Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

User Guide

February 2011

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

Table of Contents

1.  Introducing Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware ............................................... 3 

2.  Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware License .................................................... 5 

3.  Preparing to Install Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware ...................................... 6 

3.1.  Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware Installation Overview ......................... 6 

3.2.  Checking Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware Minimum Requirements ........... 6 

4.  Installing the Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware ............................................. 8 

4.1.  Installing the Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware ............................................. 8 

4.2.  Configuring Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware.....................................11 

4.3.  Starting Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware .........................................17 

4.4.  Verifying Successful Deployment ...................................................................17 

4.5.  Provisioning Storage ..................................................................................18 

4.6.  Licensing Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware .......................................18 

5.  Managing Your Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware ......................................... 19 

Page 2

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

1. Introducing Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

The Gluster Storage Virtual Appliance for VMware enables you to rapidly deploy Gluster storage, running as a virtual machine on ESX or ESXi hosts, in your environment (independent of whether the hosts are managed by vSphere). Using Gluster Storage Virtual Appliance for VMware, you can add and remove nodes as required to match the evolving needs of your organization.

Introducing Gluster

Gluster is an open source, scale-out file system capable of scaling to several petabytes and handling thousands of clients. Gluster assembles storage building blocks, aggregating disk and memory resources and managing data in a single global namespace. Gluster is based on a stackable user space design and can deliver exceptional performance for diverse workloads.

The Gluster modular architecture allows administrators to stack modules to match user requirements, as needed. For example, administrators can use Gluster to quickly configure a standalone server system and later expand the system as needs grow.

Page 3

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

Virtualized Cloud Environments

Gluster is designed for today's high-performance, virtualized cloud environments. Unlike traditional data centers, cloud environments require multi-tenancy along with the ability to grow or shrink resources on demand. Gluster incorporates cloud capabilities into the core architecture.

Every module in Gluster is treated as a volume. Gluster further adds an elastic volume manager (the glusterd daemon) and a console manager (the gluster command line interface). Using the console manager, administrators can dynamically expand, shrink, rebalance, and migrate volumes, among other operations. The command line interface additionally provides an interactive shell (with auto-completion) along with scripting capabilities suitable for automation.

About this Guide

This document introduces Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware, describes the minimum hardware requirements, and shows how to install and configure the software in your environment.

Page 4

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

2. Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware License

The Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware End User License Agreement (EULA) is available here.

Page 5

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

3. Preparing to Install Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

This section provides an overview of the Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware installation process, and describes how you can check against the minimum system requirements.

Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware Installation Overview

Checking Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware Minimum Requirements

3.1. Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware Installation Overview

This section provides an overview of how to install Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware.

Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware offers an easy-to-use installation scheme that streamlines the process of installing the software and configuring the basic settings.

Installing Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware involves the following steps:

Check the Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware License.

Verify that your system matches the minimum system requirements. For more information, see Checking Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware Minimum Requirements.

Install, configure, and start Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware. For more information, see Installing the Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware.

License Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware. For more information, see Licensing Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware.

Begin managing your Gluster cluster. For more information, see Managing Your Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware.

3.2. Checking Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware Minimum Requirements

Before installing Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware, verify that your environment matches the minimum requirements described in this section.

General

Verify the following:

DNS is properly configured for your environment

Centralized time servers are available (required in clustered environments)

Page 6

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

Virtual Machines

Verify the following:

The virtual machine is running HW v7

The virtual machine uses the default configuration settings, as supplied by Gluster (except as noted in this topic)

Guests are not set to "sync time with host"

The VMware Tools version of the appliance matches the ESX host (VMware Tools needs to be loaded in the guest by default)

The VMware Tools version of the appliance matches the ESX host (the appliance comes pre-installed with VMware tools for ESX 4.1)

Note: Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance is not supported if other, non-Gluster, virtual machines are running on the same host or datastore.

When Using ESX Hosts Managed by VirtualCenter

Verify the following:

VMware HCL hardware (Virtual Machine Hardware v7.0) is used, running ESX 4.1

ESX hosts are clustered, and any Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS) rules are defined against these clusters

Remote storage allows vMotion/DRS of the appliances

Note You cannot use a SQLExpress database with Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance.

When Using Standalone ESX Hosts

Verify the following:

All hardware is on the VMware HCL (Hardware Compatibility List)

2GB RAM is configured for each virtual machine, plus 800MB for COS (up to 8GB or more is recommended for each virtual machine)

ESX hosts are capable of running 64-bit machines, and the ESX host operating system is set to 800MB (RAM)

Note: Nehalem procs in the ESX server is recommended to take advantage of appliance performance tuning.

Page 7

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

4. Installing the Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

This section describes how to install, configure, start, and license Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware in your environment.

Installing the Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

Configuring Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

Starting Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

Verifying Successful Deployment (Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware)

Provisioning Storage

Licensing Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

4.1. Installing the Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

This section describes how to install Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware.

To install the virtual storage appliance

1. Launch the VMware vSphere Client. The logon dialog appears.

2. Logon to the client. The VMware vSphere Client main screen appears.

3. Connect vSphere Client to an ESX, ESXi, or Virtual Center host, as appropriate.

Page 8

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

4. Choose File > Deploy OVF Template. The Deploy OVF Template wizard launches.

Page 9

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

5. Copy the download URL you received when you licensed Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware, paste the URL into the Source field, and click Next.

6. Follow the on-screen instructions to complete the wizard.

After you complete the wizard, the appliance is downloaded and added to the ESX host virtual machine inventory.

Page 10

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

4.2. Configuring Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

This section describes how to configure Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware to attach additional virtual disks to the appliance.

To configure the virtual storage appliance

1. Using VMware VirtualCenter, right-click the appliance, and choose Edit Settings from the menu. The Virtual Machine Properties dialog appears.

Page 11

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

2. In the Hardware tab, click Add. The Add Hardware dialog appears.

3. Select Hard Disk, and click Next. The Select a Disk screen appears.

Page 12

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

4. Select Create a new virtual disk, and click Next. The Create a Disk screen appears.

5. Specify the disk capacity, select Specify a datastore, and click Browse. The Browse for Datastore dialog appears.

Page 13

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

6. Select a datastore, click OK, and click Next.

Gluster highly recommends separating the OS disk from the brick disks. The Advanced Options screen appears.

Page 14

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

7. Click Next. The Ready to Complete screen appears.

Page 15

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

8. Review the summary, and click Finish. The Virtual Machine Properties screen appears with the new virtual disk appearing in the list.

Note: For increased performance, use the vmkfstools command on the ESX host to convert the disk to eagerzeroedthick.

Page 16

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

4.3. Starting Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

This section describes how to start Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware.

To start the virtual storage appliance

Using VMware VirtualCenter, right-click the appliance, and choose Power On from the menu.

The virtual storage appliance powers on.

4.4. Verifying Successful Deployment

This section describes how to verify that you have successfully deployed Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware.

To verify successful deployment

Logon to the virtual machine.

Enter the following command:

/etc/init.d/glusterd status

Verify that the command indicates that the glusterd daemon is running.

Page 17

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide

4.5. Provisioning Storage

You can provision storage on Gluster Virtual Storage Appliances for VMware, as required.

To provision additional storage

Run the following command on a Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware instance:

# gluster-provision-block BLOCK

where BLOCK represents the name of the new block device attached to the virtual server. The command formats and mounts the block storage device as /export/BLOCK.

4.6. Licensing Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware offers a 30-day trial license. During these first 30 days, you need to configure your storage environment, generate a license request, submit the request to Gluster, and install the returned license in your environment.

Important: You need to renew your license before it expires since the gluster-renewal-request command does not work with an expired license. Similarly, the glusterfs processes and glusterd daemon are terminated when the license expires.

To license Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

1. Install, start, and configure your Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware storage environment.

For more information, see Installing the Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware.

2. Peer probe the servers in your storage environment.

For more information, see gluster Command.

3. Generate the license request using the following command:

# gluster-lic-request

This command creates a license request (with file name license.req) in the current working directory. The license request represents the number of servers configured in your environment.

Note: The gluster-lic-request command requires SSH access to all storage servers in your environment.

4. Navigate to http://supportservices.gluster.com and upload the license.req file.

Gluster returns a validated and signed license file (with file name license.asc)

5. Copy the license.asc file to the server and run the following command:

# gluster-lic-install license.asc

6. Verify that your license was installed successfully. You can use the following command to display information about your current license:

# gluster-lic-info

The command shows details about the current license, including the number of nodes, expiry date, and so on.

Page 18

ds

Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware User Guide Page 19

5. Managing Your Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware

After installing, configuring, and starting Gluster Virtual Storage Appliance for VMware, refer to the following guides for complete information about how to configure your Gluster cluster:

Gluster 3.1 Filesystem Installation and Configuration Guide

Gluster 3.1 Filesystem Administration Guide

Note: The glusterd daemon is configured to run automatically after booting, by default.