Manage volumes

The default OpenStack Block Storage service implementation is an iSCSI solution that uses Logical Volume Manager (LVM) for Linux.

Note

The OpenStack Block Storage service also provides drivers that enable you to use several vendors’ back-end storage devices in addition to the base LVM implementation. These storage devices can also be used instead of the base LVM installation.

This high-level procedure shows you how to create and attach a volume to a server instance.

To create and attach a volume to an instance

1. Configure the OpenStack Compute and the OpenStack Block Storage services through the /etc/cinder/cinder.conf file.

2. Use the openstack volume create command to create a volume. This command creates an LV into the volume group (VG) cinder-volumes.

3. Use the openstack server add volume command to attach the volume to an instance. This command creates a unique IQN that is exposed to the compute node.

   • The compute node, which runs the instance, now has an active iSCSI session and new local storage (usually a /dev/sdX disk).

   • Libvirt uses that local storage as storage for the instance. The instance gets a new disk (usually a /dev/vdX disk).

For this particular walkthrough, one cloud controller runs nova-api, nova-scheduler, nova-conductor and cinder-* services. Two additional compute nodes run nova-compute. The walkthrough uses a custom partitioning scheme that carves out 60 GB of space and labels it as LVM. The network uses the FlatManager and NetworkManager settings for OpenStack Compute.

The network mode does not interfere with OpenStack Block Storage operations, but you must set up networking for Block Storage to work. For details, see networking.

To set up Compute to use volumes, ensure that Block Storage is installed along with lvm2. This guide describes how to troubleshoot your installation and back up your Compute volumes.

• Boot from volume
• Configure an NFS storage back end
• Configure multiple-storage back ends
  • Enable multiple-storage back ends
  • Configure shared volume driver backends
  • Configure Block Storage scheduler multi back end
  • Volume type
  • Usage
• Back up Block Storage service disks
• Migrate volumes
• Back up and restore volumes and snapshots
  • Cancelling
• Export and import backup metadata
• Use LIO iSCSI support
• Configure and use volume number weigher
  • Enable volume number weigher
  • Configure multiple-storage back ends
  • Volume type
  • Usage
• Capacity based quality of service
• Consistency groups
• Configure and use driver filter and weighing for scheduler
  • What is driver filter and weigher and when to use it
  • Enable driver filter and weighing
  • Defining your own filter and goodness functions
  • Supported operations in filter and goodness functions
  • Available properties when creating custom functions
    • Host stats for a back end
    • Capabilities specific to a back end
    • Requested volume properties
  • Extra specs for the requested volume type
  • Current QoS specs for the requested volume type
  • Driver filter and weigher usage examples
• Rate-limit volume copy bandwidth
  • Configure volume copy bandwidth limit
• Oversubscription in thin provisioning
  • Configure oversubscription settings
  • Capabilities
  • Volume type extra specs
  • Volume replication extra specs
  • Capacity filter
  • Capacity weigher
• Image-Volume cache
  • Configure the Internal Tenant
  • Configure the Image-Volume cache
  • Notifications
  • Managing cached Image-Volumes
• Volume-backed image
  • Configure the Volume-backed image
  • Creating a Volume-backed image
• Get capabilities
  • Usage of cinder client
  • Disable a service
  • Usage of REST API
  • Usage of volume type access extension
• Generic volume groups

Note

To enable the use of encrypted volumes, see the setup instructions in Create an encrypted volume type.