Install Kubernetes Platform on All-in-one Simplex¶

This section describes the steps to install the StarlingX Kubernetes platform on a StarlingX R7.0 All-in-one Simplex deployment configuration.

Create a bootable USB¶

Refer to Bootable USB for instructions on how to create a bootable USB with the StarlingX ISO on your system.

Install software on controller-0¶

Insert the bootable USB into a bootable USB port on the host you are configuring as controller-0.
Power on the host.
Attach to a console, ensure the host boots from the USB, and wait for the StarlingX Installer Menus.
Make the following menu selections in the installer:
1. First menu: Select ‘All-in-one Controller Configuration’
2. Second menu: Select ‘Graphical Console’ or ‘Textual Console’ depending on your terminal access to the console port
Wait for non-interactive install of software to complete and server to reboot. This can take 5-10 minutes, depending on the performance of the server.

Warning

When using the low latency kernel, you must use the serial console instead of the graphics console, as it causes RT performance issues.

Bootstrap system on controller-0 ¶

Login using the username / password of “sysadmin” / “sysadmin”. When logging in for the first time, you will be forced to change the password.
```
Login: sysadmin
Password:
Changing password for sysadmin.
(current) UNIX Password: sysadmin
New Password:
(repeat) New Password:
```
Verify and/or configure IP connectivity.

External connectivity is required to run the Ansible bootstrap playbook. The StarlingX boot image will DHCP out all interfaces so the server may have obtained an IP address and have external IP connectivity if a DHCP server is present in your environment. Verify this using the ip addr and ping 8.8.8.8 commands.

Otherwise, manually configure an IP address and default IP route. Use the PORT, IP-ADDRESS/SUBNET-LENGTH and GATEWAY-IP-ADDRESS applicable to your deployment environment.
```
sudo ip address add <IP-ADDRESS>/<SUBNET-LENGTH> dev <PORT>
sudo ip link set up dev <PORT>
sudo ip route add default via <GATEWAY-IP-ADDRESS> dev <PORT>
ping 8.8.8.8
```
Specify user configuration overrides for the Ansible bootstrap playbook.

Ansible is used to bootstrap StarlingX on controller-0. Key files for Ansible configuration are:

/etc/ansible/hosts
The default Ansible inventory file. Contains a single host: localhost.

/usr/share/ansible/stx-ansible/playbooks/bootstrap.yml
The Ansible bootstrap playbook.

/usr/share/ansible/stx-ansible/playbooks/host_vars/bootstrap/default.yml
The default configuration values for the bootstrap playbook.

sysadmin home directory ($HOME)
The default location where Ansible looks for and imports user configuration override files for hosts. For example: $HOME/<hostname>.yml.

Important

Some Ansible bootstrap parameters cannot be changed or are very difficult to change after installation is complete.

Review the set of install-time-only parameters before installation and confirm that your values for these parameters are correct for the desired installation.

Refer to Ansible install-time-only parameters for details.

Specify the user configuration override file for the Ansible bootstrap playbook using one of the following methods:

Note

This Ansible Overrides file for the Bootstrap Playbook ($HOME/localhost.yml) contains security sensitive information, use the ansible-vault create $HOME/localhost.yml command to create it. You will be prompted for a password to protect/encrypt the file. Use the ansible-vault edit $HOME/localhost.yml command if the file needs to be edited after it is created.
1. Use a copy of the default.yml file listed above to provide your overrides.
  
  The default.yml file lists all available parameters for bootstrap configuration with a brief description for each parameter in the file comments.
  
  To use this method, run the ansible-vault create $HOME/localhost.yml command and copy the contents of the default.yml file into the ansible-vault editor, and edit the configurable values as required.
2. Create a minimal user configuration override file.
  
  To use this method, create your override file with the ansible-vault create $HOME/localhost.yml command and provide the minimum required parameters for the deployment configuration as shown in the example below. Use the OAM IP SUBNET and IP ADDRESSing applicable to your deployment environment.
```
cd ~

cat <<EOF > localhost.yml

system_mode: simplex

dns_servers:
  - 8.8.8.8
  - 8.8.4.4

external_oam_subnet: <OAM-IP-SUBNET>/<OAM-IP-SUBNET-LENGTH>
external_oam_gateway_address: <OAM-GATEWAY-IP-ADDRESS>
external_oam_floating_address: <OAM-FLOATING-IP-ADDRESS>

admin_username: admin
admin_password: <admin-password>
ansible_become_pass: <sysadmin-password>

# OPTIONALLY provide a ROOT CA certificate and key for k8s root ca,
# if not specified, one will be auto-generated,
# see ‘Kubernetes Root CA Certificate’ in Security Guide for details.
k8s_root_ca_cert: < your_root_ca_cert.pem >
k8s_root_ca_key: < your_root_ca_key.pem >
apiserver_cert_sans:
  - < your_hostname_for_oam_floating.your_domain >

EOF
```
  In either of the above options, the bootstrap playbook’s default values will pull all container images required for the StarlingX Platform from Docker hub
  
  If you have setup a private Docker registry to use for bootstrapping then you will need to add the following lines in $HOME/localhost.yml:
```
docker_registries:
  quay.io:
     url: myprivateregistry.abc.com:9001/quay.io
  docker.elastic.co:
     url: myprivateregistry.abc.com:9001/docker.elastic.co
  gcr.io:
     url: myprivateregistry.abc.com:9001/gcr.io
  ghcr.io:
     url: myprivateregistry.abc.com:9001/ghcr.io
  k8s.gcr.io:
     url: myprivateregistry.abc.com:9001/k8s.gcr.io
  docker.io:
     url: myprivateregistry.abc.com:9001/docker.io
  defaults:
     type: docker
     username: <your_myprivateregistry.abc.com_username>
     password: <your_myprivateregistry.abc.com_password>

# Add the CA Certificate that signed myprivateregistry.abc.com’s
# certificate as a Trusted CA
ssl_ca_cert: /home/sysadmin/myprivateregistry.abc.com-ca-cert.pem
```
  See Use a Private Docker Registry for more information.
  
  If a firewall is blocking access to Docker hub or your private registry from your StarlingX deployment, you will need to add the following lines in $HOME/localhost.yml (see Docker Proxy Configuration for more details about Docker proxy settings):
```
# Add these lines to configure Docker to use a proxy server
docker_http_proxy: http://my.proxy.com:1080
docker_https_proxy: https://my.proxy.com:1443
docker_no_proxy:
   - 1.2.3.4
```
  Refer to Ansible Bootstrap Configurations for information on additional Ansible bootstrap configurations for advanced Ansible bootstrap scenarios.

Run the Ansible bootstrap playbook:

Note

Before running the Ansible bootstrap playbook, it is important that you ensure that controller-0 server time is synchronized correctly. Run the following command:

# check the current server time
$ date

# if the current server time is not correct, update with NTP

      # first add nameserver for DNS resolution
      $ echo "nameserver 8.8.8.8" >> /etc/resolv.conf
      $ echo "nameserver 8.8.4.4" >> /etc/resolv.conf

      # run ntpdate
      $ sudo ntpdate 0.pool.ntp.org 1.pool.ntp.org

ansible-playbook --ask-vault-pass /usr/share/ansible/stx-ansible/playbooks/bootstrap.yml

Wait for Ansible bootstrap playbook to complete. This can take 5-10 minutes, depending on the performance of the host machine.

Configure controller-0 ¶

The newly installed controller needs to be configured.

Acquire admin credentials:
```
source /etc/platform/openrc
```
Configure the OAM interface of controller-0 and specify the attached network as “oam”. The following example configures the OAM interface on a physical untagged ethernet port, use OAM port name that is applicable to your deployment environment, for example eth0:
```
OAM_IF=<OAM-PORT>
system host-if-modify controller-0 $OAM_IF -c platform
system interface-network-assign controller-0 $OAM_IF oam
```
To configure a vlan or aggregated ethernet interface, see Node Interfaces.
Configure NTP servers for network time synchronization:
```
system ntp-modify ntpservers=0.pool.ntp.org,1.pool.ntp.org
```
To configure PTP instead of NTP, see PTP Server Configuration.

OpenStack-specific host configuration¶

Important

These steps are required only if the StarlingX OpenStack application (stx-openstack) will be installed.

For OpenStack only: Assign OpenStack host labels to controller-0 in support of installing the stx-openstack manifest and helm-charts later.

system host-label-assign controller-0 openstack-control-plane=enabled
system host-label-assign controller-0 openstack-compute-node=enabled
system host-label-assign controller-0 openvswitch=enabled

Note

If you have a NIC that supports SR-IOV, then you can enable it by using the following:

system host-label-assign controller-0 sriov=enabled

For OpenStack only: Due to the additional OpenStack services running on the AIO controller platform cores, a minimum of 4 platform cores are required, 6 platform cores are recommended.

Increase the number of platform cores with the following commands:
```
# Assign 6 cores on processor/numa-node 0 on controller-0 to platform
system host-cpu-modify -f platform -p0 6 controller-0
```

Due to the additional OpenStack services’ containers running on the controller host, the size of the Docker filesystem needs to be increased from the default size of 30G to 60G.

# check existing size of docker fs
system host-fs-list controller-0
# check available space (Avail Size (GiB)) in cgts-vg LVG where docker fs is located
system host-lvg-list controller-0
# if existing docker fs size + cgts-vg available space is less than
# 80G, you will need to add a new disk partition to cgts-vg.
# There must be at least 20GB of available space after the docker
# filesystem is increased.

   # Assuming you have unused space on ROOT DISK, add partition to ROOT DISK.
   # ( if not use another unused disk )

   # Get device path of ROOT DISK
   system host-show controller-0 | fgrep rootfs

   # Get UUID of ROOT DISK by listing disks
   system host-disk-list controller-0

   # Create new PARTITION on ROOT DISK, and take note of new partition's 'uuid' in response
   # Use a partition size such that you’ll be able to increase docker fs size from 30G to 60G
   PARTITION_SIZE=30
   system host-disk-partition-add -t lvm_phys_vol controller-0 <root-disk-uuid> ${PARTITION_SIZE}

   # Add new partition to ‘cgts-vg’ local volume group
   system host-pv-add controller-0 cgts-vg <NEW_PARTITION_UUID>
   sleep 2    # wait for partition to be added

   # Increase docker filesystem to 60G
   system host-fs-modify controller-0 docker=60

For OpenStack only: Configure the system setting for the vSwitch.

StarlingX has OVS (kernel-based) vSwitch configured as default:
- Runs in a container; defined within the helm charts of stx-openstack manifest.
- Shares the core(s) assigned to the platform.
If you require better performance, OVS-DPDK (OVS with the Data Plane Development Kit, which is supported only on bare metal hardware) should be used:
- Runs directly on the host (it is not containerized). Requires that at least 1 core be assigned/dedicated to the vSwitch function.
To deploy the default containerized OVS:
```
system modify --vswitch_type none
```
This does not run any vSwitch directly on the host, instead, it uses the containerized OVS defined in the helm charts of stx-openstack manifest.

To deploy OVS-DPDK, run the following command:
```
system modify --vswitch_type ovs-dpdk
```
Default recommendation for an AIO-controller is to use a single core for OVS-DPDK vSwitch.
```
# assign 1 core on processor/numa-node 0 on controller-0 to vswitch
system host-cpu-modify -f vswitch -p0 1 controller-0
```
When using OVS-DPDK, configure 1G of huge pages for vSwitch memory on each NUMA node on the host. It is recommended to configure 1x 1G huge page (-1G 1) for vSwitch memory on each NUMA node on the host.

However, due to a limitation with Kubernetes, only a single huge page size is supported on any one host. If your application VMs require 2M huge pages, then configure 500x 2M huge pages (-2M 500) for vSwitch memory on each NUMA node on the host.
```
# Assign 1x 1G huge page on processor/numa-node 0 on controller-0 to vswitch
system host-memory-modify -f vswitch -1G 1 controller-0 0

# Assign 1x 1G huge page on processor/numa-node 1 on controller-0 to vswitch
system host-memory-modify -f vswitch -1G 1 controller-0 1
```
Important

VMs created in an OVS-DPDK environment must be configured to use huge pages to enable networking and must use a flavor with property: hw:mem_page_size=large

Configure the huge pages for VMs in an OVS-DPDK environment on this host, the following commands are an example that assumes that 1G huge page size is being used on this host:
```
# assign 1x 1G huge page on processor/numa-node 0 on controller-0 to applications
system host-memory-modify -f application -1G 10 controller-0 0

# assign 1x 1G huge page on processor/numa-node 1 on controller-0 to applications
system host-memory-modify -f application -1G 10 controller-0 1
```
Note

After controller-0 is unlocked, changing vswitch_type requires locking and unlocking controller-0 to apply the change.

For OpenStack only: Set up disk partition for nova-local volume group, which is needed for stx-openstack nova ephemeral disks.

export NODE=controller-0

# Create ‘nova-local’ local volume group
system host-lvg-add ${NODE} nova-local

# Get UUID of DISK to create PARTITION to be added to ‘nova-local’ local volume group
# CEPH OSD Disks can NOT be used
# For best performance, do NOT use system/root disk, use a separate physical disk.

# List host’s disks and take note of UUID of disk to be used
system host-disk-list ${NODE}
# ( if using ROOT DISK, select disk with device_path of
#   ‘system host-show ${NODE} | fgrep rootfs’   )

# Create new PARTITION on selected disk, and take note of new partition’s ‘uuid’ in response
# The size of the PARTITION needs to be large enough to hold the aggregate size of
# all nova ephemeral disks of all VMs that you want to be able to host on this host,
# but is limited by the size and space available on the physical disk you chose above.
# The following example uses a small PARTITION size such that you can fit it on the
# root disk, if that is what you chose above.
# Additional PARTITION(s) from additional disks can be added later if required.
PARTITION_SIZE=30

system host-disk-partition-add -t lvm_phys_vol ${NODE} <disk-uuid> ${PARTITION_SIZE}

# Add new partition to ‘nova-local’ local volume group
system host-pv-add ${NODE} nova-local <NEW_PARTITION_UUID>
sleep 2

For OpenStack only: Configure data interfaces for controller-0. Data class interfaces are vSwitch interfaces used by vSwitch to provide VM virtio vNIC connectivity to OpenStack Neutron Tenant Networks on the underlying assigned Data Network.

Important

A compute-labeled AIO-controller host MUST have at least one Data class interface.

Configure the data interfaces for controller-0.

export NODE=controller-0

# List inventoried host’s ports and identify ports to be used as ‘data’ interfaces,
# based on displayed linux port name, pci address and device type.
system host-port-list ${NODE}

# List host’s auto-configured ‘ethernet’ interfaces,
# find the interfaces corresponding to the ports identified in previous step, and
# take note of their UUID
system host-if-list -a ${NODE}

# Modify configuration for these interfaces
# Configuring them as ‘data’ class interfaces, MTU of 1500 and named data#
system host-if-modify -m 1500 -n data0 -c data ${NODE} <data0-if-uuid>
system host-if-modify -m 1500 -n data1 -c data ${NODE} <data1-if-uuid>

# Create Data Networks that vswitch 'data' interfaces will be connected to
DATANET0='datanet0'
DATANET1='datanet1'
system datanetwork-add ${DATANET0} vlan
system datanetwork-add ${DATANET1} vlan

# Assign Data Networks to Data Interfaces
system interface-datanetwork-assign ${NODE} <data0-if-uuid> ${DATANET0}
system interface-datanetwork-assign ${NODE} <data1-if-uuid> ${DATANET1}

Optionally Configure PCI-SRIOV Interfaces¶

Optionally, configure PCI-SRIOV interfaces for controller-0.

This step is optional for Kubernetes. Do this step if using SR-IOV network attachments in hosted application containers.

This step is optional for OpenStack. Do this step if using SR-IOV vNICs in hosted application VMs. Note that PCI-SRIOV interfaces can have the same Data Networks assigned to them as vswitch data interfaces.

Configure the PCI-SRIOV interfaces for controller-0.

export NODE=controller-0

# List inventoried host’s ports and identify ports to be used as ‘pci-sriov’ interfaces,
# based on displayed linux port name, pci address and device type.
system host-port-list ${NODE}

# List host’s auto-configured ‘ethernet’ interfaces,
# find the interfaces corresponding to the ports identified in previous step, and
# take note of their UUID
system host-if-list -a ${NODE}

# Modify configuration for these interfaces
# Configuring them as ‘pci-sriov’ class interfaces, MTU of 1500 and named sriov#
system host-if-modify -m 1500 -n sriov0 -c pci-sriov ${NODE} <sriov0-if-uuid> -N <num_vfs>
system host-if-modify -m 1500 -n sriov1 -c pci-sriov ${NODE} <sriov1-if-uuid> -N <num_vfs>

# If not already created, create Data Networks that the 'pci-sriov' interfaces will
# be connected to
DATANET0='datanet0'
DATANET1='datanet1'
system datanetwork-add ${DATANET0} vlan
system datanetwork-add ${DATANET1} vlan

# Assign Data Networks to PCI-SRIOV Interfaces
system interface-datanetwork-assign ${NODE} <sriov0-if-uuid> ${DATANET0}
system interface-datanetwork-assign ${NODE} <sriov1-if-uuid> ${DATANET1}

For Kubernetes Only: To enable using SR-IOV network attachments for the above interfaces in Kubernetes hosted application containers:

Configure the Kubernetes SR-IOV device plugin.

system host-label-assign controller-0 sriovdp=enabled

If planning on running DPDK in Kubernetes hosted application containers on this host, configure the number of 1G Huge pages required on both NUMA nodes.

# assign 10x 1G huge page on processor/numa-node 0 on controller-0 to applications
system host-memory-modify -f application controller-0 0 -1G 10

# assign 10x 1G huge page on processor/numa-node 1 on controller-0 to applications
system host-memory-modify -f application controller-0 1 -1G 10

If required, initialize a Ceph-based Persistent Storage Backend¶

A persistent storage backend is required if your application requires PVCs.

Important

The StarlingX OpenStack application requires PVCs.

There are two options for persistent storage backend: the host-based Ceph solution and the Rook container-based Ceph solution.

For host-based Ceph:

Add host-based Ceph backend:

system storage-backend-add ceph --confirmed

Add an OSD on controller-0 for host-based Ceph:

# List host’s disks and identify disks you want to use for CEPH OSDs, taking note of their UUID
# By default, /dev/sda is being used as system disk and can not be used for OSD.
system host-disk-list controller-0

# Add disk as an OSD storage
system host-stor-add controller-0 osd <disk-uuid>

# List OSD storage devices
system host-stor-list controller-0

For Rook container-based Ceph:

Add Rook container-based backend:

system storage-backend-add ceph-rook --confirmed

Assign Rook host labels to controller-0 in support of installing the rook-ceph-apps manifest/helm-charts later:

system host-label-assign controller-0 ceph-mon-placement=enabled
system host-label-assign controller-0 ceph-mgr-placement=enabled

Unlock controller-0 ¶

Unlock controller-0 to bring it into service:

system host-unlock controller-0

Controller-0 will reboot in order to apply configuration changes and come into service. This can take 5-10 minutes, depending on the performance of the host machine.

If using Rook container-based Ceph, finish configuring the ceph-rook Persistent Storage Backend¶

On controller-0:

Wait for application rook-ceph-apps to be uploaded

$ source /etc/platform/openrc
$ system application-list
+---------------------+---------+-------------------------------+---------------+----------+-----------+
| application         | version | manifest name                 | manifest file | status   | progress  |
+---------------------+---------+-------------------------------+---------------+----------+-----------+
| oidc-auth-apps      | 1.0-0   | oidc-auth-manifest            | manifest.yaml | uploaded | completed |
| platform-integ-apps | 1.0-8   | platform-integration-manifest | manifest.yaml | uploaded | completed |
| rook-ceph-apps      | 1.0-1   | rook-ceph-manifest            | manifest.yaml | uploaded | completed |
+---------------------+---------+-------------------------------+---------------+----------+-----------+

Configure rook to use /dev/sdb disk on controller-0 as a ceph OSD.

system host-disk-wipe -s --confirm controller-0 /dev/sdb

values.yaml for rook-ceph-apps.

cluster:
  storage:
    nodes:
    - name: controller-0
      devices:
      - name: /dev/disk/by-path/pci-0000:00:03.0-ata-2.0

system helm-override-update rook-ceph-apps rook-ceph kube-system --values values.yaml

Apply the rook-ceph-apps application.

system application-apply rook-ceph-apps

Wait for OSDs pod to be ready.

kubectl get pods -n kube-system
rook--ceph-crashcollector-controller-0-764c7f9c8-bh5c7   1/1     Running     0          62m
rook--ceph-mgr-a-69df96f57-9l28p                         1/1     Running     0          63m
rook--ceph-mon-a-55fff49dcf-ljfnx                        1/1     Running     0          63m
rook--ceph-operator-77b64588c5-nlsf2                     1/1     Running     0          66m
rook--ceph-osd-0-7d5785889f-4rgmb                        1/1     Running     0          62m
rook--ceph-osd-prepare-controller-0-cmwt5                0/1     Completed   0          2m14s
rook--ceph-tools-5778d7f6c-22tms                         1/1     Running     0          64m
rook--discover-kmv6c                                     1/1     Running     0          65m

Next steps¶

Your Kubernetes cluster is now up and running.

For instructions on how to access StarlingX Kubernetes see Access StarlingX Kubernetes R7.0.

For instructions on how to install and access StarlingX OpenStack see StarlingX OpenStack.