Bifrost (pronounced bye-frost) is a set of Ansible playbooks that automates the task of deploying a base image onto a set of known hardware using ironic. It provides modular utility for one-off operating system deployment with as few operational requirements as reasonably possible.
- Installation of ironic in standalone/noauth mode without other OpenStack components.
- Deployment of an operating system to a known pool of hardware as a batch operation.
- Testing and development of ironic in a standalone use case.
Installation and use of bifrost is split into roughly three steps:
- install: prepare the local environment by downloading and/or building machine images, and installing and configuring the necessary services.
- enroll-dynamic: take as input a customizable hardware inventory file and enroll the listed hardware with ironic, configuring each appropriately for deployment with the previously-downloaded images.
- deploy-dynamic: instruct ironic to deploy the operating system onto each machine.
Supported operating systems:
- Ubuntu 14.04, 14.10, 15.04, 16.04
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 7
- CentOS 7
- Fedora 22
- openSUSE Leap 42.1, 42.2
Installing bifrost on RHEL or CentOS requires a few extra pre-install steps.
The extras and optional yum repositories must be enabled to satisfy bifrost's dependencies. To check:
sudo yum repolist | grep 'optional\|extras'
To add the repositories:
sudo yum repolist all | grep 'optional\|extras'
The output will look like this:
!rhui-REGION-rhel-server-debug-extras/7Server/x86_64 Red H disabled rhui-REGION-rhel-server-debug-optional/7Server/x86_64 Red H disabled rhui-REGION-rhel-server-extras/7Server/x86_64 Red H disabled rhui-REGION-rhel-server-optional/7Server/x86_64 Red H disabled rhui-REGION-rhel-server-source-extras/7Server/x86_64 Red H disabled rhui-REGION-rhel-server-source-optional/7Server/x86_64 Red H disabled
Use the names of the repositories (minus the version and architecture) to enable them:
sudo yum-config-manager --enable rhui-REGION-rhel-server-optional sudo yum-config-manager --enable rhui-REGION-rhel-server-extras
The Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux (EPEL) repository contains
some of bifrost's dependencies. To enable it, install the
epel-release package as follows:
sudo yum install https://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/epel-release-latest-7.noarch.rpm
To enable EPEL on CentOS, run:
sudo yum install epel-release
The installation is split into two parts.
The first part is a bash script which lays the basic groundwork of installing Ansible itself.
Bifrost source code should be pulled directly from git first:
git clone https://git.openstack.org/openstack/bifrost.git cd bifrost
Edit ./playbooks/inventory/group_vars/* to match your environment. The
localhost file is intended for steps executed upon the localhost, such as
installation, or image generation. The baremetal file is geared for steps
performed on baremetal nodes, such as enrollment, deployment, or any other
custom playbooks that a user may bolt on to this toolkit.
- If MySQL is already installed, update
mysql_passwordto match your local installation. - Change
network_interfaceto match the interface that will need to service DHCP requests. - Change the
ironic_db_passwordwhich is set by Ansible in MySQL and in ironic's configuration file.
The install process builds or modifies a disk image to deploy. The following two settings (which are mutually exclusive) allow you to choose if a partition image is used or an image is created with diskimage-builder:
create_image_via_dib: true transform_boot_image: false
If you are running the installation behind a proxy, export the
environment variables http_proxy and https_proxy so that
Ansible will use these proxy settings.
The below script env-setup.sh will install ansible and all of bifrost's
dependencies. You can configure the ansible installation location by setting
ANSIBLE_INSTALL_ROOT environment variable. The default value will be
/opt/stack.
Note:
Only ansible installation location will be moved as part of the
environment variable. The other components will continue to be cloned under
/opt/stack
Then run:
bash ./scripts/env-setup.sh
source ${ANSIBLE_INSTALL_ROOT}/ansible/hacking/env-setup
cd playbooks
The second part is an Ansible playbook that installs and configures ironic in a stand-alone fashion.
- Keystone is NOT installed by default, and ironic's API is accessible without
authentication. It is possible to put basic password auth on ironic's API by
changing the nginx configuration accordingly.
- Bifrost playbooks can leverage and optionally install keystone. See :ref:`keystone`.
- Neutron is NOT installed. Ironic performs static IP injection via config-drive.
- dnsmasq is configured statically and responds to all PXE boot requests by chain-loading to iPXE, which then fetches the ironic-python-agent ramdisk from Nginx.
- Deployments are performed by the Ironic Python Agent, which as configured supports IPMI, iLO, and UCS drivers. AMT driver support is also enabled, however it should only be used for testing as due to a known bug which can be read about at https://bugs.launchpad.net/ironic/+bug/1454492.
- By default, installation will build an Ubuntu-based image for deployment to nodes. This image can be easily customized if so desired.
The re-execution of the playbook will cause states to be re-asserted. If not already present, a number of software packages including MySQL and RabbitMQ will be installed on the host. Python code will be reinstalled regardless if it has changed, RabbitMQ user passwords will be reset, and services will be restarted.
Run:
If you have passwordless sudo enabled, run: ansible-playbook -vvvv -i inventory/localhost install.yaml Otherwise, add -K option to let Ansible prompting for the sudo password: ansible-playbook -K -vvvv -i inventory/localhost install.yaml
With regard to testing, ironic's node cleaning capability is disabled by default as it can be an unexpected surprise for a new user that their test node is unusable for however long it takes for the disks to be wiped.
If you wish to enable cleaning, you can achieve this by passing the option
-e cleaning=true to the command line or executing the command below:
ansible-playbook -K -vvvv -i inventory/localhost install.yaml -e cleaning=true
After you have performed an installation, you can edit /etc/ironic/ironic.conf to enable or disable cleaning as desired, however it is highly encouraged to utilize cleaning in any production environment.
The ironic community maintains a repository additional of drivers outside ironic.
These drivers and information about them can be found here.
If you would like to install the ironic staging drivers, simply pass
-e staging_drivers_include=true when executing the install playbook:
ansible-playbook -K -vvvv -i inventory/localhost install.yaml -e staging_drivers_include=true
If you wish to utilize ironic's CLI in no-auth mode, you must set two environment variables:
IRONIC_URL- A URL to the ironic API, such as http://localhost:6385/OS_AUTH_TOKEN- Any value except empty space, such as 'fake-token', is required to cause the client library to send requests directly to the API.
For your ease of use, env-vars can be sourced to allow the CLI to connect
to a local ironic installation operating in noauth mode. Run e.g.:
source env-vars ironic node-list +------+------+---------------+-------------+--------------------+-------------+ | UUID | Name | Instance UUID | Power State | Provisioning State | Maintenance | +------+------+---------------+-------------+--------------------+-------------+ +------+------+---------------+-------------+--------------------+-------------+
which should print an empty table if connection to Ironic works as expected.
The following requirements are installed during the Installation step above:
- openstack-infra/shade library
- openstack-infra/os-client-config
In order to enroll hardware, you will naturally need an inventory of your hardware. When utilizing the dynamic inventory module and accompanying roles the inventory can be supplied in one of three ways, all of which ultimately translate to JSON data that Ansible parses.
The original method is to utilize a CSV file. This format is covered below in the Legacy CSV File Format section. This has a number of limitations, but does allow a user to bulk load hardware from an inventory list with minimal data transformations.
The newer method is to utilize a JSON or YAML document which the inventory parser will convert and provide to Ansible.
In order to use, you will need to define the environment variable
BIFROST_INVENTORY_SOURCE to equal a file, which then allows you to
execute Ansible utilizing the bifrost_inventory.py file as the data
source.
The inventory/bifrost_inventory.py program additionally features a
mode that allows a user to convert a CSV file to the JSON data format
utilizing a --convertcsv command line setting when directly invoked.
Example:
export BIFROST_INVENTORY_SOURCE=/tmp/baremetal.csv inventory/bifrost_inventory.py --convertcsv >/tmp/baremetal.json
The JSON format closely resembles the data structure that ironic
utilizes internally. The name, driver_info, nics,
driver, and properties fields are directly mapped through to
ironic. This means that the data contained within can vary from host
to host, such as drivers and their parameters thus allowing a mixed
hardware environment to be defined in a single file.
Example:
{
"testvm1": {
"uuid": "00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000001",
"driver_info": {
"power": {
"ssh_port": 22,
"ssh_username": "ironic",
"ssh_virt_type": "virsh",
"ssh_address": "192.168.122.1",
"ssh_key_filename": "/home/ironic/.ssh/id_rsa"
}
},
"nics": [
{
"mac": "52:54:00:f9:32:f6"
}
],
"driver": "agent_ssh",
"ansible_ssh_host": "192.168.122.2",
"ipv4_address": "192.168.122.2",
"provisioning_ipv4_address": "10.0.0.9",
"properties": {
"cpu_arch": "x86_64",
"ram": "3072",
"disk_size": "10",
"cpus": "1"
},
"name": "testvm1"
}
}
The additional power of this format is easy configuration parameter injection,
which could potentially allow a user to provision different operating system
images onto different hardware chassis by defining the appropriate settings
in an instance_info variable.
Examples utilizing JSON and YAML formatting, along host specific variable
injection can be found in the playbooks/inventory/ folder.
The CSV file has the following columns:
- MAC Address
- Management username
- Management password
- Management Address
- CPU Count
- Memory size in MB
- Disk Storage in GB
- Flavor (Not Used)
- Type (Not Used)
- Host UUID
- Host or Node name
- Host IP Address to be set
ipmi_target_channel- Requires:ipmi_bridgingset to singleipmi_target_address- Requires:ipmi_bridgingset to singleipmi_transit_channel- Requires:ipmi_bridgingset to dualipmi_transit_address- Requires:ipmi_bridgingset to dual- ironic driver
- Host provisioning IP Address
Example definition:
00:11:22:33:44:55,root,undefined,192.168.122.1,1,8192,512,NA,NA,aaaaaaaa-bbbb-cccc-dddd-eeeeeeeeeeee,hostname_100,192.168.2.100,,,,agent_ipmitool,10.0.0.9
This file format is fairly flexible and can be easily modified although the enrollment and deployment playbooks utilize the model of a host per line model in order to process through the entire list, as well as reference the specific field items.
An example file can be found at: playbooks/inventory/baremetal.csv.example
Utilizing the dynamic inventory module, enrollment is as simple as setting
the BIFROST_INVENTORY_SOURCE environment variable to your inventory data
source, and then executing the enrollment playbook.:
export BIFROST_INVENTORY_SOURCE=/tmp/baremetal.json ansible-playbook -vvvv -i inventory/bifrost_inventory.py enroll-dynamic.yaml
Note that enrollment is a one-time operation. The Ansible module does not synchronize data for existing nodes. You should use the ironic CLI to do this manually at the moment.
Additionally, it is important to note that the playbooks for enrollment are
split into three separate playbooks based on the ipmi_bridging setting.
After the nodes are enrolled, they can be deployed upon. Bifrost is geared to utilize configuration drives to convey basic configuration information to the each host. This configuration information includes an SSH key to allow a user to login to the system.
To utilize the newer dynamic inventory based deployment:
export BIFROST_INVENTORY_SOURCE=/tmp/baremetal.json ansible-playbook -vvvv -i inventory/bifrost_inventory.py deploy-dynamic.yaml
Note:
Before running the above command, ensure that the value for `ssh_public_key_path` in ``./playbooks/inventory/group_vars/baremetal`` refers to a valid public key file, or set the ssh_public_key_path option on the ansible-playbook command line by setting the variable. Example: "-e ssh_public_key_path=~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub"
If the hosts need to be re-deployed, the dynamic redeploy playbook may be used:
export BIFROST_INVENTORY_SOURCE=/tmp/baremetal.json ansible-playbook -vvvv -i inventory/bifrost_inventory.py redeploy-dynamic.yaml
This playbook will undeploy the hosts, followed by a deployment, allowing a configurable timeout for the hosts to transition in each step.
A simple scripts/test-bifrost.sh script can be utilized to install
pre-requisite software packages, Ansible, and then execute the
test-bifrost-create-vm.yaml and test-bifrost.yaml playbooks in order
to provide a single step testing mechanism.
playbooks/test-bifrost-create-vm.yaml creates one or more VMs for
testing and saves out a baremetal.csv file which is used by
playbooks/test-bifrost.yaml to execute the remaining roles. Two
additional roles are invoked by this playbook which enables Ansible to
connect to the new nodes by adding them to the inventory, and then
logging into the remote machine via the user's ssh host key. Once
that has successfully occurred, additional roles will unprovision the
host(s) and delete them from ironic.
Command:
scripts/test-bifrost.sh
Note:
- Cleaning mode is explicitly disabled in the
test-bifrost.yamlplaybook due to the fact that is an IO-intensive operation that can take a great deal of time.
Bifrost supports using virtual machines to emulate the hardware. All of the steps mentioned above are mostly the same.
It is assumed you have an SSH server running on the host machine. The
agent_ssh driver, used by ironic with VM testing, will need to use
SSH to control the virtual machines.
An SSH key is generated for the ironic user when testing. The
ironic conductor will use this key to connect to the host machine and
run virsh commands.
- Set
testingto true in theplaybooks/inventory/group_vars/localhostfile. - You may need to adjust the value for
ssh_public_key_path. - Run the install step, as documented above, however adding
-e testing=trueto the Ansible command line. - Execute the
ansible-playbook -vvvv -i inventory/localhost test-bifrost-create-vm.yamlcommand to create a test virtual machine. - Set the environment variable of
BIFROST_INVENTORY_SOURCEto the path to the csv file, which by default has been written to /tmp/baremetal.csv. - Run the enrollment step, as documented above, using the CSV file you created in the previous step.
- Run the deployment step, as documented above.
By default, Bifrost deploys a configuration drive which includes the user SSH public key, hostname, and the network configuration in the form of network_data.json that can be read/parsed by the glean utility. This allows for the deployment of Ubuntu, CentOS, or Fedora "tenants" on baremetal. This file format is not yet supported by Cloud-Init, however it is on track for inclusion in cloud-init 2.0.
By default, Bifrost utilizes a utility called simple-init which leverages the previously noted glean utility to apply network configuration. This means that by default, root file systems may not be automatically expanded to consume the entire disk, which may, or may not be desirable depending upon operational needs. This is dependent upon what base OS image you utilize, and if the support is included in that image or not. At present, the standard Ubuntu cloud image includes cloud-init which will grow the root partition, however the ubuntu-minimal image does not include cloud-init and thus will not automatically grow the root partition.
Due to the nature of the design, it would be relatively easy for a user to import automatic growth or reconfiguration steps either in the image to be deployed, or in post-deployment steps via custom Ansible playbooks.
Bifrost supports the ability for a user to build a custom IPA ramdisk
utilizing the diskimage-builder element "ironic-agent". In order to utilize
this feature, the download_ipa setting must be set to false and the
create_ipa_image must be set to "true". By default, the install playbook will
build a Debian jessie based IPA image, if a pre-existing IPA image is not
present on disk. If you wish to explicitly set a specific release to be
passed to diskimage-create, then the setting dib_os_release can be set in
addition to dib_os_element.
If you wish to include an extra element into the IPA disk image, such as a
custom hardware manager, you can pass the variable ipa_extra_dib_elements
as a space-separated list of elements. This defaults to an empty string.
When setup in testing mode, bifrost configures ironic to utilize the
agent_ssh driver to help facilitate the deployment of local test
machines.
When not in testing mode, bifrost enables the following ironic drivers:
- agent_ipmitool
- pxe_amt
- agent_ilo
- agent_ucs
As the OneView driver requires configuration information to be populated in the ironic.conf configuration file that points to the OneView manager node as well as credentials, bifrost does not support installation and configuration of the driver.
Please reference the ironic OneView driver documentation at if you wish to update the configuration after installation in order to leverage bifrost for mass node deployment.
The OneView documentation can be found here.
Bifrost can be used with a python virtual environment. At present,
this feature is experimental, so it's disabled by default. If you
would like to use a virtual environment, you'll need to modify the
install steps slightly. To set up the virtual environment and install
ansible into it, run env-setup.sh as follows:
export VENV=/opt/stack/bifrost ./scripts/env-setup.sh
Then run the install playbook with the following arguments:
ansible-playbook -vvvv -i inventory/localhost install.yaml
This will install ironic and its dependencies into the virtual environment.