R: [Linux-cluster] Homebrew NAS Cluster

[Brandon Young]

Yeah, similar question to the first responder ... Is your intent to have
shared disk space between all the ESX servers?  To support live migrations,
etc?  If so, then ESX server has a built-in filesystem called vmfs, which
can be shared by all the servers in the farm to store VM images, etc.  We
use it at my place of employment.  It's just SAN disk volumes shared by all
the ESX servers.

If you're looking for common storage to be shared and accessed among all the
virtual machines, then an NFS farm might be what you're looking for; maybe
it's unnecessary, though.  I have a GFS storage cluster where four machines
export the same data to user land.  Actually, I have one server handling all
the user space NFS needs (about 50 clients), and it isn't even breathing
hard.  I have two other NFS servers facing an HPC cluster with 300 client
machines.  I also have a Samba server serving out all this same data to user
land, too, and it is underchallenged as well, with perhaps 100 clients.  So,
depending on how much traffic you would need to sustain, it may not even
require a cluster of NFS servers to achieve your goals.  If that's what you
need, though, then a homebrwed NAS solution where the data is stored on a
clustered filesystem is certainly an option worth considering.

2008/7/1 Leandro Dardini <l.dardini at comune.prato.it>:

> I am running a home-brew NAS Cluster for a medium sized ISP. It is run with
> a pair of Dell PowerEdge 2900 with 1 Terabyte of filesystem exported via NFS
> to 4 nodes running apache, exim and imap/pop3 services. Filesystem is made
> on top of drbd in a active/backup setup with heartbeat. Performance are
> good, but can be better with more memory on nfs node and faster disks.
>
> I don't know VMware very well, but I run other virtualization solutions,
> like QEMU. Do you plan to mount the NFS from inside the virtual machine or
> create a virtual disk on an exported NFS filesystem?
>
> Leandro
>
>
> -----Messaggio originale-----
> Da: linux-cluster-bounces at redhat.com per conto di Stephen Nelson-Smith
> Inviato: lun 30/06/2008 23.56
> A: linux clustering
> Oggetto: [Linux-cluster] Homebrew NAS Cluster
>
> Hi all,
>
> I'm in the process of setting up a virtualisation farm which will have
> 50-60 virtual machines, running a wide range of web, application and
> database applications, all on top of vmware vi3.
>
> My budget won't stretch to a commercial NAS solution, so it's either a
> SAN, which could get complicated and hard to manage with so many
> nodes, or a home-brew NAS solution.
>
> Has anyone done this, on the list?  I'm wondering what the catch is?
> I'm thinking all I need to do is run NFS on top of a clustered
> filesystem, and export to ESX.
>
> I could use some pointers, gotchas, ideas and experiences.
>
> Thanks!
>
> S.
>
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