MongoDB

Curated name mongodb. Adds a MongoDB 8 service to the workbench in compose mode, with seeded dev credentials and a readiness healthcheck.

What it’s for

A document database for local development - a real MongoDB your app runs against, with a root user seeded for you. Use it when your stack stores documents/JSON rather than relational rows.

Add it

At init, or to an existing workbench:

monoceros init acme --with-services=mongodb
monoceros add-service acme mongodb

Need a second database? Add it again under a different name with --as - each instance gets its own host, data dir, and connection env:

monoceros add-service acme mongodb --as=events

Remove it

monoceros remove-service acme mongodb

Or delete the service’s block from acme.yml by hand and re-run monoceros apply acme - the yml is the source of truth. (Its data volume monoceros-acme-data-mongodb is removed with the workbench on monoceros remove, which backs it up first.)

The yml entry

services:
  - name: mongodb # host name in the container + data dir name
    image: mongo:8
    port: 27017 # in-container port (feeds `monoceros tunnel`)
    env:
      MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_USERNAME: ${MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_USERNAME} # values live in acme.env
      MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_PASSWORD: ${MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_PASSWORD}
      MONGO_INITDB_DATABASE: ${MONGO_INITDB_DATABASE}
    volumes:
      - data:/data/db # the service's own Docker volume
    restart: unless-stopped
    healthcheck: # workspace waits for service_healthy
      test: [CMD, mongosh, --quiet, --eval, 'db.adminCommand({ ping: 1 }).ok']
      interval: 10s
      timeout: 5s
      retries: 5
    connectionEnv: # → the workspace env vars below
      URL: mongodb://${MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_USERNAME}:${MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_PASSWORD}@${host}:${port}/${MONGO_INITDB_DATABASE}?authSource=admin
      HOST: ${host}
      PORT: ${port}
      USER: ${MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_USERNAME}
      PASSWORD: ${MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_PASSWORD}
      DB: ${MONGO_INITDB_DATABASE}

The credentials are ${VAR} references; the real values live in acme.env (dev default monoceros for user, password, and database), so the yml stays shareable without baking credentials in (see Workbench configuration).

What your code sees

Monoceros injects a connection env into the workspace container, prefixed with the service name:

Variable	Value (defaults)
`MONGODB_URL`	`mongodb://monoceros:monoceros@mongodb:27017/monoceros?authSource=admin`
`MONGODB_HOST`	`mongodb`
`MONGODB_PORT`	`27017`
`MONGODB_USER`	`monoceros`
`MONGODB_PASSWORD`	`monoceros`
`MONGODB_DB`	`monoceros`

The URL carries ?authSource=admin because the seeded user is the root user (authenticated against the admin database). The prefix is the service name, uppercased, so a second instance added with --as=events gets EVENTS_URL, … and never collides.