The document details Arnold Bechtoldt's presentation at the OpenNebula Conference 2014, focusing on creating a lightweight hosting platform using OpenNebula to manage virtual machines. It outlines key concepts, infrastructure requirements, deployment methods, and the challenges faced, including storage and networking issues. The advantages highlighted include low infrastructure needs and high automation, while drawbacks mention the lack of VM live migration and longer deployment times.

1. OpenNebula Conference 2014
Bootstrapping a virtual infrastructure using
OpenNebula from scratch
Arnold Bechtoldt
Karlsruhe, 04.12.14

2. About
Arnold Bechtoldt
‣ IT Systems Engineer at inovex GmbH (Germany)
‣ Small to large Open Source datacenter management solutions
‣ High available web-based applications
‣ Contributing to various Open Source projects
github.com/bechtoldt Ÿ arnold.bechtoldt@inovex.de 2

3. 3
Concept
Requirements
Goal:
‣ Setup a lightweight hosting platform to run web applications
‣ Virtual machines (VMs) instead of plain bare-metal
‣ Infrastructure should be easy to maintain
Outlines:
‣ Create a new infrastructure from scratch
‣ Individual VM deployment (Preseed/ Kickstart)
‣ No shared storage available (yet)
‣ Small network bandwidth (2 x 1 GigE per node)

4. 4
Concept
Network Topology

5. 5
Concept
VM Deployment
Foreman
(Provisioning + ENC)
OpenNebula
(VM Management)
SaltStack
(Cfg Mgmt + Orchestration)
1. VM Creation
2. „Host“ Creation
3. DHCP/ Preseed
4. VM Netinstall
5. Software Install
6. Orchestration
(7. Scaling)

6. 6
Concept
Challenges
Storage:
‣ HW-RAID 10
‣ QCOW2 VM disk images
‣ Creation of disk during VM deployment (custom TM driver)
Networking:
‣ „Ethernet“ address range in ONE, IPAM by Foreman/ SaltStack
‣ Open vSwitch (custom VNM driver)
‣ STP management via VNM driver
‣ IPSec/ GRE tunneling between compute nodes (MTU 9000)

7. 7
Conclusions
Pros & Cons
Pros:
+ Low (cloud) infrastructure requirements
+ High degree of automation (Automate everything!)
+ „Cloud“-like feature set
Cons:
- No VM live migration due to non-shared storage
- No experiences in Open vSwitch (GRE) scaling
- VM deployment takes ~ 10 minutes (deployment + software install)
‣ VM Images vs. individual deployment/ netinstall
‣ DHCP vs. OpenNebula contextualization
‣ IPAM in OpenNebula vs. Foreman vs. Salt
‣ Pets vs. cattles

8. 8
We are hiring!
inovex.de
exciting projects Ÿ great technologies Ÿ nice colleagues Ÿ cool offices
We have excellent job offers in Karlsruhe, Cologne, Munich and Pforzheim!

9. 9
Thank You!
Questions?
Contact
Arnold Bechtoldt
IT Engineering & Operations
inovex GmbH
Office Karlsruhe
Ludwig-Erhard-Allee 6
D-76139 Karlsruhe
arnold.bechtoldt@inovex.de