappdata%\Programs\Lens\resources\extensions\lescloud-lens-extension while Lens app closed worked for me.

gbg-sany avatar May 27 '22 05:05 gbg-sany

The workarounds aren't working for me.

Another good app consigned to history.

ps68060 avatar May 27 '22 08:05 ps68060

I have quite some issues after removing the lenscloud extension folders at lest with the Mac version. Selecting a pod gives me an "invalid string length" error and clicking the edit button on other resources works but is delayed by more than 10s. Using the older version (with the localhost hack) works though.

mbaeuerle avatar May 27 '22 09:05 mbaeuerle

Workarounds not working for me as well.
Living behind a corporate proxy (using SSL interception) locks me out as well as enterprise policies that require verification and approval for the use of SaaS/PaaS/... services which will take some time go went through.

As with Docker Desktop we will give alternatives a try like Rancher (Desktop).
Lens IDE is still a great peace of software so this is REALLY SAD!...

Update:
As mentioned in other comments, 5.4.6 is still working fine on Windows 10 https://api.k8slens.dev/binaries/Lens%20Setup%205.4.6-latest.20220428.1.exe

wegerts avatar May 27 '22 09:05 wegerts

@mbaeuerle I did not touch anything and I am having the same issue. See https://github.com/lensapp/lens/issues/5476

daper avatar May 27 '22 09:05 daper

The "skip" option should have remained if you ask me. The need to hoard PII for an open source project that relied heavily on contributor effort is a huge facepalm. I too have uninstalled it and will hope for someone to fork or for this decision to be reverted. It's okay to ask for corporate subscription, offer team based features, but this implementation.. No.

luceos avatar May 27 '22 09:05 luceos

Installed 5.5.1 from brew and then from .DMG both distros don't have a Skip button.

5.4.6 is working just fine

den-is avatar May 27 '22 09:05 den-is

https://lens-binaries.s3.amazonaws.com/ide/Lens%20Setup%205.4.6-latest.20220428.1.exe Surprised no one found this earlier But yeah, new version wouldn't allow me to connect to the clusters I work with. After being forced to login; not a great update.

Laurens-W avatar May 27 '22 09:05 Laurens-W

For Windows (Windows 10 for my case) remove the folder %localappdata%\Programs\Lens\resources\extensions\lescloud-lens-extension while Lens app closed worked for me.

I have tried the same and found out that a "skip" button appears just for a second. I've had to press it and i've been able to run lens without problems.

atxulo avatar May 27 '22 09:05 atxulo

Hello all, I've created this repo for automatic Lens builds. It checks for the latest version of Lens and if a new version is released it automatically builds this repo for macOS AMD64.

Repo is also a Homebrew Tap and automatically updates the openlens cask with the latest version. So you can use with Homebrew as well.

brew tap ykursadkaya/openlens
brew install openlens

https://github.com/ykursadkaya/homebrew-openlens https://github.com/ykursadkaya/homebrew-openlens/releases

ykursadkaya avatar May 27 '22 09:05 ykursadkaya

@mbaeuerle I did not touch anything and I am having the same issue. See #5476

@daper I see, thanks for sharing! Haven't tested the newest version without removing the extensions so I falsely assumed the issue was related.

mbaeuerle avatar May 27 '22 10:05 mbaeuerle