Installation of KVM host

We run several KVM servers, which are hosting virtual machines for various infrastructure services and OpenStack APIs. This page describes how to install a physical KVM server.

Install a KVM host

Minimum requirements

• Server with two or more NICs
  • 1 NIC for management
  • <1 NIC for VM networks. This must be a trunk
• Minimum 150GB of storage for virtual machines
• Defined hiera keys for KVM (Hieradata)

PXE / Installation

1. Define the host in the management dashboard, and specify the MAC-address for the management NIC.
   1. Initially, select Puppet role role::base
   2. Select KVMhost partitioning scheme
2. Boot the server, and select Network boot / PXE
3. When the installation is finished, select role::kvm for the host.

The server will be partitioned with:

• 1G /boot
• 70G LVM Volume Group "rootvg"
  • 16G swap
  • 10G /
  • 30G /var
  • <rest of rootvg>G /fill
• <rest of disk>G LVM Volume Group "vmvg"
  • Virtual Machines will have logical volumes inside this volume group as their disk

All network and storage pool configuration are done by puppet and hieradata.