This document discusses Pedro Dias's experience with OpenNebula. It describes how he used OpenNebula at his hosting company PTisp to replace their previous IaaS solution. OpenNebula met their requirements of being open, avoiding vendor lock-in, and having a low maintenance stack. The document outlines some customizations made to OpenNebula, such as using LVM instead of cLVM and developing tools like ONE Janitor to help with storage and VM sanitization. It also mentions contributions to the OpenNebula project and developing a Node.js addon and multi-tenant web panel called Cloudash.

1. An OpenNebula Tale
Pedro Dias

2. ● Pedro Dias
○ @pedromdias
○ github.com/apocas
● CTO at ptisp.com
○ github.com/ptisp
● Lecturer at ipt.pt
● Freelancer
● Likes Node.js, created dockerode, nodechecker.
com, ...
Who am i

3. PTisp.com
● Hosting provider
○ 2 datacenters
○ ~36000 domains
○ ~700 virtual servers
○ ~800 physical servers
○ ~9000 active customers

4. What is this tale about?
● Why a new IaaS?
● Requirements
● Why OpenNebula?
● Making it fit
● Giving back to community

5. Why a new IaaS?
● Turnkey solution issues
○ Value-added products are harder
○ Vendor lock-in
○ No control
● Expansion
● Licensing

6. Requirements
● Openness
● Avoid spaghetti stack
● Low maintenance
● Low entry barrier
● KVM
● API
● Support

7. Tested
● OpenStack
○ High maintenance/operation
● Onapp
○ Turnkey
● CloudStack
○ Entry barrier
● OpenNebula

8. Why OpenNebula?
● Open
● Scenario adaptability
● Low maintenance
● Support
● API

9. Making it fit
1. cLVM vs LVM
2. VM image resize
3. Systems integration
4. Resellers

10. 1. clvm… right...
● Hard to maintain
● Cluster recovery related with it’s
size/previous state
● Additional “moving” parts
● Critical layer

11. lvm
● Volume sanitization
○ Avoid data corruption by
simultaneous access
● Keeping volume directory
clean and sane

12. Solution
● Custom fs_lvm drivers
○ Activate volumes where and when they are needed.
(ex: premigrate)
○ Deactivate volumes when and there they are not
needed anymore. (ex: postmigrate)

13. ONE Janitor
● https://github.com/ptisp/one-janitor
● Uses API and SSH
○ API for logic data
○ SSH for infra/real data
○ Matches them
● Storage sanitization
● Virt sanitization
● Boilerplate for other integrations

14. 2. VM image resize
● Leverages libguestfs
● Strategy:
a. Stops VM
b. Creates a new volume (bigger size)
c. Copies old volume into the newer one
d. Expands fs
e. Renames old and new volumes
f. Starts VM
● Original volume is left untouched.
● Not yet integrated into ONE workflow

15. 3. ONE Node.js addon
● https://github.com/OpenNebula/addon-
nodejs
● Contributions are welcome
○ Tests coverage need to be increased.

16. VM manipulation
var vm = one.getVM(12);
// query API for vm info
vm.info(function (err, data) {
console.log(data);
});
vm.action('reboot', function(err, data) {
console.log(data);
});

17. 4. http://cloudash.one

18. What it is?
● Web panel for OpenNebula
● Abstracts IaaS
○ Build a “DigitalOcean feeling” on top of OpenNebula
● Multi-tenant
● Optional built-in ticketing system
● Resources limits/plans per user and per
instance

19. Functionality
● VM ownership implied
● Resources editing
● Network manipulation
● Console
● Doesn’t need ONE admin privileges
● Templating or custom VM creation

20. demo.cloudash.one