RAID Configuration¶

Overview¶

Ironic supports RAID configuration for bare metal nodes. It allows operators to specify the desired RAID configuration via the OpenStackClient CLI or REST API. The desired RAID configuration is applied on the bare metal during manual cleaning.

The examples described here use the OpenStackClient CLI; please see the REST API reference for their corresponding REST API requests.

Prerequisites¶

The bare metal node needs to use a hardware type that supports RAID configuration. RAID interfaces may implement RAID configuration either in-band or out-of-band.

In-band RAID configuration is done using the Ironic Python Agent ramdisk. For in-band RAID configuration using agent ramdisk, a hardware manager which supports RAID should be bundled with the ramdisk. Whether a node supports RAID configuration could be found using the CLI command openstack baremetal node validate <node-uuid>.

Build agent ramdisk which supports RAID configuration¶

For doing in-band RAID configuration, Ironic needs an agent ramdisk bundled with a hardware manager which supports RAID configuration for your hardware. For example, the DIB support for Proliant Hardware Manager should be used for HPE Proliant Servers.

RAID configuration JSON format¶

The desired RAID configuration and current RAID configuration are represented in JSON format.

{
 "logical_disks": [
                   {<desired properties of logical disk 1>},
                   {<desired properties of logical disk 2>},
                   .
                   .
                   .
                  ]
}

openstack baremetal --os-baremetal-api-version 1.15 driver raid property list <driver name>

  No API version was specified and the requested operation was not
  supported by the client's negotiated API version 1.9. Supported
  version range is: 1.1 to ...

where the "..." in above error message would be the maximum version
supported by the service.

{
 "logical_disks": [
                   {
                    "size_gb": "MAX",
                    "raid_level": "5",
                    "is_root_volume": true
                   }
                  ]
}

{
 "logical_disks": [
                   {
                    "size_gb": 100,
                    "raid_level": "5",
                    "is_root_volume": true,
                    "disk_type": "ssd"
                   },
                   {
                    "size_gb": 500,
                    "raid_level": "1",
                    "disk_type": "hdd"
                   }
                  ]
}

{
 "logical_disks": [
                   {
                    "size_gb": 100,
                    "raid_level": "5",
                    "controller": "Smart Array P822 in Slot 3",
                    "physical_disks": ["6I:1:5", "6I:1:6", "6I:1:7"],
                    "is_root_volume": true
                   }
                  ]
}

{
  "logical_disks":
    [
      {
        "size_gb": 50,
        "raid_level": "1+0",
        "controller": "RAID.Integrated.1-1",
        "volume_name": "root_volume",
        "is_root_volume": true,
        "physical_disks": [
                           "Disk.Bay.0:Encl.Int.0-1:RAID.Integrated.1-1",
                           "Disk.Bay.1:Encl.Int.0-1:RAID.Integrated.1-1"
                          ]
      },
      {
        "size_gb": 100,
        "raid_level": "5",
        "controller": "RAID.Integrated.1-1",
        "volume_name": "data_volume",
        "physical_disks": [
                           "Disk.Bay.2:Encl.Int.0-1:RAID.Integrated.1-1",
                           "Disk.Bay.3:Encl.Int.0-1:RAID.Integrated.1-1",
                           "Disk.Bay.4:Encl.Int.0-1:RAID.Integrated.1-1"
                          ]
      }
    ]
}

openstack baremetal --os-baremetal-api-version 1.15 node show <node-uuid-or-name>

Workflow¶

• Operator configures the bare metal node with a hardware type that has a RAIDInterface other than no-raid (None for classic drivers).

• For in-band RAID configuration, operator builds an agent ramdisk which supports RAID configuration by bundling the hardware manager with the ramdisk. See Build agent ramdisk which supports RAID configuration for more information.

• Operator prepares the desired target RAID configuration as mentioned in Target RAID configuration. The target RAID configuration is set on the Ironic node:

    openstack baremetal --os-baremetal-api-version 1.15 node set <node-uuid-or-name> \
       --target-raid-config <JSON file containing target RAID configuration>
  
  The CLI command can accept the input from standard input also:
     openstack baremetal --os-baremetal-api-version 1.15 node set <node-uuid-or-name> \
        --target-raid-config -
  

• Create a JSON file with the RAID clean steps for manual cleaning. Add other clean steps as desired:

  [{
    "interface": "raid",
    "step": "delete_configuration"
  },
  {
    "interface": "raid",
    "step": "create_configuration"
  }]
  

  Note

  ‘create_configuration’ doesn’t remove existing disks. It is recommended to add ‘delete_configuration’ before ‘create_configuration’ to make sure that only the desired logical disks exist in the system after manual cleaning.

• Bring the node to manageable state and do a clean action to start cleaning on the node:

  openstack baremetal --os-baremetal-api-version 1.15 node clean <node-uuid-or-name> \
     --clean-steps <JSON file containing clean steps created above>
  

• After manual cleaning is complete, the current RAID configuration can be viewed using:

  openstack baremetal --os-baremetal-api-version 1.15 node show <node-uuid-or-name>
  

Using RAID in nova flavor for scheduling¶

The operator can specify the raid_level capability in nova flavor for node to be selected for scheduling:

nova flavor-key my-baremetal-flavor set capabilities:raid_level="1+0"

Developer documentation¶

In-band RAID configuration is done using IPA ramdisk. IPA ramdisk has support for pluggable hardware managers which can be used to extend the functionality offered by IPA ramdisk using stevedore plugins. For more information, see Ironic Python Agent Hardware Manager documentation.

The hardware manager that supports RAID configuration should do the following:

1. Implement a method named create_configuration. This method creates the RAID configuration as given in target_raid_config. After successful RAID configuration, it returns the current RAID configuration information which ironic uses to set node.raid_config.

2. Implement a method named delete_configuration. This method deletes all the RAID disks on the bare metal.

3. Return these two clean steps in get_clean_steps method with priority as 0. Example:

   return [{'step': 'create_configuration',
            'interface': 'raid',
            'priority': 0},
           {'step': 'delete_configuration',
            'interface': 'raid',
            'priority': 0}]