Category: Cloud Computing

Cloud Computing

Install OpenStack Newton All In One with Heat Service on CentOS 7

Dec 11, 2016 by Grzegorz Juszczak 10 Comments , , , , , , , , ,

Install OpenStack Newton All In One with Heat Service on CentOS 7
In OpenStack all-in-one configuration all OpenStack nodes (controller node, compute node, network node) are installed on a single machine. All in one configuration can be quickly deployed for testing purposes and is often recommended for developers to test their applications on top of OpenStack environment.

In this tutorial we install OpenStack Newton release from RDO repository including Heat Orchestration service on single node (all-in-one installation) based on CentOS 7 / RHEL 7 using packstack installer script.
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Cloud Computing

OpenStack Horizon Error: Unable to get network agents info

Aug 21, 2016 by Grzegorz Juszczak 0 Comments , ,

OpenStack Horizon Error: Unable to get network agents info
OpenStack Dashboard Error: Unable to get network agents info often seen in Horizon is a result of Neutron related problems.

Usually the problem is caused by neutron-service failure due to service operation time outs.

The below screenshot presents OpenStack Dashboard Error: Unable to get network agents info:

openstack error: unable to get network agents info
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Cloud Computing, Storage

Install and Configure OpenStack Mitaka with GlusterFS on CentOS 7

Aug 15, 2016 by Grzegorz Juszczak 14 Comments , , , , , , , , , , ,

integrate openstack with glusterfs storage
OpenStack can use diffirent backend technologies for Cinder Volumes Service to create volumes for Instances running in cloud. The default and most common backend used for Cinder Service is LVM (Logical Volume Manager), but it has one basic disadventage – it’s slow and overloads the server which serves LVM (usually Controller), especially during volume operations like volume deletion. OpenStack supports other Cinder backend technologies, like GlusterFS which is more sophisticated and reliable solution, provides redundancy and does not occupy Controller’s resources, because it usually runs on separate dedicated servers.

In this tutorial we are going to deploy VLAN based OpenStack Mitaka on three CentOS 7 nodes (Controller, Network, Compute) using Packstack installer script and integrate it with already existing GlusterFS redundant storage based on two Gluster Peers.

openstack installation and integration with glusterfs
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Cloud Computing

OpenStack: Unable to Connect to Horizon Dashboard

Aug 10, 2016 by Grzegorz Juszczak 1 Comments , , , ,

Packstack Error: Command exceeded timeout
Pretty often after rebooting Controller node or powering it on after shutdown, the Horizon (OpenStack Dashboard) is not responding, but we know that it worked before reboot. This issue may be caused by httpd service (Apache), which entered failed state right after powering on the Controller node.

This results in browser’s connection problem to the Horizon:

chrome_unable to connect
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Cloud Computing

KVM OpenStack Error: /Stage[main]/Nova::Db::Sync/Exec[nova-db-sync]

Aug 7, 2016 by Grzegorz Juszczak 1 Comments , , , ,

Packstack Error: Command exceeded timeout
Few times during KVM based OpenStack (Mitaka, Newton) automated installations using packstack we encountered DB synchronization errors.

It turned out, that these installation errors appeared due to slow network and/or poor hardware performance of KVM virtualized hardware used to build OpenStack virtual nodes (Controller, Network, Compute).
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Cloud Computing, Virtualization

How to shrink OpenStack qcow2 image using qemu-img

May 24, 2016 by Grzegorz Juszczak 0 Comments , , , , , ,

shrink openstack qcow2 image
If you transfer qcow2 images very frequently across OpenStack Clouds or between KVM and Openstack environments, they can quickly grow larger. Luckily qcow2 image size can be decreased to reasonable values using qemu-img tool. During image conversion the empty sectors are detected and suppressed from the destination image. Below we present how to shrink Openstack/KVM qcow2 image.
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Cloud Computing, OpenStack / KVM Images

Download Kali Linux OpenStack KVM qcow2 image by tuxfixer.com

May 20, 2016 by Grzegorz Juszczak 0 Comments , , , , , , , , ,

Kali Linux Openstack KVM qcow2 image by tuxfixer.com

Kali Linux (formerly known as BackTrack Linux) is an open-source, Debian-based Linux distribution designed for advanced Penetration Testing and Security Auditing. Kali Linux contains dozens of tools targeted towards various information security tasks, such as Penetration Testing, Security Research, Computer Forensics, and Reverse Engineering. Kali Linux is a multi-platform solution, accessible and freely available to information security professionals and hobbyists.

Kali Linux can run as a bare-metal server, can be booted from a live CD or live USB, or it can run as KVM virtual machine or OpenStack instance using qcow2 image.

TuxFixer's Kali openstack qcow2 image

Below you can purchase ready to use Kali Linux OpenStack / KVM 64bit qcow2 images. There are two types of image:

  • OpenStack.qcow2 image – cloud-init service enabled, SSH password-based/key-based login, local console/GUI login
  • KVM.qcow2 image – SSH password-based login, local console/GUI login

Don’t have time to launch your Kali Virtual Machine on your own?

TuxFixer’s Kali_2022.1_Xfce images are now available on: CinderCloud.com
Deploy your Kali VM within minutes with 50% discount using this code: 50FREENOW

image name image size metapackages
Kali_2022.1_Xfce_OpenStack.qcow2 3.0 GB kali-linux-core + Xfce
Kali_2022.1_Xfce_KVM.qcow2 2.9 GB kali-linux-core + Xfce

Price: $5.90

Image details:

  • os-release: 2022.1
  • GUI: Xfce
  • filesystem size inside image: 25 GB
  • minimum flavor requirements: 1 vCPU, 2GB RAM, 25GB HDD

Note: by purchasing and using this software you accept our Terms and Conditions

Cloud Computing, Virtualization

Configure OpenStack Instance at boot using cloud-init and user data

May 3, 2016 by Grzegorz Juszczak 3 Comments , , , , , , , ,

onfigure OpenStack Instance at boot using cloud-init and user data

The administration of the large-scale production cloud environments requires the management of dozens of customer’s virtual servers (OpenStack Instances) in the cloud on the daily basis. Manual configuration of the multiple newly created Instances in the OpenStack cloud at a time would be problematic for cloud administrators. Luckily, OpenStack is equipped with metadata service cooperating with the so-called cloud-init script, which together do the magic of automated Instances’ mass configuration.

Metadata service runs usually on Controller node in multi-node environment and is accessible by the Instances running on Compute nodes to let them retrieve instance-specific data, like IP address or hostname. Instances access metadata service at http://169.254.169.254. The HTTP request from Instance either hits the router or DHCP namespace depending on the route in the Instance. The metadata proxy service adds Instance IP address and Router ID information to the request. The metadata proxy service sends this request to neutron-metadata-agent. The neutron-metadata-agent service forwards the request to the nova-api-metadata server, by adding some new headers, i.e. Instance ID, to the request. The metadata service supports two sets of APIs: an OpenStack metadata API and an EC2-compatible API.

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Cloud Computing, Virtualization

OpenStack: Create Instance Snapshot to backup or migrate Instance

May 2, 2016 by Grzegorz Juszczak 0 Comments , , , , ,

openstack: create instance snapshot to migrate or restore instance
OpenStack Snapshots can be utilized to backup Instance before some critical changes are made on Instance OS or to migrate Instance to the new OpenStack Cloud.
In this tutorial we will create snapshot from existing Instance to launch it in different Cloud, but you can also create snapshot just to backup the Instance and restore it’s state later in the same Cloud, if needed.
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Cloud Computing

How to Extend Subnet Allocation Pool in OpenStack

Apr 25, 2016 by Grzegorz Juszczak 0 Comments , , , , , ,

extend subnet IP allocation pool in neutron
After OpenStack installation it can turn out, that the IP allocation pool of the subnet, we have just created is too small. If the allocation pool refers to public / provider network, we will quickly run out of free Floating IPs. Moreover, OpenStack Dashboard (Horizon) doesn’t provide the ability to extend or modify subnet IP alocation pool of already created subnet with already allocated IPs. But we can use dirty workaround and manually edit MariaDB which stores Openstack configuration data.
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