OpenStack Lab on VMware Workstation – Setting up the All-In-One VM

openstacklogo1In our first post, we got to the start of the OpenStack install using the Rackspace Private Cloud ISO (Alamo). Because we had to set up the VM, we stopped at our first menu option. Now we are going to set up the base system using the All-In-One option which co-locates all of the OpenStack node roles (controller and compute) in a single system.

Understanding the OpenStack Framework

First we need to do some quick review of what exactly will be found in our OpenStack All-In-One VM. There are numerous components in the OpenStack framework including:

  • Compute (Nova)
  • Image Service (Glance)
  • Dashboard (Horizon)
  • Identity (Keystone)
  • Block Storage (Cinder)

Object Storage (Swift) is one of the components that’s not packaged with the All-In-One deployment, but you can install it after the fact if you desire.

Here is a logical layout of the design (image care of OpenStack.org):

alamo-30-designconcept

So what exactly are these components is your next question right?

Compute (Nova)

Nova is the compute node system of OpenStack which provisions virtual servers. It was built by NASA. No, seriously, it was built by NASA. This is some true space age computing!

Image Service (Glance)

The role of Glance is to store a catalog of virtual images. The images will be deployed into compute nodes and will be key for any real dynamic environments. For lab purposes, we won’t be using this as much but we need to fully understand its operational requirements and behavior.

Dashboard (Horizon)

This is your web application which will be how you perform most activities in the OpenStack cloud. This is how you launch a new instance, manage ACLs and network addresses.

Identity (Keystone)

The identity management of OpenStack is inside Keystone. This is your authentication and authorization system for your cloud. This is also a service catalog for your OpenStack cloud.

Block Storage (Cinder)

Newly minted for the Folsom release of OpenStack, the Cinder block storage system houses your VMs. Just like your traditional VMware storage environment, this is block, not NFS or CIFS.

Let’s Get Started

We begin where we left off, which is at the first menu during the OpenStack installation process. We are choosing the All-In-One deployment option:

alamo-01-aiomenu

 We give our VM a static IP address from the VMware Workstation NAT range so it can communicate with the outside world:

alamo-02-ipaddress

Provide the gateway address next. Note that it will default to x.x.x.1 so you have to make sure it is the NAT gateway for your virtual network which should be x.x.x.2

alamo-03-gateway

We need DNS to be able to resolve addresses. I’ve chosen to use 8.8.8.8 which is the Google public DNS:

alamo-04-dns

I always love a little humor during an install. The “you can make something up here” always makes me smile. I’ve used openstack01 as the hostname for my instance:

alamo-05-hostname

This can be whatever is appropriate for your system, but I’ve opted for my own domain which is corp.discoposse.com:

alamo-06-dnssuffix

The Nova range (private internal range) is already selected, so I’ve accepted the default:

alamo-07-novanetwork

Enter a password for your admin user (I’ve used openstack to make it easy to remember:

alamo-08-password

Re-enter your password:

alamo-09-reenterpassword

Next we create the OpenStack user account (consumer of our services). I’ve opted to keep the default which is demo:

alamo-10-normaluser

Again, we need to select a password. I’ve also used openstack to make it easy to remember:

alamo-11-normalpassword

Re-enter the password:

alamo-12-normalreenterpassword

We provide a full name to a non-admin user account. I’ve used my name:

alamo-13-realusername

Next we set the username for the non-admin account:

alamo-14-accountname

Set your password:

alamo-15-password

Re-enter your password:

alamo-16-reenterpassword

Now the installation will begin. This takes a little while, but you will be able to monitor the progress on the console:

alamo-17-installingprogressbar

Once the base installation is done, the system needs to contact the public mirror for Ubuntu to be able to download additional libraries and applications:

alamo-18-aptsource

The subfolder will be defaulted to /Ubuntu and you can leave this as-is and continue:

alamo-19-mirrorfolder

If you have an HTTP proxy between your VMware Workstation and the internet, enter the information here. I’m directly connected so I have just left this blank:

alamo-20-proxy

Next the additional components are downloaded:

alamo-21-installing

You will notice the installer screen changes and the actual Rackspace OpenStack environment begins to install and configure itself:

alamo-22-installalmostdone

A little bit of waiting (depending on speed of your system) and you will see the final screen with the current configuration on the console of your VM:

alamo-23-installcompleted

Browse to the IP address using https://youripaddress as shown in the configuration screen. You are presented with the login screen where you will use the admin user and your password to log in:

alamo-2-welcometoopenstack

Now you see the Rackspace OpenStack console for your new VM deployment:

alamo-24-firstlogin

Yay!!!

yeah

Congratulations! You are now at the next step in our journey into discovering OpenStack. More posts to come!

24 thoughts on “OpenStack Lab on VMware Workstation – Setting up the All-In-One VM”

  1. Hi,
    I am finding an error in my installation.
    I’m installing on VMware Wokstation 9 on CentOS:

    The installation progress of Alamo’s ISO remains to 82% in “Update Sub Modules” (just after installation of the Chef server).
    The Install log is blocked on the raw:
    “Checking out cookbook cookbooks/apache2 … [update]”

    Can you help me?

    Thanks in advance.
    M.

    Reply
    • Hi there,

      There are some updates that are coming from the net throughout the installation. The only thing that I’d have you try is to run the process where the network type is “bridged” to ensure that the connection is clear to pick up all of the remote libraries and updates. The alternative is to install a bare Ubuntu installation to confirm the access to all of the apt modules from your NAT range within VMware Workstation.

      Give that a try if possible and let me know if that’s still an issue with access from your NAT range.

      Thanks!
      Eric

      Reply
  2. hi, eric,
    can you post few things like how to install and manage VMs along with few interesting features at least today , so i can try that. i am using 16GB RAM pc with i7 processor. i provisioned 8GB RAM to this all in one VM. it installed successfully.
    thank you man !

    Reply
  3. hi
    I’ve encountered an error. I came to help. Please
    error :

    opt/arpcs/status.sh: line 19: dialog: command not found
    opt/arpcs/status.sh: line 64: dialog: command not found

    Reply
    • Hi There,

      I’ve had some installations in the past, but oddly enough, a re-install from the CD was the fix typically. I’m not sure if it is because the ISO mount drops at some point during the install or not. Can you try to install a second VM using the same process and confirm if it behaves the same?

      Thanks,

      Eric

      Reply
    • Hi Archana,

      I seem to remember that I’ve had a similar error and had to retry the build. For some reason the connection to the repo fails during the installation, but a reinstall works. It’s tricky to troubleshoot because once the overall load fails, it’s tricky to rebuild unless you wipe and replace.

      Hopefully I’ll have my Havana deployment post up soon to fix things up, and in the mean time you can also follow Kenneth Hui’s great post for the Havana version of the Rackspace Private Cloud deployment in VirtualBox here: http://cloudarchitectmusings.com/2013/12/01/deploy-openstack-havana-on-your-laptop-using-vagrant-and-chef/

      Thanks!

      Eric

      Reply
      • Hi Eric,

        Thanks for response..but i figured out that i had some corrections to make in my NAT IP address configurations. The issue got resolved and I was able to complete the installation. I am now trying to use this .iso file to set up separate controller and compute node VM instances. Do you have any posts/suggestions on how to do that?

        Thanks,
        Archana.

        Reply
  4. I am new to Openstack and cloud computing as a whole, how can i get refrence materials on this topic and if there are relevant certifications in this area.

    Thanks.

    Reply
  5. Please help,

    I have set password and the time of installation but the same password is not accepting.

    One more thing, Web gui is also not accessble by browser.

    Reply
    • Without the initial password, it will be a challenge to keep going. Unfortunately, there is no simple workaround for the Ubuntu OS. I may add a new user for a back door safety measure during the install script to avoid this issue now that I see it could happen.

      For the dashboard, we will definitely need to do some local work on the system to check logs which will require the shell login. If you do have any luck getting logged in locally, let me know and we can see what the Horizon issues are. Good luck with the password issue and I hope we can get you up and running. In a worst case scenario, you can re-launch the instance altogether from a new machine.

      Reply

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