Devstack with Octavia Load Balancing

Starting with the OpenStack Pike release, Octavia is now a standalone service providing load balancing services for OpenStack.

This guide will show you how to create a devstack with Octavia API enabled.

Phase 1: Create DevStack + 2 nova instances

First, set up a vm of your choice with at least 8 GB RAM and 16 GB disk space, make sure it is updated. Install git and any other developer tools you find useful.

Install devstack

git clone https://opendev.org/openstack/devstack
cd devstack/tools
sudo ./create-stack-user.sh
cd ../..
sudo mv devstack /opt/stack
sudo chown -R stack.stack /opt/stack/devstack

This will clone the current devstack code locally, then setup the “stack” account that devstack services will run under. Finally, it will move devstack into its default location in /opt/stack/devstack.

Edit your /opt/stack/devstack/local.conf to look like

[[local|localrc]]
enable_plugin octavia https://opendev.org/openstack/octavia
# If you are enabling horizon, include the octavia dashboard
# enable_plugin octavia-dashboard https://opendev.org/openstack/octavia-dashboard.git
# If you are enabling barbican for TLS offload in Octavia, include it here.
# enable_plugin barbican https://opendev.org/openstack/barbican

# ===== BEGIN localrc =====
DATABASE_PASSWORD=password
ADMIN_PASSWORD=password
SERVICE_PASSWORD=password
SERVICE_TOKEN=password
RABBIT_PASSWORD=password
# Enable Logging
LOGFILE=$DEST/logs/stack.sh.log
VERBOSE=True
LOG_COLOR=True
# Pre-requisite
ENABLED_SERVICES=rabbit,mysql,key
# Horizon - enable for the OpenStack web GUI
# ENABLED_SERVICES+=,horizon
# Nova
ENABLED_SERVICES+=,n-api,n-crt,n-cpu,n-cond,n-sch,n-api-meta,n-sproxy
ENABLED_SERVICES+=,placement-api,placement-client
# Glance
ENABLED_SERVICES+=,g-api
# Neutron
ENABLED_SERVICES+=,q-svc,q-agt,q-dhcp,q-l3,q-meta,neutron
ENABLED_SERVICES+=,octavia,o-cw,o-hk,o-hm,o-api
# Cinder
ENABLED_SERVICES+=,c-api,c-vol,c-sch
# Tempest
ENABLED_SERVICES+=,tempest
# Barbican - Optionally used for TLS offload in Octavia
# ENABLED_SERVICES+=,barbican
# ===== END localrc =====

Run stack.sh and do some sanity checks

sudo su - stack
cd /opt/stack/devstack
./stack.sh
. ./openrc

openstack network list  # should show public and private networks

Create two nova instances that we can use as test http servers:

#create nova instances on private network
openstack server create --image $(openstack image list | awk '/ cirros-.*-x86_64-.* / {print $2}') --flavor 1 --nic net-id=$(openstack network list | awk '/ private / {print $2}') node1
openstack server create --image $(openstack image list | awk '/ cirros-.*-x86_64-.* / {print $2}') --flavor 1 --nic net-id=$(openstack network list | awk '/ private / {print $2}') node2
openstack server list # should show the nova instances just created

#add secgroup rules to allow ssh etc..
openstack security group rule create default --protocol icmp
openstack security group rule create default --protocol tcp --dst-port 22:22
openstack security group rule create default --protocol tcp --dst-port 80:80

Set up a simple web server on each of these instances. ssh into each instance (username ‘cirros’, password ‘cubswin:)’ or ‘gocubsgo’) and run

MYIP=$(ifconfig eth0|grep 'inet addr'|awk -F: '{print $2}'| awk '{print $1}')
while true; do echo -e "HTTP/1.0 200 OK\r\n\r\nWelcome to $MYIP" | sudo nc -l -p 80 ; done&

Phase 2: Create your load balancer

Make sure you have the ‘openstack loadbalancer’ commands:

pip install python-octaviaclient

Create your load balancer:

openstack loadbalancer create --name lb1 --vip-subnet-id private-subnet
openstack loadbalancer show lb1  # Wait for the provisioning_status to be ACTIVE.
openstack loadbalancer listener create --protocol HTTP --protocol-port 80 --name listener1 lb1
openstack loadbalancer show lb1  # Wait for the provisioning_status to be ACTIVE.
openstack loadbalancer pool create --lb-algorithm ROUND_ROBIN --listener listener1 --protocol HTTP --name pool1
openstack loadbalancer show lb1  # Wait for the provisioning_status to be ACTIVE.
openstack loadbalancer healthmonitor create --delay 5 --timeout 2 --max-retries 1 --type HTTP pool1
openstack loadbalancer show lb1  # Wait for the provisioning_status to be ACTIVE.
openstack loadbalancer member create --subnet-id private-subnet --address <web server 1 address> --protocol-port 80 pool1
openstack loadbalancer show lb1  # Wait for the provisioning_status to be ACTIVE.
openstack loadbalancer member create --subnet-id private-subnet --address <web server 2 address> --protocol-port 80 pool1

Please note: The <web server # address> fields are the IP addresses of the nova servers created in Phase 1. Also note, using the API directly you can do all of the above commands in one API call.

Phase 3: Test your load balancer

openstack loadbalancer show lb1 # Note the vip_address
curl http://<vip_address>
curl http://<vip_address>

This should show the “Welcome to <IP>” message from each member server.