Volume-as-a-Service (Cinder)

The COARE Science Cloud’s volume-as-a-service is implemented through Cinder, OpenStack’s Block Storage service. This is a disk-based data storage that is designed to present storage resources to users and can be consumed by OpenStack’s Compute.

Managing Volumes

On the Project tab, open the Compute tab and click Volumes category.

Creating Volumes

1. Click Create Volume on the Volumes category.
2. Fill out the required fields:
   • Volume Name: Specify the name to identify the volume
   • Volume Source: Options for the volume contents (it may be blank or based on an image)
   • Type: Specify the volume type backend
   • Size: Size of block device in GiB
   • Availability Zone: Zone which handles the resources

   

3. Click Create Volume

   NOTE: For now, the only Volume Type available is RADOS Block Device (rbd).

Editing Volumes

1. Click the Edit Volume button
2. Fill out the required fields:
   • Volume Name: Name of the volume
   • Description: Description of the volume

   

   NOTE: Bootable option is required if the volume will be a bootable disk.

3. Click Submit

Extending volumes

1. Click Extend Volume on the drop-down arrow beside the Edit Volume button
2. Fill out the required field:
   • New Size (GiB): New size value

   

   NOTE: Size here should be the total value not the additional value.

3. Click Extend Volume

Managing Attachments

1. Click Manage Attachments on the drop-down arrow beside the Edit Volume button
2. Fill out the required field:
   • Attach to Instances: Select which instance to attach volume

   

   NOTE: It is better to leave the Device Name field blank and let the system generate this automatically.

3. Click Attach Volume

Creating Snapshots

A snapshot is a point-in-time copy of an OpenStack storage volume or image. Storage volume snapshots are used to back up volumes. Image snapshots are used to back up data, or as “gold” images for additional servers.

1. Click Create Snapshot on the drop-down arrow beside the Edit Volume button
2. Fill out the required field:
   • Snapshot Name: Specify to identify volume snapshot

   

   Warning: In some cases, creating a snapshot from an attached volume can result in a corrupted snapshot.

3. Click Create Volume Snapshot

Creating Volume Backups

1. Click Create Backup on the drop-down arrow beside the Edit Volume button
2. Fill out the required fields:
   • Backup Name: Specify to identify volume
   • Container Name: Container for the volume backups

   

   NOTE: We recommend creating a container first for your volume backups to avoid errors.

3. Click Create Volume Backup

Creating Volume Transfer

1. Click Create Backup on the drop-down arrow beside the Edit Volume button
2. Fill out the required field:
   • Transfer Name: Specify name to identify volume's ownership to be transferred to another user/project

   

3. Click Create Volume Transfer

Restoring Volume Backups

1. Select the Volume backups page
2. Fill out the required field:
   • Select Volume: Selects a volume to restore the Volume Backup

   

   NOTE: This automatically deletes the backup volume.

3. Click Restore Backup to Volume

Deleting Volumes, Snapshots and Volume Backups

1. Select Volume, Volume Snapshots, or Volume Backups page
2. Check the box on the left of the specific Volume, Snapshot, or Volume Backups
3. Click Delete Volume, Volume Snapshots, or Volume Backups (red colored button)
4. Click Delete Volume, Volume Snapshots, or Volume Backups on the confirmation prompt.

   NOTE: If volume has an existing snapshot, deletion will fail and prompt an error