Re: [xcat-user] How to create and deploy an xCAT Service Node
Hi Wang Xiaopeng (I apologize if I got your name wrong before), You said: SN cannot work without MN since there's only one database which is running on MN. If MN is down you cannot run lots of commands on SN. In fact xCAT does NOT recommend to run any command on SN. Will DNS and DHCP still work however from an SN when the MN is down? I would need the SN to still resolve the compute nodes' DNS requests on the cluster subnet and issue DHCP leases/renewals as necessary. It looks like SNs are intended to take responsibility on behalf of the MN for serving the compute nodes' necessary services, such that you designate each node's xcatmaster as the SN like: chdef -t group compute1 servicenode=sn1 xcatmaster=sn1-nic. If that is the case then shouldn't DNS DHCP still be resolved from the SN by a node even when the MN is down? Thanks, Josh On Wed, Jan 8, 2014 at 6:32 PM, Xiao Peng Wang w...@cn.ibm.com wrote: The doc mentioned by Josh will lead you in the correct direction to setup Service Node. Several information for you: Roughly, your understand is correct that you can install and configure a SN automatically when prepare/configure correctly for SNnode definition (correct group like service, correct attribute like postscripts, correct osimage like rhels6.4-x86_64-install-service) and xCAT rpm repository. Generally, the /tftpboot and /install on SN are mounted from xCAT MN, so them will be identical with the dirs on MN in any time. SN cannot work without MN since there's only one database which is running on MN. If MN is down you cannot run lots of commands on SN. In fact xCAT does NOT recommend to run any command on SN. Thanks Best Regards -- Wang Xiaopeng (王晓朋) IBM China System Technology Laboratory Tel: 86-10-82453455 Email: w...@cn.ibm.com Address: 28,ZhongGuanCun Software Park,No.8 Dong Bei Wang West Road, Haidian District Beijing P.R.China 100193 [image: Inactive hide details for Josh Nielsen ---2014/01/09 03:48:01---Hi Russell, For some reason that wiki page never came up in my]Josh Nielsen ---2014/01/09 03:48:01---Hi Russell, For some reason that wiki page never came up in my Google searches even From: Josh Nielsen jniel...@hudsonalpha.org To: xCAT Users Mailing list xcat-user@lists.sourceforge.net, Date: 2014/01/09 03:48 Subject: Re: [xcat-user] How to create and deploy an xCAT Service Node -- Hi Russell, For some reason that wiki page never came up in my Google searches even when I placed quotes around service node. Thanks! I'll take a look through it. Regards, Josh On Wed, Jan 8, 2014 at 12:25 PM, Russell Jones *russell-l...@jonesmail.me* russell-l...@jonesmail.me wrote: Hi Josh, This should be helpful for you (it was for me when first learning how to set this up): *http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/xcat/index.php?title=Setting_Up_a_Linux_Hierarchical_Cluster*http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/xcat/index.php?title=Setting_Up_a_Linux_Hierarchical_Cluster On 1/8/2014 11:52 AM, Josh Nielsen wrote: Hello all, I am trying to move my xCAT installation toward a hierarchical structure by including Service Nodes but I am finding a dearth of information on how to create a service node on the xCAT wiki and even the Sumavi xCAT guide. At first I began following the instructions for a setting up a management node (which involves a new xCAT install, an independent xCAT database, etc.) on a VM intended to the the SN but then realized that that must be wrong. I have noticed the xCAT 'servicenode' database table present on the Management Node (listed with tabdump). I am wondering if I can simply designate a new node (in my case a VM) to be the prospective SN, designate which services (like dhcp, dns, etc.) to enable/disable in the 'servicenode' table, and then do a fresh 'rinstall' to that VM and have it be automatically fully configured as an SN from postinstall scripts (which I presume are already present and will be automatically applied to that node by some xCAT logic of parsing the 'servicenode' table and associating any relevant postscripts to be run with the node). If so will it create the /install and /tftpboot directories (including ISOs made with copycds) on each SN identical to the contents of the MN? Is it that simple or is there more involved than that? In addition I want to be able to take down the Management Node in the future for maintenance and be able to do just about everything that the MN can do from the SNs (including dhcp leases, rpower commands, updatenode, psh, etc) while the MN is down. Is that possible? Any clarifications would be appreciated. Thank you, Josh Nielsen
[xcat-user] networks.dhcpserver
Hi all, What is the purpose of the networks.dhcpserver entry in relation to service nodes? What configuration files will contain this entry when it is set? Thanks! -- CenturyLink Cloud: The Leader in Enterprise Cloud Services. Learn Why More Businesses Are Choosing CenturyLink Cloud For Critical Workloads, Development Environments Everything In Between. Get a Quote or Start a Free Trial Today. http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=119420431iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk ___ xCAT-user mailing list xCAT-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xcat-user
Re: [xcat-user] How to create and deploy an xCAT Service Node
DNS and DHCP will still work from the Service Node, if setup correctly. In other words, you have configured the service node as the DNS server and/or DHCP server for the nodes and there is no requirement on the Management Node for dns or dhcp. You will not be able to run any xcat commands on the service node, if the Management Node is down. xCAT requires access to the database configured on the MN for the xcat cluster ( mysql, postgresql) to run most xcat commands. Even to recognize that the node is in the xcat cluster. Lissa K. Valletta 8-3/B10 Poughkeepsie, NY 12601 (tie 293) 433-3102 From: Josh Nielsen jniel...@hudsonalpha.org To: xCAT Users Mailing list xcat-user@lists.sourceforge.net, Date: 01/10/2014 12:59 PM Subject:Re: [xcat-user] How to create and deploy an xCAT Service Node Hi Wang Xiaopeng (I apologize if I got your name wrong before), You said: SN cannot work without MN since there's only one database which is running on MN. If MN is down you cannot run lots of commands on SN. In fact xCAT does NOT recommend to run any command on SN. Will DNS and DHCP still work however from an SN when the MN is down? I would need the SN to still resolve the compute nodes' DNS requests on the cluster subnet and issue DHCP leases/renewals as necessary. It looks like SNs are intended to take responsibility on behalf of the MN for serving the compute nodes' necessary services, such that you designate each node's xcatmaster as the SN like: chdef -t group compute1 servicenode=sn1 xcatmaster=sn1-nic. If that is the case then shouldn't DNS DHCP still be resolved from the SN by a node even when the MN is down? Thanks, Josh On Wed, Jan 8, 2014 at 6:32 PM, Xiao Peng Wang w...@cn.ibm.com wrote: The doc mentioned by Josh will lead you in the correct direction to setup Service Node. Several information for you: Roughly, your understand is correct that you can install and configure a SN automatically when prepare/configure correctly for SNnode definition (correct group like service, correct attribute like postscripts, correct osimage like rhels6.4-x86_64-install-service) and xCAT rpm repository. Generally, the /tftpboot and /install on SN are mounted from xCAT MN, so them will be identical with the dirs on MN in any time. SN cannot work without MN since there's only one database which is running on MN. If MN is down you cannot run lots of commands on SN. In fact xCAT does NOT recommend to run any command on SN. Thanks Best Regards -- Wang Xiaopeng (王晓朋) IBM China System Technology Laboratory Tel: 86-10-82453455 Email: w...@cn.ibm.com Address: 28,ZhongGuanCun Software Park,No.8 Dong Bei Wang West Road, Haidian District Beijing P.R.China 100193 Inactive hide details for Josh Nielsen ---2014/01/09 03:48:01---Hi Russell, For some reason that wiki page never came up in my Josh Nielsen ---2014/01/09 03:48:01---Hi Russell, For some reason that wiki page never came up in my Google searches even From: Josh Nielsen jniel...@hudsonalpha.org To: xCAT Users Mailing list xcat-user@lists.sourceforge.net, Date: 2014/01/09 03:48 Subject: Re: [xcat-user] How to create and deploy an xCAT Service Node Hi Russell, For some reason that wiki page never came up in my Google searches even when I placed quotes around service node. Thanks! I'll take a look through it. Regards, Josh On Wed, Jan 8, 2014 at 12:25 PM, Russell Jones russell-l...@jonesmail.me wrote: Hi Josh, This should be helpful for you (it was for me when first learning how to set this up): http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/xcat/index.php?title=Setting_Up_a_Linux_Hierarchical_Cluster On 1/8/2014 11:52 AM, Josh Nielsen wrote: Hello all, I am trying to move my xCAT installation toward a hierarchical structure by including Service Nodes but I am finding a dearth of information on how to create a service node on the xCAT wiki and even the Sumavi xCAT guide. At first I began following the instructions for a setting up a management node (which involves a new xCAT install, an independent xCAT database, etc.) on a VM intended to the the SN but then realized that that must be wrong. I have noticed the xCAT 'servicenode' database table present on the Management Node (listed with tabdump). I am wondering if I can simply designate a new node (in my case a VM) to be the prospective SN, designate which services (like dhcp, dns, etc.) to enable/disable in the 'servicenode' table, and then do a fresh 'rinstall' to that VM and have it be automatically fully configured
Re: [xcat-user] networks.dhcpserver
It is used to configure service node pools. Check this document for how to setup service node pools. https://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/xcat/index.php?title=Setting_Up_a_Linux_Hierarchical_Cluster Lissa K. Valletta 8-3/B10 Poughkeepsie, NY 12601 (tie 293) 433-3102 From: Russell Jones russell-l...@jonesmail.me To: xCAT Users Mailing list xcat-user@lists.sourceforge.net, Date: 01/10/2014 01:56 PM Subject:[xcat-user] networks.dhcpserver Hi all, What is the purpose of the networks.dhcpserver entry in relation to service nodes? What configuration files will contain this entry when it is set? Thanks! -- CenturyLink Cloud: The Leader in Enterprise Cloud Services. Learn Why More Businesses Are Choosing CenturyLink Cloud For Critical Workloads, Development Environments Everything In Between. Get a Quote or Start a Free Trial Today. http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=119420431iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk ___ xCAT-user mailing list xCAT-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xcat-user inline: graycol.gif-- CenturyLink Cloud: The Leader in Enterprise Cloud Services. Learn Why More Businesses Are Choosing CenturyLink Cloud For Critical Workloads, Development Environments Everything In Between. Get a Quote or Start a Free Trial Today. http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=119420431iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk___ xCAT-user mailing list xCAT-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xcat-user
Re: [xcat-user] How to create and deploy an xCAT Service Node
Thank you Lissa, that is helpful. -Josh On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 1:25 PM, Lissa Valletta lis...@us.ibm.com wrote: DNS and DHCP will still work from the Service Node, if setup correctly. In other words, you have configured the service node as the DNS server and/or DHCP server for the nodes and there is no requirement on the Management Node for dns or dhcp. You will not be able to run any xcat commands on the service node, if the Management Node is down. xCAT requires access to the database configured on the MN for the xcat cluster ( mysql, postgresql) to run most xcat commands. Even to recognize that the node is in the xcat cluster. Lissa K. Valletta 8-3/B10 Poughkeepsie, NY 12601 (tie 293) 433-3102 [image: Inactive hide details for Josh Nielsen ---01/10/2014 12:59:12 PM---Hi Wang Xiaopeng (I apologize if I got your name wrong befor]Josh Nielsen ---01/10/2014 12:59:12 PM---Hi Wang Xiaopeng (I apologize if I got your name wrong before), You said: SN cannot work without MN From: Josh Nielsen jniel...@hudsonalpha.org To: xCAT Users Mailing list xcat-user@lists.sourceforge.net, Date: 01/10/2014 12:59 PM Subject: Re: [xcat-user] How to create and deploy an xCAT Service Node -- Hi Wang Xiaopeng (I apologize if I got your name wrong before), You said: SN cannot work without MN since there's only one database which is running on MN. If MN is down you cannot run lots of commands on SN. In fact xCAT does NOT recommend to run any command on SN. Will DNS and DHCP still work however from an SN when the MN is down? I would need the SN to still resolve the compute nodes' DNS requests on the cluster subnet and issue DHCP leases/renewals as necessary. It looks like SNs are intended to take responsibility on behalf of the MN for serving the compute nodes' necessary services, such that you designate each node's xcatmaster as the SN like: chdef -t group compute1 servicenode=sn1 xcatmaster=sn1-nic. If that is the case then shouldn't DNS DHCP still be resolved from the SN by a node even when the MN is down? Thanks, Josh On Wed, Jan 8, 2014 at 6:32 PM, Xiao Peng Wang *w...@cn.ibm.com*w...@cn.ibm.com wrote: The doc mentioned by Josh will lead you in the correct direction to setup Service Node. Several information for you: Roughly, your understand is correct that you can install and configure a SN automatically when prepare/configure correctly for SNnode definition (correct group like service, correct attribute like postscripts, correct osimage like rhels6.4-x86_64-install-service) and xCAT rpm repository. Generally, the /tftpboot and /install on SN are mounted from xCAT MN, so them will be identical with the dirs on MN in any time. SN cannot work without MN since there's only one database which is running on MN. If MN is down you cannot run lots of commands on SN. In fact xCAT does NOT recommend to run any command on SN. Thanks Best Regards -- Wang Xiaopeng (王晓朋) IBM China System Technology Laboratory Tel: 86-10-82453455 Email: *w...@cn.ibm.com* w...@cn.ibm.com Address: 28,ZhongGuanCun Software Park,No.8 Dong Bei Wang West Road, Haidian District Beijing P.R.China 100193 [image: Inactive hide details for Josh Nielsen ---2014/01/09 03:48:01---Hi Russell, For some reason that wiki page never came up in my]Josh Nielsen ---2014/01/09 03:48:01---Hi Russell, For some reason that wiki page never came up in my Google searches even From: Josh Nielsen *jniel...@hudsonalpha.org*jniel...@hudsonalpha.org To: xCAT Users Mailing list *xcat-user@lists.sourceforge.net*xcat-user@lists.sourceforge.net, Date: 2014/01/09 03:48 Subject: Re: [xcat-user] How to create and deploy an xCAT Service Node -- Hi Russell, For some reason that wiki page never came up in my Google searches even when I placed quotes around service node. Thanks! I'll take a look through it. Regards, Josh On Wed, Jan 8, 2014 at 12:25 PM, Russell Jones *russell-l...@jonesmail.me* russell-l...@jonesmail.me wrote: Hi Josh, This should be helpful for you (it was for me when first learning how to set this up): *http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/xcat/index.php?title=Setting_Up_a_Linux_Hierarchical_Cluster*http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/xcat/index.php?title=Setting_Up_a_Linux_Hierarchical_Cluster On 1/8/2014 11:52 AM, Josh Nielsen wrote: Hello all, I am trying to move my xCAT installation toward a hierarchical structure by including Service Nodes but I am finding a dearth of information on how to create a service node on the xCAT wiki and even the Sumavi xCAT guide. At first I
Re: [xcat-user] networks.dhcpserver
Thanks Lisa, Yeah I get that, I am just wondering *why* it is needed - service node pools by their very definition can share DHCP requests and all answer a DHCP request for any node. Why does networks.dhcpserver need to be set to a single IP in that instance? The docs say to set it, but don't say why or what it's used for: Note:If using service node pools, the networks table dhcpserver attribute can be set to any single service node in your pool. The networks tftpserver, and nameserver attributes should be left blank. On 1/10/2014 1:32 PM, Lissa Valletta wrote: It is used to configure service node pools. Check this document for how to setup service node pools. https://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/xcat/index.php?title=Setting_Up_a_Linux_Hierarchical_Cluster Lissa K. Valletta 8-3/B10 Poughkeepsie, NY 12601 (tie 293) 433-3102 Russell Jones ---01/10/2014 01:56:23 PM---Hi all, What is the purpose of the networks.dhcpserver entry in relation to From: Russell Jones russell-l...@jonesmail.me To: xCAT Users Mailing list xcat-user@lists.sourceforge.net, Date: 01/10/2014 01:56 PM Subject: [xcat-user] networks.dhcpserver Hi all, What is the purpose of the networks.dhcpserver entry in relation to service nodes? What configuration files will contain this entry when it is set? Thanks! -- CenturyLink Cloud: The Leader in Enterprise Cloud Services. Learn Why More Businesses Are Choosing CenturyLink Cloud For Critical Workloads, Development Environments Everything In Between. Get a Quote or Start a Free Trial Today. http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=119420431iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk ___ xCAT-user mailing list xCAT-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xcat-user -- CenturyLink Cloud: The Leader in Enterprise Cloud Services. Learn Why More Businesses Are Choosing CenturyLink Cloud For Critical Workloads, Development Environments Everything In Between. Get a Quote or Start a Free Trial Today. http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=119420431iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk ___ xCAT-user mailing list xCAT-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xcat-user -- CenturyLink Cloud: The Leader in Enterprise Cloud Services. Learn Why More Businesses Are Choosing CenturyLink Cloud For Critical Workloads, Development Environments Everything In Between. Get a Quote or Start a Free Trial Today. http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=119420431iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk___ xCAT-user mailing list xCAT-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xcat-user
[xcat-user] Policy table question
Hi all, What are the default policy attributes service nodes should have in the policy table for xCAT 2.8+? Unless I specifically add, for example, rpower to the below list, I get a permission denied when a compute node is configured to a service node. If the compute node is not configured to use a service node, it works fine. This doesn't seem right given that I have granted the root user full access. Any ideas what's going on? Table is below. Thanks! #priority,name,host,commands,noderange,parameters,time,rule,comments,disable 1,root,,allow,, 1.2,master.local,,trusted,, 2,,,getbmcconfigallow,, 2.1,,,remoteimmsetupallow,, 2.3,,,lsxcatdallow,, 3,,,nextdestinyallow,, 4,,,getdestinyallow,, 4.1,,,rpowerallow,, 4.2,,,makedhcpallow,, 4.3,,,nodesetallow,, 4.4,,,getpostscriptallow,, 4.5,,,getcredentialsallow,, 4.6,,,syncfilesallow,, 4.7,,,litefileallow,, 4.8,,,litetreeallow,, 5.1,,master.local,allow,, 6.1,root,master.local,allow,, 6.2,root,servicefarm01,allow,, 6.3,root,servicefarm02,allow,, 6.4,root,servicefarm03,allow,, -- CenturyLink Cloud: The Leader in Enterprise Cloud Services. Learn Why More Businesses Are Choosing CenturyLink Cloud For Critical Workloads, Development Environments Everything In Between. Get a Quote or Start a Free Trial Today. http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=119420431iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk ___ xCAT-user mailing list xCAT-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xcat-user
[xcat-user] Node discovery for VMs in VMWare
Hello all, I would like to provision some new nodes in my xCAT cluster inside VMWare but I just realized that the way xCAT has identified and discovered my nodes in the past has been by dedicated physical port numbers on the switches as defined in the xCAT switch database table. That is not a problem for physical nodes which have a single cable going into a port on a switch dedicated only to that node. For example one of my nodes has this entry in the switch table: #node,switch,port,vlan,interface,comments,disable hinode,bnt01,44,1,eth0,bnt01:p44 This tells xCAT that the node found connected to port 44 on switch bnt01 can be identified as node hinode. With a VMWare cluster however a VM may reside on many ports (in my case I have 3 ESX servers - and 3 corresponding cables to the switch - which the VM may be on) at any given time, depending on which VMWare host it is running on. And on top of that the network connection is trunked so that every VM running on each ESX host goes through the same network port. Has anyone provisioned nodes in VMWare before with xCAT? And if there is not a way to do this automatically by the switch/port associations, is there another manual way that I can discover the node? Would manually inserting the node's MAC address into the xCAT 'mac' table work, or is more than that required for (auto)discovery? Thanks, Josh Nielsen -- CenturyLink Cloud: The Leader in Enterprise Cloud Services. Learn Why More Businesses Are Choosing CenturyLink Cloud For Critical Workloads, Development Environments Everything In Between. Get a Quote or Start a Free Trial Today. http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=119420431iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk___ xCAT-user mailing list xCAT-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xcat-user
