Chapter 6. Configuring bare-metal nodes to enable the creation of bare-metal instances from a bootable volume

Procedure

1. Source your overcloud credentials file:

   $ source ~/<credentials_file>

   • Replace <credentials_file> with the name of your credentials file, for example, overcloudrc.

2. Set the iscsi_boot capability to true for each bare-metal node:

   $ openstack baremetal node set --property capabilities=iscsi_boot:true <node_uuid>

   • Replace <node_uuid> with the ID of the bare-metal node.

3. Set the storage-interface to cinder for each bare-metal node:

   $ openstack baremetal node set --storage-interface cinder <node_uuid>

4. Create an iSCSI connector for the node:

   $ openstack baremetal volume connector create --node <node_uuid> \
    --type iqn --connector-id <connector_id>

   • Replace <connector_id> with a unique ID for each node, for example, iqn.2010-10.org.openstack.node<NUM>, where <NUM> is an incremented number for each node.

Procedure

1. Log in to the undercloud host as the stack user.

2. Source the stackrc undercloud credentials file:

   $ source ~/stackrc

3. Download a Red Hat Enterprise Linux KVM image in QCOW2 format from the Red Hat Enterprise Linux Product Software download page.
4. Copy the image to the /home/stack/ directory on the undercloud.

5. Mount the QCOW2 image and access it as the root user:

   1. Load the nbd kernel module:

      $ sudo modprobe nbd

   2. Connect the QCOW image as /dev/nbd0:

      $ sudo qemu-nbd --connect=/dev/nbd0 <image>

   3. Check the partitions on the NBD:

      $ sudo fdisk /dev/nbd0 -l

      New Red Hat Enterprise Linux QCOW2 images contain only one partition, which is usually named /dev/nbd0p1 on the NBD.

   4. Create a mount point for the image:

      $ mkdir /tmp/mountpoint

   5. Mount the image:

      $ sudo mount /dev/nbd0p1 /tmp/mountpoint/

   6. Mount your dev directory so that the image has access to device information on the host:

      $ sudo mount -o bind /dev /tmp/mountpoint/dev

   7. Change the root directory to the mount point:

      $ sudo chroot /tmp/mountpoint /bin/bash

6. Configure iSCSI on the image:

   Note

   Some commands in this step might report the following error:

   lscpu: cannot open /proc/cpuinfo: No such file or directory

   This error is not critical and you can ignore the error.

   1. Move the resolv.conf file to a temporary location:

      # mv /etc/resolv.conf /etc/resolv.conf.bak

   2. Create a temporary resolv.conf file to resolve DNS requests for the Red Hat Content Delivery Network. This example uses 8.8.8.8 for the nameserver:

      # echo "nameserver 8.8.8.8" > /etc/resolv.conf

   3. Register the mounted image to the Red Hat Content Delivery Network:

      # subscription-manager register

      Enter your user name and password when the command prompts you.

   4. Attach a subscription that contains Red Hat Enterprise Linux:

      # subscription-manager list --all --available
      # subscription-manager attach --pool <POOLID>

      Substitute <POOLID> with the pool ID of the subscription.

   5. Disable the default repositories:

      # subscription-manager repos --disable "*"

   6. Enable the Red Hat Enterprise Linux repository:

      • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7:

        # subscription-manager repos --enable "rhel-7-server-rpms"

      • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8:

        # subscription-manager repos --enable "rhel-8-for-x86_64-baseos-eus-rpms"

   7. Install the iscsi-initiator-utils package:

      # yum install -y iscsi-initiator-utils

   8. Unregister the mounted image:

      # subscription-manager unregister

   9. Restore the original resolv.conf file:

      # mv /etc/resolv.conf.bak /etc/resolv.conf

   10. Check the kernel version on the mounted image:

       # rpm -qa kernel

       For example, if the output is kernel-3.10.0-1062.el7.x86_64, the kernel version is 3.10.0-1062.el7.x86_64. Note this kernel version for the next step.

       Note

       New Red Hat Enterprise Linux QCOW2 images have only one kernel version installed. If more than one kernel version is installed, use the latest one.

   11. Add the network and iscsi dracut modules to the initramfs image:

       # dracut --force --add "network iscsi" /boot/initramfs-<KERNELVERSION>.img <KERNELVERSION>

       Replace <KERNELVERSION> with the version number that you obtained from rpm -qa kernel. The following example uses 3.10.0-1062.el7.x86_64 as the kernel version:

       # dracut --force --add "network iscsi" /boot/initramfs-3.10.0-1062.el7.x86_64.img 3.10.0-1062.el7.x86_64

   12. Exit from the mounted image back to your host operating system:

       # exit

7. Unmount the image:

   1. Unmount the dev directory from the temporary mount point:

      $ sudo umount /tmp/mountpoint/dev

   2. Unmount the image from the mount point:

      $ sudo umount /tmp/mountpoint

   3. Disconnect the QCOW2 image from /dev/nbd0/:

      $ sudo qemu-nbd --disconnect /dev/nbd0

8. Rebuild the grub menu configuration on the image:

   1. Install the libguestfs-tools package:

      $ sudo yum -y install libguestfs-tools

      Important

      If you install the libguestfs-tools package on the undercloud, disable iscsid.socket to avoid port conflicts with the tripleo_iscsid service on the undercloud:

      $ sudo systemctl disable --now iscsid.socket

   2. Set the libguestfs backend to use QEMU directly:

      $ export LIBGUESTFS_BACKEND=direct

   3. Update the grub configuration on the image and set the rd.iscsi.firmware=1 kernel parameter on the boot disk:

      $ guestfish -a /tmp/images/{{ dib_image }} -m /dev/sda3 sh "mount /dev/sda2 /boot/efi && rm /boot/grub2/grubenv && /sbin/grub2-mkconfig -o /boot/grub2/grub.cfg && cp /boot/grub2/grub.cfg /boot/efi/EFI/redhat/grub.cfg && grubby --update-kernel=ALL --args=\"rd.iscsi.firmware=1\" && cp /boot/grub2/grubenv /boot/efi/EFI/redhat/grubenv && echo Success"

9. Upload the iSCSI-enabled image to the Image service (glance):

   $ openstack image create --disk-format qcow2 --container-format bare \
    --file <image> <image_name>

   • Replace <image> with the name of the iSCSI-enabled image, for example, rhel-server-7.7-x86_64-kvm.qcow2.
   • Replace <image_ref> with a name to use to reference the image, for example, rhel-server-7.7-iscsi.

Procedure

1. Source your overcloud credentials file:

   $ source ~/<credentials_file>

   • Replace <credentials_file> with the name of your credentials file, for example, overcloudrc.

2. Create a volume from the iSCSI-enabled instance image:

   $ openstack volume create --size 10 --image <image_ref> --bootable myBootableVolume

   • Replace <image_ref> with the name or ID of the image to write to the volume, for example, rhel-server-7.7-iscsi.

3. Create a bare-metal instance that uses the boot volume:

   $ openstack server create --flavor baremetal --volume myBootableVolume --key default myBareMetalInstance