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Re: [Xen-users] XEN Images Storage

To: <xen-users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, "Alejandro Weintz Aguilar" <alejandro@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [Xen-users] XEN Images Storage
From: "Nick Couchman" <Nick.Couchman@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2008 08:50:13 -0700
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I have my XEN servers on a SAN and I use OCFS2 and EVMS to create storage areas for my servers.  This also requires that you configure heartbeat, as the cluster part of EVMS uses heartbeat.  I've run into a couple of issues with this method, though - first, I'm not able to resize volumes on EVMS.  Second, I've had some trouble getting heartbeat to work correctly, especially when adding nodes to it.  That could just be my lack of experience with the tool, though.


Based on my experience, I'd suggest something like this:

1) If you don't have a SAN, get a machine that has a good deal of built-in redundancy (redundant power supplies, HARDWARE RAID unit, etc.) and set it up as an iSCSI server (you can use iSCSI Enterprise Target - ietf - for this).  Use dual network cards and some sort of redundant Ethernet setup (bonding, for example) to connect this machine to a switch.  Even the cheapest of "smart switches" (NetGear GS108T, for example) support link aggregation.

2) Use either iSCSI HBAs (Qlogic has some nice ones) or the iSCSI software initiator and connect your XEN servers to the iSCSI Target.

3) Use LVM2 with clvmd (Cluster LVM Daemon) to manage volumes.  This will give you the flexibility to choose whether you'd like to create one big storage area and store the disk images as files in that folder or configure each VM to have its own LVM volume.

4) If you choose to create a large file share and mount it, use OCFS2 or GFS on the share.  Configuration of either of these filesystems is relatively easy.  GFS has the plus of supporting POSIX ACLs, but I'm not sure that really matters on XEN servers, so compare them and pick the ones you like.


-Nick

>>> On Wed, Jan 23, 2008 at  8:04 AM, Alejandro Weintz Aguilar <alejandro@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I want to build on Open Source tools a high availabitiy server to store
my images, someone with suggestions? experiences plz. really aprreciate.

Started to try Gluster but yesterday discussion pointed me very
important things.

thx



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