Installing a Cluster of Raspberry Pis with Stacki Ace
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The document outlines the process of installing a cluster of Raspberry Pis using Stacki Ace, which converts Raspberry Pis into Stacki frontends and backends for network management. It details the specifications of the Raspberry Pi, installation steps for the frontend and backend appliances, and the necessary software and configuration settings. Additionally, it provides links for further information and support regarding Stacki Ace.
Installing a Cluster of Raspberry Pis with Stacki Ace
- 1. Installing a Cluster of Raspberry Pis
- 2. What is a Raspberry Pi? Single board computer Designed to promote teaching of computer science As of November 2016, 11 million units sold Raspberry Pi 3 Model B - $35!!
- 3. Raspberry Pi Stats 1.2 GHz quad-core ARM 64/32 bit capable 1 GB RAM 1 MicroSD slot 4 USB ports 100 Mbit Ethernet HDMI Bluetooth Wireless LAN Audio / Composite video out Camera header Display header 40 pins of general-purpose I/O
- 4. Raspberry Pi Software Supports Linux Debian (“Raspbian”) • Main software release CentOS 7.x • Only 32-bit for now Many other distributions too And now Stacki!
- 5. Stacki Ace The best ARM on your team is an Ace Stacki pallet for ARM • Based on Stacki 4.0 Stacki-ace pallet for ARM • Raspberry Pi specific configuration
- 6. Why Stacki Ace? Great marketing vehicle X86_64 rules the server space • But 15 billion ARMs shipped in 2015 Can install a datacenter with a $35 device Interesting new use cases • Low-cost pooled storage • IoT
- 7. Stacki Ace – What does it do? Converts a Raspberry Pi into a Stacki frontend Stacki Ace frontend can install: • Other Raspberry Pis (“ace” appliances) • Traditional x86_64 servers (“backend” appliances)
- 8. What We Are Going To Do Today We are going to use a pre-installed Stacki Ace Frontend to build 3 Stacki Ace Backends Stacki Ace Frontend (rasp002) Network Switch Stacki Ace Backend (rasp003) Stacki Ace Backend (rasp004) Stacki Ace Backend (rasp005)
- 9. Install Stacki Ace Backends
- 10. How We Installed the Stacki Ace Frontend
- 11. Frontend Installation Download “stacki-centos.img”: Copy “stacki-centos.img” to a MicroSD card: Boot the Raspberry Pi that will be the frontend with the MicroSD card wget http://stacki.s3.amazonaws.com/public/pallets/4.1/open-source/ace/stacki-centos.img dd if=stacki-centos.img of=/dev/sdd
- 12. Frontend Installation When the frontend boots, login as “root” • Password is: “stacki-centos” • You’ll be asked to change the password Download the Stacki Ace pallets: wget http://stacki.s3.amazonaws.com/public/pallets/4.1/open-source/ace/ os-7.3-7.x.armv7hl.disk1.iso wget http://stacki.s3.amazonaws.com/public/pallets/4.1/open-source/ace/ stacki-4.1-7.x.armv7hl.disk1.iso wget http://stacki.s3.amazonaws.com/public/pallets/4.1/open-source/ace/ stacki-ace-4.1-7.x.armv7hl.disk1.iso
- 13. Frontend Installation Download and run “frontend-install.py”: This converts vanilla CentOS to a Stacki Ace frontend wget http://stacki.s3.amazonaws.com/public/pallets/4.1/open-source/ace/ frontend-install.py ./frontend-install.py --stacki-iso=stacki-4.1-7.x.armv7hl.disk1.iso --stacki-version=4.1 --stacki-name=stacki -–extra-iso=os-7.3-7.x.armv7hl.disk1.iso
- 19. Frontend Installation Install the “stacki-ace” and “os” pallets: Apply the “stacki-ace” pallet: Stacki Ace frontend can now build Stacki Ace backend nodes stack add pallet os-7.3-7.x.armv7hl.disk1.iso stack enable pallet os stack add pallet stacki-ace-4.1-7.x.armv7hl.disk1.iso stack enable pallet stacki-ace stack run pallet stacki-ace | bash -x
- 20. Refresher We are going to use a pre-installed Stacki Ace Frontend to build 3 Stacki Ace Backends Stacki Ace Frontend (rasp002) Network Switch Stacki Ace Backend (rasp003) Stacki Ace Backend (rasp004) Stacki Ace Backend (rasp005)
- 21. Contact
- 22. For More Info On Stacki Ace GitHub for downloads and documentation: Join our Slack channel and our Google Group: Questions? Email me: https://github.com/StackIQ/stacki-ace https://www.stackiq.com/support/ greg.bruno@stackiq.com
- 23. Internals
- 24. Basic Kickstart File Processing Wrote a “kickstart interpreter” for CentOS ARM • No kickstart on CentOS ARM Dynamically create a valid kickstart file and send it back to the Pi • Pre • Package • Post
- 25. Storage Configuration Set “bootdisk” parameter • Default: mmcblk0 (the MicroSD card) • USB storage: sda Can install onto: • MicroSD card • USB-connected hard disk • USB stick Note: If you install onto a USB device, you no longer need a MicroSD card
- 26. Kickstart File Processing During an install, NFS mount “/” from the frontend • This allows for the backend Pi to be “off” the storage so we can repartition and reformat “/boot” and “/” We configure /etc/dhcp/dhcpd.conf to answer Raspberry Pi DHCP requests • Which we automatically enable via “program_usb_boot_mode=1” in /boot/config.txt
- 27. Basic Kickstart File Processing On each boot, backend asks for kickstart file Looks at attributes section for “bootaction” attribute If “bootaction” == “install”, then parse and execute the kickstart file • Otherwise, do nothing
- 28. Future
- 29. Avalanche Package Installation • Benefits x86_64 too • Parallel file distribution on running hosts Storage and partitioning spreadsheets Wireless networking