1. Introduction
Proxmox VE is a platform to run virtual machines and containers. It is based on Debian Linux, and completely open source. For maximum flexibility, we implemented two virtualization technologies - Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) and container-based virtualization (LXC).
One main design goal was to make administration as easy as possible. You can use Proxmox VE on a single node, or assemble a cluster of many nodes. All management tasks can be done using our web-based management interface, and even a novice user can setup and install Proxmox VE within minutes.
1.1. Central Management
While many people start with a single node, Proxmox VE can scale out to a large set of clustered nodes. The cluster stack is fully integrated and ships with the default installation.
- Unique Multi-Master Design
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The integrated web-based management interface gives you a clean overview of all your KVM guests and Linux containers and even of your whole cluster. You can easily manage your VMs and containers, storage or cluster from the GUI. There is no need to install a separate, complex, and pricey management server.
- Proxmox Cluster File System (pmxcfs)
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Proxmox VE uses the unique Proxmox Cluster file system (pmxcfs), a database-driven file system for storing configuration files. This enables you to store the configuration of thousands of virtual machines. By using corosync, these files are replicated in real time on all cluster nodes. The file system stores all data inside a persistent database on disk, nonetheless, a copy of the data resides in RAM which provides a maximum storage size is 30MB - more than enough for thousands of VMs.
Proxmox VE is the only virtualization platform using this unique cluster file system.
- Web-based Management Interface
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Proxmox VE is simple to use. Management tasks can be done via the included web based management interface - there is no need to install a separate management tool or any additional management node with huge databases. The multi-master tool allows you to manage your whole cluster from any node of your cluster. The central web-based management - based on the JavaScript Framework (ExtJS) - empowers you to control all functionalities from the GUI and overview history and syslogs of each single node. This includes running backup or restore jobs, live-migration or HA triggered activities.
- Command Line
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For advanced users who are used to the comfort of the Unix shell or Windows Powershell, Proxmox VE provides a command line interface to manage all the components of your virtual environment. This command line interface has intelligent tab completion and full documentation in the form of UNIX man pages.
- REST API
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Proxmox VE uses a RESTful API. We choose JSON as primary data format, and the whole API is formally defined using JSON Schema. This enables fast and easy integration for third party management tools like custom hosting environments.
- Role-based Administration
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You can define granular access for all objects (like VMs, storages, nodes, etc.) by using the role based user- and permission management. This allows you to define privileges and helps you to control access to objects. This concept is also known as access control lists: Each permission specifies a subject (a user or group) and a role (set of privileges) on a specific path.
- Authentication Realms
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Proxmox VE supports multiple authentication sources like Microsoft Active Directory, LDAP, Linux PAM standard authentication or the built-in Proxmox VE authentication server.
1.2. Flexible Storage
The Proxmox VE storage model is very flexible. Virtual machine images can either be stored on one or several local storages or on shared storage like NFS and on SAN. There are no limits, you may configure as many storage definitions as you like. You can use all storage technologies available for Debian Linux.
One major benefit of storing VMs on shared storage is the ability to live-migrate running machines without any downtime, as all nodes in the cluster have direct access to VM disk images.
We currently support the following Network storage types:
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LVM Group (network backing with iSCSI targets)
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iSCSI target
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NFS Share
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Ceph RBD
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Directly use iSCSI LUNs
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GlusterFS
Local storage types supported are:
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LVM Group (local backing devices like block devices, FC devices, DRBD, etc.)
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Directory (storage on existing filesystem)
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ZFS
1.3. Integrated Backup and Restore
The integrated backup tool (vzdump) creates consistent snapshots of running Containers and KVM guests. It basically creates an archive of the VM or CT data which includes the VM/CT configuration files.
KVM live backup works for all storage types including VM images on NFS, iSCSI LUN, Ceph RBD or Sheepdog. The new backup format is optimized for storing VM backups fast and effective (sparse files, out of order data, minimized I/O).
1.4. High Availability Cluster
A multi-node Proxmox VE HA Cluster enables the definition of highly available virtual servers. The Proxmox VE HA Cluster is based on proven Linux HA technologies, providing stable and reliable HA services.
1.5. Flexible Networking
Proxmox VE uses a bridged networking model. All VMs can share one bridge as if virtual network cables from each guest were all plugged into the same switch. For connecting VMs to the outside world, bridges are attached to physical network cards assigned a TCP/IP configuration.
For further flexibility, VLANs (IEEE 802.1q) and network bonding/aggregation are possible. In this way it is possible to build complex, flexible virtual networks for the Proxmox VE hosts, leveraging the full power of the Linux network stack.
1.6. Integrated Firewall
The integrated firewall allows you to filter network packets on any VM or Container interface. Common sets of firewall rules can be grouped into “security groups”.
1.7. Why Open Source
Proxmox VE uses a Linux kernel and is based on the Debian GNU/Linux Distribution. The source code of Proxmox VE is released under the GNU Affero General Public License, version 3. This means that you are free to inspect the source code at any time or contribute to the project yourself.
At Proxmox we are committed to use open source software whenever possible. Using open source software guarantees full access to all functionalities - as well as high security and reliability. We think that everybody should have the right to access the source code of a software to run it, build on it, or submit changes back to the project. Everybody is encouraged to contribute while Proxmox ensures the product always meets professional quality criteria.
Open source software also helps to keep your costs low and makes your core infrastructure independent from a single vendor.
1.8. Your benefit with Proxmox VE
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Open source software
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No vendor lock-in
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Linux kernel
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Fast installation and easy-to-use
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Web-based management interface
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REST API
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Huge active community
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Low administration costs and simple deployment
1.9. Getting Help
1.9.1. Proxmox VE Wiki
The primary source of information is the Proxmox VE Wiki. It combines the reference documentation with user contributed content.
1.9.2. Community Support Forum
Proxmox VE itself is fully open source, so we always encourage our users to discuss and share their knowledge using the Proxmox VE Community Forum. The forum is fully moderated by the Proxmox support team, and has a quite large user base around the whole world. Needless to say that such a large forum is a great place to get information.
1.9.3. Mailing Lists
This is a fast way to communicate via email with the Proxmox VE community
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Mailing list for users: PVE User List
The primary communication channel for developers is:
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Mailing list for developer: PVE development discussion
1.9.4. Commercial Support
Proxmox Server Solutions Gmbh also offers commercial Proxmox VE Subscription Service Plans. System Administrators with a standard subscription plan can access a dedicated support portal with guaranteed reponse time, where Proxmox VE developers help them should an issue appear. Please contact the Proxmox sales team for more information or volume discounts.
1.9.5. Bug Tracker
We also run a public a public bug tracker at https://bugzilla.proxmox.com. If you ever detect a bug, you can file an bug entry there. This makes it easy to track the bug status, and you will get notified as soon as the bug is fixed.
1.10. Project History
The project started in 2007, followed by a first stable version in 2008. At the time we used OpenVZ for containers, and KVM for virtual machines. The clustering features were limited, and the user interface was simple (server generated web page).
But we quickly developed new features using the Corosync cluster stack, and the introduction of the new Proxmox cluster file system (pmxcfs) was a big step forward, because it completely hides the cluster complexity from the user. Managing a cluster of 16 nodes is as simple as managing a single node.
We also introduced a new REST API, with a complete declarative specification written in JSON-Schema. This enabled other people to integrate Proxmox VE into their infrastructure, and made it easy to provide additional services.
Also, the new REST API made it possible to replace the original user interface with a modern HTML5 application using JavaScript. We also replaced the old Java based VNC console code with noVNC. So you only need a web browser to manage your VMs.
The support for various storage types is another big task. Notably, Proxmox VE was the first distribution to ship ZFS on Linux by default in 2014. Another milestone was the ability to run and manage Ceph storage on the hypervisor nodes. Such setups are extremely cost effective.
When we started we were among the first companies providing commercial support for KVM. The KVM project itself continuously evolved, and is now a widely used hypervisor. New features arrive with each release. We developed the KVM live backup feature, which makes it possible to create snapshot backups on any storage type.
The most notable change with version 4.0 was the move from OpenVZ to LXC. Containers are now deeply integrated, and they can use the same storage and network features as virtual machines.
1.11. Improving the Proxmox VE Documentation
Depending on which issue you want to improve, you can use a variety of communication mediums to reach the developers.
If you notice an error in the current documentation, use the· Proxmox bug tracker and propose an· alternate text/wording.
If you want to propose new content, it depends on what you want to document:
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if the content is specific to your setup, a wiki article is the best option. For instance if you want to document specific options for guest systems, like which combination of Qemu drivers work best with a less popular OS, this is a perfect fit for a wiki article.
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if you think the content is generic enough to be of interest for all users, then you should try to get it into the reference documentation. The reference documentation is written in the easy to use asciidoc document format. Editing the official documentation requires to clone the git repository at git://git.proxmox.com/git/pve-docs.git and then follow the REAME.adoc document.
Improving the documentation is just as easy as editing a Wikipedia article and is an interesting foray in the development of a large opensource project.
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If you are interested in working on the Proxmox VE codebase, the Developer Documentation wiki article will show you where to start. |
2. Installing Proxmox VE
Proxmox VE is based on Debian and comes with an installation CD-ROM which includes a complete Debian ("jessie" for Proxmox VE 4.x) system as well as all necessary Proxmox VE packages. The installer just asks you a few questions, then partitions the local disk(s), installs all required packages, and configures the system including a basic network setup. You can get a fully functional system within a few minutes. This is the preferred and recommended installation method.
Alternatively, Proxmox VE can be installed on top of an existing Debian system. This option is only recommended for advanced users since detail knowledge about Proxmox VE is necessary.
2.1. System Requirements
For production servers, high quality server equipment is needed. Keep in mind, if you run 10 Virtual Servers on one machine and you then experience a hardware failure, 10 services are lost. Proxmox VE supports clustering, this means that multiple Proxmox VE installations can be centrally managed thanks to the included cluster functionality.
Proxmox VE can use local storage (DAS), SAN, NAS and also distributed storage (Ceph RBD). For details see chapter storage.
2.1.1. Minimum Requirements, for Evaluation
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CPU: 64bit (Intel EMT64 or AMD64)
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Intel VT/AMD-V capable CPU/Mainboard for KVM Full Virtualization support
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RAM: 1 GB RAM, plus additional RAM used for guests
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Hard drive
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One NIC
2.1.2. Recommended System Requirements
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CPU: 64bit (Intel EMT64 or AMD64), Multi core CPU recommended
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Intel VT/AMD-V capable CPU/Mainboard for KVM Full Virtualization support
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RAM: 8 GB RAM, plus additional RAM used for guests
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Hardware RAID with batteries protected write cache (“BBU”) or flash based protection
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Fast hard drives, best results with 15k rpm SAS, Raid10
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At least two NICs, depending on the used storage technology you need more
2.1.3. Simple Performance Overview
On an installed Proxmox VE system, you can run the included pveperf script to obtain an overview of the CPU and hard disk performance.
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this is just a very quick and general benchmark. More detailed tests are recommended, especially regarding the I/O performance of your system. |
2.1.4. Supported web browsers for accessing the web interface
To use the web interface you need a modern browser, this includes:
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Firefox, a release from the current year, or the latest Extended Support Release
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Chrome, a release from the current year
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the Microsoft currently supported versions of Internet Explorer (as of 2016, this means IE 11 or IE Edge)
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the Apple currently supported versions of Safari (as of 2016, this means Safari 9)
If Proxmox VE detects you’re connecting from a mobile device, you will be redirected to a lightweight touch-based UI.
2.2. Using the Proxmox VE Installation CD-ROM
Includes the following:
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Complete operating system (Debian Linux, 64-bit)
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Partition the hard drive with ext4 (alternative ext3 or xfs) or ZFS
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Proxmox VE Kernel with LXC and KVM support
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Complete toolset
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Web based management interface
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By default, the complete server is used and all existing data is removed. |
Please insert the installation CD-ROM, then boot from that drive. Immediately afterwards you can choose the following menu options:
- Install Proxmox VE
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Start normal installation.
- Install Proxmox VE (Debug mode)
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Start installation in debug mode. It opens a shell console at several installation steps, so that you can debug things if something goes wrong. Please press CTRL-D to exit those debug consoles and continue installation. This option is mostly for developers and not meant for general use.
- Rescue Boot
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This option allows you to boot an existing installation. It searches all attached hard disks and, if it finds an existing installation, boots directly into that disk using the existing Linux kernel. This can be useful if there are problems with the boot block (grub), or the BIOS is unable to read the boot block from the disk.
- Test Memory
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Runs memtest86+. This is useful to check if your memory is functional and error free.
You normally select Install Proxmox VE to start the installation. After that you get prompted to select the target hard disk(s). The Options button lets you select the target file system, which defaults to ext4. The installer uses LVM if you select ext3, ext4 or xfs as file system, and offers additional option to restrict LVM space (see below)
If you have more than one disk, you can also use ZFS as file system. ZFS supports several software RAID levels, so this is specially useful if you do not have a hardware RAID controller. The Options button lets you select the ZFS RAID level, and you can choose disks there.
The next pages just ask for basic configuration options like time zone and keyboard layout. You also need to specify your email address and superuser (root) password (must have at least 5 characters).
The last step is the network configuration. Please note that you can use either IPv4 or IPv6 here, but not both. If you want to configure a dual stack node, you can easily do that after installation.
If you press Next now, installation starts to format disks, and copies packages to the target. Please wait until that is finished, then reboot the server.
Further configuration is done via the Proxmox web interface. Just point your browser to the IP address given during installation (https://youripaddress:8006).
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Default login is "root" (realm PAM) and the root password is defined during the installation process. |
2.2.1. Advanced LVM Configuration Options
The installer creates a Volume Group (VG) called pve, and additional Logical Volumes (LVs) called root, data and swap. The size of those volumes can be controlled with:
- hdsize
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Defines the total HD size to be used. This way you can save free space on the HD for further partitioning (i.e. for an additional PV and VG on the same hard disk that can be used for LVM storage).
- swapsize
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To define the size of the swap volume. Default is the same size as installed RAM, with 4GB minimum and hdsize/8 as maximum.
- maxroot
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The root volume size. The root volume stores the whole operation system.
- maxvz
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Define the size of the data volume.
- minfree
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To define the amount of free space left in LVM volume group pve. 16GB is the default if storage available > 128GB, hdsize/8 otherwise.
LVM requires free space in the VG for snapshot creation (not required for lvmthin snapshots).
2.2.2. ZFS Performance Tips
ZFS uses a lot of memory, so it is best to add additional RAM if you want to use ZFS. A good calculation is 4GB plus 1GB RAM for each TB RAW disk space.
ZFS also provides the feature to use a fast SSD drive as write cache. The write cache is called the ZFS Intent Log (ZIL). You can add that after installation using the following command:
zpool add <pool-name> log </dev/path_to_fast_ssd>
2.3. Install Proxmox VE on Debian
Proxmox VE ships as a set of Debian packages, so you can install it on top of a normal Debian installation. After configuring the repositories, you need to run:
apt-get update apt-get install proxmox-ve
Installing on top of an existing Debian installation looks easy, but it presumes that you have correctly installed the base system, and you know how you want to configure and use the local storage. Network configuration is also completely up to you.
In general, this is not trivial, especially when you use LVM or ZFS.
You can find a detailed step by step howto on the wiki.
2.4. Install from USB Stick
The Proxmox VE installation media is now a hybrid ISO image, working in two ways:
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An ISO image file ready to burn on CD
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A raw sector (IMG) image file ready to directly copy to flash media (USB Stick)
Using USB sticks is faster and more environmental friendly and therefore the recommended way to install Proxmox VE.
2.4.1. Prepare a USB flash drive as install medium
In order to boot the installation media, copy the ISO image to a USB media.
First download the ISO image from https://www.proxmox.com/en/downloads/category/iso-images-pve
You need at least a 1 GB USB media.
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Using UNetbootin or Rufus does not work. |
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Make sure that the USB media is not mounted and does not contain any important data. |
2.4.2. Instructions for GNU/Linux
You can simply use dd on UNUX like systems. First download the ISO image, then plug in the USB stick. You need to find out what device name gets assigned to the USB stick (see below). Then run:
dd if=proxmox-ve_*.iso of=/dev/XYZ bs=1M
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Be sure to replace /dev/XYZ with the correct device name. |
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Be very careful, and do not overwrite the hard disk! |
Find Correct USB Device Name
You can compare the last lines of dmesg command before and after the insertion, or use the lsblk command. Open a terminal and run:
lsblk
Then plug in your USB media and run the command again:
lsblk
A new device will appear, and this is the USB device you want to use.
2.4.3. Instructions for OSX
Open the terminal (query Terminal in Spotlight).
Convert the .iso file to .img using the convert option of hdiutil for example.
hdiutil convert -format UDRW -o proxmox-ve_*.dmg proxmox-ve_*.iso
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OS X tends to put the .dmg ending on the output file automatically. |
To get the current list of devices run the command again:
diskutil list
Now insert your USB flash media and run this command again to determine the device node assigned to your flash media (e.g. /dev/diskX).
diskutil list diskutil unmountDisk /dev/diskX
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replace X with the disk number from the last command. |
sudo dd if=proxmox-ve_*.dmg of=/dev/rdiskN bs=1m
2.4.4. Instructions for Windows
In order to copy the ISO, rename it first. Just rename the downloaded file from proxmox-ve_*.iso to proxmox-ve_*.raw.
Download the SUSE Studio ImageWriter from https://en.opensuse.org/SDB:Live_USB_stick
If this doesn’t work, alternative use the OSForsenics USB installer from http://www.osforensics.com/portability.html
2.4.5. Boot your server from USB media
Connect your USB media to your server and make sure that the server boots from USB (see server BIOS). Then follow the installation wizard.
3. Host System Administration
Proxmox VE is based on the famous Debian Linux distribution. That means that you have access to the whole world of Debian packages, and the base system is well documented. The Debian Administrator's Handbook is available online, and provides a comprehensive introduction to the Debian operating system (see [Hertzog13]).
A standard Proxmox VE installation uses the default repositories from Debian, so you get bug fixes and security updates through that channel. In addition, we provide our own package repository to roll out all Proxmox VE related packages. This includes updates to some Debian packages when necessary.
We also deliver a specially optimized Linux kernel, where we enable all required virtualization and container features. That kernel includes drivers for ZFS, and several hardware drivers. For example, we ship Intel network card drivers to support their newest hardware.
The following sections will concentrate on virtualization related topics. They either explains things which are different on Proxmox VE, or tasks which are commonly used on Proxmox VE. For other topics, please refer to the standard Debian documentation.
3.1. Package Repositories
All Debian based systems use APT as package management tool. The list of repositories is defined in /etc/apt/sources.list and .list files found inside /etc/apt/sources.d/. Updates can be installed directly using apt-get, or via the GUI.
Apt sources.list files list one package repository per line, with the most preferred source listed first. Empty lines are ignored, and a # character anywhere on a line marks the remainder of that line as a comment. The information available from the configured sources is acquired by apt-get update.
deb http://ftp.debian.org/debian jessie main contrib # security updates deb http://security.debian.org jessie/updates main contrib
In addition, Proxmox VE provides three different package repositories.
3.1.1. Proxmox VE Enterprise Repository
This is the default, stable and recommended repository, available for all Proxmox VE subscription users. It contains the most stable packages, and is suitable for production use. The pve-enterprise repository is enabled by default:
deb https://enterprise.proxmox.com/debian jessie pve-enterprise
As soon as updates are available, the root@pam user is notified via email about the available new packages. On the GUI, the change-log of each package can be viewed (if available), showing all details of the update. So you will never miss important security fixes.
Please note that and you need a valid subscription key to access this repository. We offer different support levels, and you can find further details at http://www.proxmox.com/en/proxmox-ve/pricing.
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You can disable this repository by commenting out the above line using a # (at the start of the line). This prevents error messages if you do not have a subscription key. Please configure the pve-no-subscription repository in that case. |
3.1.2. Proxmox VE No-Subscription Repository
As the name suggests, you do not need a subscription key to access this repository. It can be used for testing and non-production use. Its not recommended to run on production servers, as these packages are not always heavily tested and validated.
We recommend to configure this repository in /etc/apt/sources.list.
deb http://ftp.debian.org/debian jessie main contrib # PVE pve-no-subscription repository provided by proxmox.com, # NOT recommended for production use deb http://download.proxmox.com/debian jessie pve-no-subscription # security updates deb http://security.debian.org jessie/updates main contrib
3.1.3. Proxmox VE Test Repository
Finally, there is a repository called pvetest. This one contains the latest packages and is heavily used by developers to test new features. As usual, you can configure this using /etc/apt/sources.list by adding the following line:
deb http://download.proxmox.com/debian jessie pvetest
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the pvetest repository should (as the name implies) only be used for testing new features or bug fixes. |
3.1.4. SecureApt
We use GnuPG to sign the Release files inside those repositories, and APT uses that signatures to verify that all packages are from a trusted source.
The key used for verification is already installed if you install from our installation CD. If you install by other means, you can manually download the key with:
# wget http://download.proxmox.com/debian/key.asc
Please verify the fingerprint afterwards:
# gpg --with-fingerprint key.asc pub 1024D/9887F95A 2008-10-28 Proxmox Release Key <proxmox-release@proxmox.com> Key fingerprint = BE25 7BAA 5D40 6D01 157D 323E C23A C7F4 9887 F95A sub 2048g/A87A1B00 2008-10-28
If this shows the exact same fingerprint, you can add the key to the list of trusted APT keys:
# apt-key add key.asc
3.2. System Software Updates
We provide regular package updates on all repositories. You can install those update using the GUI, or you can directly run the CLI command apt-get:
apt-get update apt-get dist-upgrade
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The apt package management system is extremely flexible and provides countless of feature - see man apt-get or [Hertzog13] for additional information. |
You should do such updates at regular intervals, or when we release versions with security related fixes. Major system upgrades are announced at the Proxmox VE Community Forum. Those announcement also contain detailed upgrade instructions.
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We recommend to run regular upgrades, because it is important to get the latest security updates. |
3.3. Network Configuration
Proxmox VE uses a bridged networking model. Each host can have up to 4094 bridges. Bridges are like physical network switches implemented in software. All VMs can share a single bridge, as if virtual network cables from each guest were all plugged into the same switch. But you can also create multiple bridges to separate network domains.
For connecting VMs to the outside world, bridges are attached to physical network cards. For further flexibility, you can configure VLANs (IEEE 802.1q) and network bonding, also known as "link aggregation". That way it is possible to build complex and flexible virtual networks.
Debian traditionally uses the ifup and ifdown commands to configure the network. The file /etc/network/interfaces contains the whole network setup. Please refer to to manual page (man interfaces) for a complete format description.
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Proxmox VE does not write changes directly to /etc/network/interfaces. Instead, we write into a temporary file called /etc/network/interfaces.new, and commit those changes when you reboot the node. |
It is worth mentioning that you can directly edit the configuration file. All Proxmox VE tools tries hard to keep such direct user modifications. Using the GUI is still preferable, because it protect you from errors.
3.3.1. Naming Conventions
We currently use the following naming conventions for device names:
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Ethernet devices: eth[N], where 0 ≤ N (eth0, eth1, …)
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Bridge names: vmbr[N], where 0 ≤ N ≤ 4094 (vmbr0 - vmbr4094)
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Bonds: bond[N], where 0 ≤ N (bond0, bond1, …)
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VLANs: Simply add the VLAN number to the device name, separated by a period (eth0.50, bond1.30)
This makes it easier to debug networks problems, because the device names implies the device type.
3.3.2. Default Configuration using a Bridge
The installation program creates a single bridge named vmbr0, which is connected to the first ethernet card eth0. The corresponding configuration in /etc/network/interfaces looks like this:
auto lo iface lo inet loopback iface eth0 inet manual auto vmbr0 iface vmbr0 inet static address 192.168.10.2 netmask 255.255.255.0 gateway 192.168.10.1 bridge_ports eth0 bridge_stp off bridge_fd 0
Virtual machines behave as if they were directly connected to the physical network. The network, in turn, sees each virtual machine as having its own MAC, even though there is only one network cable connecting all of these VMs to the network.
3.3.3. Routed Configuration
Most hosting providers do not support the above setup. For security reasons, they disable networking as soon as they detect multiple MAC addresses on a single interface.
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Some providers allows you to register additional MACs on there management interface. This avoids the problem, but is clumsy to configure because you need to register a MAC for each of your VMs. |
You can avoid the problem by “routing” all traffic via a single interface. This makes sure that all network packets use the same MAC address.
A common scenario is that you have a public IP (assume 192.168.10.2 for this example), and an additional IP block for your VMs (10.10.10.1/255.255.255.0). We recommend the following setup for such situations:
auto lo iface lo inet loopback auto eth0 iface eth0 inet static address 192.168.10.2 netmask 255.255.255.0 gateway 192.168.10.1 post-up echo 1 > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/conf/eth0/proxy_arp auto vmbr0 iface vmbr0 inet static address 10.10.10.1 netmask 255.255.255.0 bridge_ports none bridge_stp off bridge_fd 0
3.3.4. Masquerading (NAT) with iptables
In some cases you may want to use private IPs behind your Proxmox host’s true IP, and masquerade the traffic using NAT:
auto lo iface lo inet loopback auto eth0 #real IP adress iface eth0 inet static address 192.168.10.2 netmask 255.255.255.0 gateway 192.168.10.1 auto vmbr0 #private sub network iface vmbr0 inet static address 10.10.10.1 netmask 255.255.255.0 bridge_ports none bridge_stp off bridge_fd 0 post-up echo 1 > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_forward post-up iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -s '10.10.10.0/24' -o eth0 -j MASQUERADE post-down iptables -t nat -D POSTROUTING -s '10.10.10.0/24' -o eth0 -j MASQUERADE
3.3.5. Linux Bond
Bonding (also called NIC teaming or Link Aggregation) is a technique for binding multiple NIC’s to a single network device. It is possible to achieve different goals, like make the network fault-tolerant, increase the performance or both together.
High-speed hardware like Fibre Channel and the associated switching hardware can be quite expensive. By doing link aggregation, two NICs can appear as one logical interface, resulting in double speed. This is a native Linux kernel feature that is supported by most switches. If your nodes have multiple Ethernet ports, you can distribute your points of failure by running network cables to different switches and the bonded connection will failover to one cable or the other in case of network trouble.
Aggregated links can improve live-migration delays and improve the speed of replication of data between Proxmox VE Cluster nodes.
There are 7 modes for bonding:
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Round-robin (balance-rr): Transmit network packets in sequential order from the first available network interface (NIC) slave through the last. This mode provides load balancing and fault tolerance.
-
Active-backup (active-backup): Only one NIC slave in the bond is active. A different slave becomes active if, and only if, the active slave fails. The single logical bonded interface’s MAC address is externally visible on only one NIC (port) to avoid distortion in the network switch. This mode provides fault tolerance.
-
XOR (balance-xor): Transmit network packets based on [(source MAC address XOR’d with destination MAC address) modulo NIC slave count]. This selects the same NIC slave for each destination MAC address. This mode provides load balancing and fault tolerance.
-
Broadcast (broadcast): Transmit network packets on all slave network interfaces. This mode provides fault tolerance.
-
IEEE 802.3ad Dynamic link aggregation (802.3ad)(LACP): Creates aggregation groups that share the same speed and duplex settings. Utilizes all slave network interfaces in the active aggregator group according to the 802.3ad specification.
-
Adaptive transmit load balancing (balance-tlb): Linux bonding driver mode that does not require any special network-switch support. The outgoing network packet traffic is distributed according to the current load (computed relative to the speed) on each network interface slave. Incoming traffic is received by one currently designated slave network interface. If this receiving slave fails, another slave takes over the MAC address of the failed receiving slave.
-
Adaptive load balancing (balanceIEEE 802.3ad Dynamic link aggregation (802.3ad)(LACP):-alb): Includes balance-tlb plus receive load balancing (rlb) for IPV4 traffic, and does not require any special network switch support. The receive load balancing is achieved by ARP negotiation. The bonding driver intercepts the ARP Replies sent by the local system on their way out and overwrites the source hardware address with the unique hardware address of one of the NIC slaves in the single logical bonded interface such that different network-peers use different MAC addresses for their network packet traffic.
For the most setups the active-backup are the best choice or if your switch support LACP "IEEE 802.3ad" this mode should be preferred.
The following bond configuration can be used as distributed/shared storage network. The benefit would be that you get more speed and the network will be fault-tolerant.
auto lo iface lo inet loopback iface eth1 inet manual iface eth2 inet manual auto bond0 iface bond0 inet static slaves eth1 eth2 address 192.168.1.2 netmask 255.255.255.0 bond_miimon 100 bond_mode 802.3ad bond_xmit_hash_policy layer2+3 auto vmbr0 iface vmbr0 inet static address 10.10.10.2 netmask 255.255.255.0 gateway 10.10.10.1 bridge_ports eth0 bridge_stp off bridge_fd 0
Another possibility it to use the bond directly as bridge port. This can be used to make the guest network fault-tolerant.
auto lo iface lo inet loopback iface eth1 inet manual iface eth2 inet manual auto bond0 iface bond0 inet maunal slaves eth1 eth2 bond_miimon 100 bond_mode 802.3ad bond_xmit_hash_policy layer2+3 auto vmbr0 iface vmbr0 inet static address 10.10.10.2 netmask 255.255.255.0 gateway 10.10.10.1 bridge_ports bond0 bridge_stp off bridge_fd 0
3.4. Time Synchronization
The Proxmox VE cluster stack itself relies heavily on the fact that all the nodes have precisely synchronized time. Some other components, like Ceph, also refuse to work properly if the local time on nodes is not in sync.
Time synchronization between nodes can be achieved with the “Network Time Protocol” (NTP). Proxmox VE uses systemd-timesyncd as NTP client by default, preconfigured to use a set of public servers. This setup works out of the box in most cases.
3.4.1. Using Custom NTP Servers
In some cases, it might be desired to not use the default NTP servers. For example, if your Proxmox VE nodes do not have access to the public internet (e.g., because of restrictive firewall rules), you need to setup local NTP servers and tell systemd-timesyncd to use them:
[Time] Servers=ntp1.example.com ntp2.example.com ntp3.example.com ntp4.example.com
After restarting the synchronization service (systemctl restart systemd-timesyncd) you should verify that your newly configured NTP servers are used by checking the journal (journalctl --since -1h -u systemd-timesyncd):
... Oct 07 14:58:36 node1 systemd[1]: Stopping Network Time Synchronization... Oct 07 14:58:36 node1 systemd[1]: Starting Network Time Synchronization... Oct 07 14:58:36 node1 systemd[1]: Started Network Time Synchronization. Oct 07 14:58:36 node1 systemd-timesyncd[13514]: Using NTP server 10.0.0.1:123 (ntp1.example.com). Oct 07 14:58:36 nora systemd-timesyncd[13514]: interval/delta/delay/jitter/drift 64s/-0.002s/0.020s/0.000s/-31ppm ...
3.5. External Metric Server
Starting with Proxmox VE 4.0, you can define external metric servers, which will be sent various stats about your hosts, virtual machines and storages.
Currently supported are:
-
graphite (see http://graphiteapp.org )
-
influxdb (see https://www.influxdata.com/time-series-platform/influxdb/ )
The server definitions are saved in /etc/pve/status.cfg
3.5.1. Graphite server configuration
The definition of a server is:
graphite: server your-server port your-port path your-path
where your-port defaults to 2003 and your-path defaults to proxmox
Proxmox VE sends the data over udp, so the graphite server has to be configured for this
3.5.2. Influxdb plugin configuration
The definition is:
influxdb: server your-server port your-port
Proxmox VE sends the data over udp, so the influxdb server has to be configured for this
Here is an example configuration for influxdb (on your influxdb server):
[[udp]] enabled = true bind-address = "0.0.0.0:8089" database = "proxmox" batch-size = 1000 batch-timeout = "1s"
With this configuration, your server listens on all IP adresses on port 8089, and writes the data in the proxmox database
3.6. Disk Health Monitoring
Altough a robust and redundant storage is recommended, it can be very helpful to monitor the health of your local disks.
Starting with Proxmox VE 4.3, the package smartmontools
[smartmontools homepage https://www.smartmontools.org]
is installed and required. This is a set of tools to monitor and control
the S.M.A.R.T. system for local hard disks.
You can get the status of a disk by issuing the following command:
# smartctl -a /dev/sdX
where /dev/sdX is the path to one of your local disks.
If the output says:
SMART support is: Disabled
you can enable it with the command:
# smartctl -s on /dev/sdX
For more information on how to use smartctl, please see man smartctl.
By default, smartmontools daemon smartd is active and enabled, and scans the disks under /dev/sdX and /dev/hdX every 30 minutes for errors and warnings, and sends an e-mail to root if it detects a problem.
For more information about how to configure smartd, please see man smartd and man smartd.conf.
If you use your hard disks with a hardware raid controller, there are most likely tools to monitor the disks in the raid array and the array itself. For more information about this, please refer to the vendor of your raid controller.
3.7. Logical Volume Manager (LVM)
Most people install Proxmox VE directly on a local disk. The Proxmox VE installation CD offers several options for local disk management, and the current default setup uses LVM. The installer let you select a single disk for such setup, and uses that disk as physical volume for the Volume Group (VG) pve. The following output is from a test installation using a small 8GB disk:
# pvs PV VG Fmt Attr PSize PFree /dev/sda3 pve lvm2 a-- 7.87g 876.00m # vgs VG #PV #LV #SN Attr VSize VFree pve 1 3 0 wz--n- 7.87g 876.00m
The installer allocates three Logical Volumes (LV) inside this VG:
# lvs LV VG Attr LSize Pool Origin Data% Meta% data pve twi-a-tz-- 4.38g 0.00 0.63 root pve -wi-ao---- 1.75g swap pve -wi-ao---- 896.00m
- root
-
Formatted as ext4, and contains the operation system.
- swap
-
Swap partition
- data
-
This volume uses LVM-thin, and is used to store VM images. LVM-thin is preferable for this task, because it offers efficient support for snapshots and clones.
3.7.1. Hardware
We highly recommend to use a hardware RAID controller (with BBU) for such setups. This increases performance, provides redundancy, and make disk replacements easier (hot-pluggable).
LVM itself does not need any special hardware, and memory requirements are very low.
3.7.2. Bootloader
We install two boot loaders by default. The first partition contains the standard GRUB boot loader. The second partition is an EFI System Partition (ESP), which makes it possible to boot on EFI systems.
3.8. ZFS on Linux
ZFS is a combined file system and logical volume manager designed by Sun Microsystems. Starting with Proxmox VE 3.4, the native Linux kernel port of the ZFS file system is introduced as optional file system and also as an additional selection for the root file system. There is no need for manually compile ZFS modules - all packages are included.
By using ZFS, its possible to achieve maximum enterprise features with low budget hardware, but also high performance systems by leveraging SSD caching or even SSD only setups. ZFS can replace cost intense hardware raid cards by moderate CPU and memory load combined with easy management.
-
Easy configuration and management with Proxmox VE GUI and CLI.
-
Reliable
-
Protection against data corruption
-
Data compression on file system level
-
Snapshots
-
Copy-on-write clone
-
Various raid levels: RAID0, RAID1, RAID10, RAIDZ-1, RAIDZ-2 and RAIDZ-3
-
Can use SSD for cache
-
Self healing
-
Continuous integrity checking
-
Designed for high storage capacities
-
Protection against data corruption
-
Asynchronous replication over network
-
Open Source
-
Encryption
-
…
3.8.1. Hardware
ZFS depends heavily on memory, so you need at least 8GB to start. In practice, use as much you can get for your hardware/budget. To prevent data corruption, we recommend the use of high quality ECC RAM.
If you use a dedicated cache and/or log disk, you should use a enterprise class SSD (e.g. Intel SSD DC S3700 Series). This can increase the overall performance significantly.
|
Do not use ZFS on top of hardware controller which has its own cache management. ZFS needs to directly communicate with disks. An HBA adapter is the way to go, or something like LSI controller flashed in “IT” mode. |
If you are experimenting with an installation of Proxmox VE inside a VM (Nested Virtualization), don’t use virtio for disks of that VM, since they are not supported by ZFS. Use IDE or SCSI instead (works also with virtio SCSI controller type).
3.8.2. Installation as Root File System
When you install using the Proxmox VE installer, you can choose ZFS for the root file system. You need to select the RAID type at installation time:
RAID0
|
Also called “striping”. The capacity of such volume is the sum of the capacities of all disks. But RAID0 does not add any redundancy, so the failure of a single drive makes the volume unusable. |
RAID1
|
Also called “mirroring”. Data is written identically to all disks. This mode requires at least 2 disks with the same size. The resulting capacity is that of a single disk. |
RAID10
|
A combination of RAID0 and RAID1. Requires at least 4 disks. |
RAIDZ-1
|
A variation on RAID-5, single parity. Requires at least 3 disks. |
RAIDZ-2
|
A variation on RAID-5, double parity. Requires at least 4 disks. |
RAIDZ-3
|
A variation on RAID-5, triple parity. Requires at least 5 disks. |
The installer automatically partitions the disks, creates a ZFS pool called rpool, and installs the root file system on the ZFS subvolume rpool/ROOT/pve-1.
Another subvolume called rpool/data is created to store VM images. In order to use that with the Proxmox VE tools, the installer creates the following configuration entry in /etc/pve/storage.cfg:
zfspool: local-zfs pool rpool/data sparse content images,rootdir
After installation, you can view your ZFS pool status using the zpool command:
# zpool status pool: rpool state: ONLINE scan: none requested config: NAME STATE READ WRITE CKSUM rpool ONLINE 0 0 0 mirror-0 ONLINE 0 0 0 sda2 ONLINE 0 0 0 sdb2 ONLINE 0 0 0 mirror-1 ONLINE 0 0 0 sdc ONLINE 0 0 0 sdd ONLINE 0 0 0 errors: No known data errors
The zfs command is used configure and manage your ZFS file systems. The following command lists all file systems after installation:
# zfs list NAME USED AVAIL REFER MOUNTPOINT rpool 4.94G 7.68T 96K /rpool rpool/ROOT 702M 7.68T 96K /rpool/ROOT rpool/ROOT/pve-1 702M 7.68T 702M / rpool/data 96K 7.68T 96K /rpool/data rpool/swap 4.25G 7.69T 64K -
3.8.3. Bootloader
The default ZFS disk partitioning scheme does not use the first 2048 sectors. This gives enough room to install a GRUB boot partition. The Proxmox VE installer automatically allocates that space, and installs the GRUB boot loader there. If you use a redundant RAID setup, it installs the boot loader on all disk required for booting. So you can boot even if some disks fail.
|
It is not possible to use ZFS as root file system with UEFI boot. |
3.8.4. ZFS Administration
This section gives you some usage examples for common tasks. ZFS itself is really powerful and provides many options. The main commands to manage ZFS are zfs and zpool. Both commands come with great manual pages, which can be read with:
# man zpool # man zfs
To create a new pool, at least one disk is needed. The ashift should have the same sector-size (2 power of ashift) or larger as the underlying disk.
zpool create -f -o ashift=12 <pool> <device>
To activate compression
zfs set compression=lz4 <pool>
Minimum 1 Disk
zpool create -f -o ashift=12 <pool> <device1> <device2>
Minimum 2 Disks
zpool create -f -o ashift=12 <pool> mirror <device1> <device2>
Minimum 4 Disks
zpool create -f -o ashift=12 <pool> mirror <device1> <device2> mirror <device3> <device4>
Minimum 3 Disks
zpool create -f -o ashift=12 <pool> raidz1 <device1> <device2> <device3>
Minimum 4 Disks
zpool create -f -o ashift=12 <pool> raidz2 <device1> <device2> <device3> <device4>
It is possible to use a dedicated cache drive partition to increase the performance (use SSD).
As <device> it is possible to use more devices, like it’s shown in "Create a new pool with RAID*".
zpool create -f -o ashift=12 <pool> <device> cache <cache_device>
It is possible to use a dedicated cache drive partition to increase the performance(SSD).
As <device> it is possible to use more devices, like it’s shown in "Create a new pool with RAID*".
zpool create -f -o ashift=12 <pool> <device> log <log_device>
If you have an pool without cache and log. First partition the SSD in 2 partition with parted or gdisk
|
Always use GPT partition tables. |
The maximum size of a log device should be about half the size of physical memory, so this is usually quite small. The rest of the SSD can be used as cache.
zpool add -f <pool> log <device-part1> cache <device-part2>
zpool replace -f <pool> <old device> <new-device>
3.8.5. Activate E-Mail Notification
ZFS comes with an event daemon, which monitors events generated by the ZFS kernel module. The daemon can also send emails on ZFS events like pool errors.
To activate the daemon it is necessary to edit /etc/zfs/zed.d/zed.rc with your favourite editor, and uncomment the ZED_EMAIL_ADDR setting:
ZED_EMAIL_ADDR="root"
Please note Proxmox VE forwards mails to root to the email address configured for the root user.
|
The only setting that is required is ZED_EMAIL_ADDR. All other settings are optional. |
3.8.6. Limit ZFS Memory Usage
It is good to use at most 50 percent (which is the default) of the system memory for ZFS ARC to prevent performance shortage of the host. Use your preferred editor to change the configuration in /etc/modprobe.d/zfs.conf and insert:
options zfs zfs_arc_max=8589934592
This example setting limits the usage to 8GB.
|
If your root file system is ZFS you must update your initramfs every time this value changes: update-initramfs -u |
SWAP on ZFS on Linux may generate some troubles, like blocking the server or generating a high IO load, often seen when starting a Backup to an external Storage.
We strongly recommend to use enough memory, so that you normally do not run into low memory situations. Additionally, you can lower the “swappiness” value. A good value for servers is 10:
sysctl -w vm.swappiness=10
To make the swappiness persistent, open /etc/sysctl.conf with an editor of your choice and add the following line:
vm.swappiness = 10
Value | Strategy |
---|---|
vm.swappiness = 0 |
The kernel will swap only to avoid an out of memory condition |
vm.swappiness = 1 |
Minimum amount of swapping without disabling it entirely. |
vm.swappiness = 10 |
This value is sometimes recommended to improve performance when sufficient memory exists in a system. |
vm.swappiness = 60 |
The default value. |
vm.swappiness = 100 |
The kernel will swap aggressively. |
4. Cluster Manager
The Proxmox VE cluster manager pvecm is a tool to create a group of physical servers. Such a group is called a cluster. We use the Corosync Cluster Engine for reliable group communication, and such clusters can consist of up to 32 physical nodes (probably more, dependent on network latency).
pvecm can be used to create a new cluster, join nodes to a cluster, leave the cluster, get status information and do various other cluster related tasks. The Proxmox Cluster File System (“pmxcfs”) is used to transparently distribute the cluster configuration to all cluster nodes.
Grouping nodes into a cluster has the following advantages:
-
Centralized, web based management
-
Multi-master clusters: each node can do all management task
-
pmxcfs: database-driven file system for storing configuration files, replicated in real-time on all nodes using corosync.
-
Easy migration of virtual machines and containers between physical hosts
-
Fast deployment
-
Cluster-wide services like firewall and HA
4.1. Requirements
-
All nodes must be in the same network as corosync uses IP Multicast to communicate between nodes (also see Corosync Cluster Engine). Corosync uses UDP ports 5404 and 5405 for cluster communication.
Some switches do not support IP multicast by default and must be manually enabled first. -
Date and time have to be synchronized.
-
SSH tunnel on TCP port 22 between nodes is used.
-
If you are interested in High Availability, you need to have at least three nodes for reliable quorum. All nodes should have the same version.
-
We recommend a dedicated NIC for the cluster traffic, especially if you use shared storage.
|
It is not possible to mix Proxmox VE 3.x and earlier with Proxmox VE 4.0 cluster nodes. |
4.2. Preparing Nodes
First, install Proxmox VE on all nodes. Make sure that each node is installed with the final hostname and IP configuration. Changing the hostname and IP is not possible after cluster creation.
Currently the cluster creation has to be done on the console, so you need to login via ssh.
4.3. Create the Cluster
Login via ssh to the first Proxmox VE node. Use a unique name for your cluster. This name cannot be changed later.
hp1# pvecm create YOUR-CLUSTER-NAME
|
The cluster name is used to compute the default multicast address. Please use unique cluster names if you run more than one cluster inside your network. |
To check the state of your cluster use:
hp1# pvecm status
4.4. Adding Nodes to the Cluster
Login via ssh to the node you want to add.
hp2# pvecm add IP-ADDRESS-CLUSTER
For IP-ADDRESS-CLUSTER use the IP from an existing cluster node.
|
A new node cannot hold any VMs, because you would get conflicts about identical VM IDs. Also, all existing configuration in /etc/pve is overwritten when you join a new node to the cluster. To workaround, use vzdump to backup and restore to a different VMID after adding the node to the cluster. |
To check the state of cluster:
# pvecm status
hp2# pvecm status Quorum information ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Date: Mon Apr 20 12:30:13 2015 Quorum provider: corosync_votequorum Nodes: 4 Node ID: 0x00000001 Ring ID: 1928 Quorate: Yes Votequorum information ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Expected votes: 4 Highest expected: 4 Total votes: 4 Quorum: 2 Flags: Quorate Membership information ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Nodeid Votes Name 0x00000001 1 192.168.15.91 0x00000002 1 192.168.15.92 (local) 0x00000003 1 192.168.15.93 0x00000004 1 192.168.15.94
If you only want the list of all nodes use:
# pvecm nodes
hp2# pvecm nodes Membership information ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Nodeid Votes Name 1 1 hp1 2 1 hp2 (local) 3 1 hp3 4 1 hp4
4.4.1. Adding Nodes With Separated Cluster Network
When adding a node to a cluster with a separated cluster network you need to use the ringX_addr parameters to set the nodes address on those networks:
pvecm add IP-ADDRESS-CLUSTER -ring0_addr IP-ADDRESS-RING0
If you want to use the Redundant Ring Protocol you will also want to pass the ring1_addr parameter.
4.5. Remove a Cluster Node
|
Read carefully the procedure before proceeding, as it could not be what you want or need. |
Move all virtual machines from the node. Make sure you have no local data or backups you want to keep, or save them accordingly.
Log in to one remaining node via ssh. Issue a pvecm nodes command to identify the node ID:
hp1# pvecm status Quorum information ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Date: Mon Apr 20 12:30:13 2015 Quorum provider: corosync_votequorum Nodes: 4 Node ID: 0x00000001 Ring ID: 1928 Quorate: Yes Votequorum information ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Expected votes: 4 Highest expected: 4 Total votes: 4 Quorum: 2 Flags: Quorate Membership information ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Nodeid Votes Name 0x00000001 1 192.168.15.91 (local) 0x00000002 1 192.168.15.92 0x00000003 1 192.168.15.93 0x00000004 1 192.168.15.94
|
at this point you must power off the node to be removed and make sure that it will not power on again (in the network) as it is. |
hp1# pvecm nodes Membership information ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Nodeid Votes Name 1 1 hp1 (local) 2 1 hp2 3 1 hp3 4 1 hp4
Log in to one remaining node via ssh. Issue the delete command (here deleting node hp4):
hp1# pvecm delnode hp4
If the operation succeeds no output is returned, just check the node list again with pvecm nodes or pvecm status. You should see something like:
hp1# pvecm status Quorum information ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Date: Mon Apr 20 12:44:28 2015 Quorum provider: corosync_votequorum Nodes: 3 Node ID: 0x00000001 Ring ID: 1992 Quorate: Yes Votequorum information ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Expected votes: 3 Highest expected: 3 Total votes: 3 Quorum: 3 Flags: Quorate Membership information ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Nodeid Votes Name 0x00000001 1 192.168.15.90 (local) 0x00000002 1 192.168.15.91 0x00000003 1 192.168.15.92
|
as said above, it is very important to power off the node before removal, and make sure that it will never power on again (in the existing cluster network) as it is. |
If you power on the node as it is, your cluster will be screwed up and it could be difficult to restore a clean cluster state.
If, for whatever reason, you want that this server joins the same cluster again, you have to
-
reinstall Proxmox VE on it from scratch
-
then join it, as explained in the previous section.
4.5.1. Separate A Node Without Reinstalling
|
This is not the recommended method, proceed with caution. Use the above mentioned method if you’re unsure. |
You can also separate a node from a cluster without reinstalling it from scratch. But after removing the node from the cluster it will still have access to the shared storages! This must be resolved before you start removing the node from the cluster. A Proxmox VE cluster cannot share the exact same storage with another cluster, as it leads to VMID conflicts.
Its suggested that you create a new storage where only the node which you want to separate has access. This can be an new export on your NFS or a new Ceph pool, to name a few examples. Its just important that the exact same storage does not gets accessed by multiple clusters. After setting this storage up move all data from the node and its VMs to it. Then you are ready to separate the node from the cluster.
|
Ensure all shared resources are cleanly separated! You will run into conflicts and problems else. |
First stop the corosync and the pve-cluster services on the node:
systemctl stop pve-cluster systemctl stop corosync
Start the cluster filesystem again in local mode:
pmxcfs -l
Delete the corosync configuration files:
rm /etc/pve/corosync.conf rm /etc/corosync/*
You can now start the filesystem again as normal service:
killall pmxcfs systemctl start pve-cluster
The node is now separated from the cluster. You can deleted it from a remaining node of the cluster with:
pvecm delnode oldnode
If the command failed, because the remaining node in the cluster lost quorum when the now separate node exited, you may set the expected votes to 1 as a workaround:
pvecm expected 1
And the repeat the pvecm delnode command.
Now switch back to the separated node, here delete all remaining files left from the old cluster. This ensures that the node can be added to another cluster again without problems.
rm /var/lib/corosync/*
As the configuration files from the other nodes are still in the cluster filesystem you may want to clean those up too. Remove simply the whole directory recursive from /etc/pve/nodes/NODENAME, but check three times that you used the correct one before deleting it.
|
The nodes SSH keys are still in the authorized_key file, this means the nodes can still connect to each other with public key authentication. This should be fixed by removing the respective keys from the /etc/pve/priv/authorized_keys file. |
4.6. Quorum
Proxmox VE use a quorum-based technique to provide a consistent state among all cluster nodes.
A quorum is the minimum number of votes that a distributed transaction has to obtain in order to be allowed to perform an operation in a distributed system.
— from Wikipedia
In case of network partitioning, state changes requires that a majority of nodes are online. The cluster switches to read-only mode if it loses quorum.
|
Proxmox VE assigns a single vote to each node by default. |
4.7. Cluster Network
The cluster network is the core of a cluster. All messages sent over it have to be delivered reliable to all nodes in their respective order. In Proxmox VE this part is done by corosync, an implementation of a high performance low overhead high availability development toolkit. It serves our decentralized configuration file system (pmxcfs).
4.7.1. Network Requirements
This needs a reliable network with latencies under 2 milliseconds (LAN performance) to work properly. While corosync can also use unicast for communication between nodes its highly recommended to have a multicast capable network. The network should not be used heavily by other members, ideally corosync runs on its own network. never share it with network where storage communicates too.
Before setting up a cluster it is good practice to check if the network is fit for that purpose.
-
Ensure that all nodes are in the same subnet. This must only be true for the network interfaces used for cluster communication (corosync).
-
Ensure all nodes can reach each other over those interfaces, using ping is enough for a basic test.
-
Ensure that multicast works in general and a high package rates. This can be done with the omping tool. The final "%loss" number should be < 1%.
omping -c 10000 -i 0.001 -F -q NODE1-IP NODE2-IP ...
-
Ensure that multicast communication works over an extended period of time. This covers up problems where IGMP snooping is activated on the network but no multicast querier is active. This test has a duration of around 10 minutes.
omping -c 600 -i 1 -q NODE1-IP NODE2-IP ...
Your network is not ready for clustering if any of these test fails. Recheck your network configuration. Especially switches are notorious for having multicast disabled by default or IGMP snooping enabled with no IGMP querier active.
In smaller cluster its also an option to use unicast if you really cannot get multicast to work.
4.7.2. Separate Cluster Network
When creating a cluster without any parameters the cluster network is generally shared with the Web UI and the VMs and its traffic. Depending on your setup even storage traffic may get sent over the same network. Its recommended to change that, as corosync is a time critical real time application.
Setting Up A New Network
First you have to setup a new network interface. It should be on a physical separate network. Ensure that your network fulfills the cluster network requirements.
Separate On Cluster Creation
This is possible through the ring0_addr and bindnet0_addr parameter of the pvecm create command used for creating a new cluster.
If you have setup a additional NIC with a static address on 10.10.10.1/25 and want to send and receive all cluster communication over this interface you would execute:
pvecm create test --ring0_addr 10.10.10.1 --bindnet0_addr 10.10.10.0
To check if everything is working properly execute:
systemctl status corosync
Separate After Cluster Creation
You can do this also if you have already created a cluster and want to switch its communication to another network, without rebuilding the whole cluster. This change may lead to short durations of quorum loss in the cluster, as nodes have to restart corosync and come up one after the other on the new network.
Check how to edit the corosync.conf file first. The open it and you should see a file similar to:
logging { debug: off to_syslog: yes } nodelist { node { name: due nodeid: 2 quorum_votes: 1 ring0_addr: due } node { name: tre nodeid: 3 quorum_votes: 1 ring0_addr: tre } node { name: uno nodeid: 1 quorum_votes: 1 ring0_addr: uno } } quorum { provider: corosync_votequorum } totem { cluster_name: thomas-testcluster config_version: 3 ip_version: ipv4 secauth: on version: 2 interface { bindnetaddr: 192.168.30.50 ringnumber: 0 } }
The first you want to do is add the name properties in the node entries if you do not see them already. Those must match the node name.
Then replace the address from the ring0_addr properties with the new addresses. You may use plain IP addresses or also hostnames here. If you use hostnames ensure that they are resolvable from all nodes.
In my example I want to switch my cluster communication to the 10.10.10.1/25 network. So I replace all ring0_addr respectively. I also set the bindetaddr in the totem section of the config to an address of the new network. It can be any address from the subnet configured on the new network interface.
After you increased the config_version property the new configuration file should look like:
logging { debug: off to_syslog: yes } nodelist { node { name: due nodeid: 2 quorum_votes: 1 ring0_addr: 10.10.10.2 } node { name: tre nodeid: 3 quorum_votes: 1 ring0_addr: 10.10.10.3 } node { name: uno nodeid: 1 quorum_votes: 1 ring0_addr: 10.10.10.1 } } quorum { provider: corosync_votequorum } totem { cluster_name: thomas-testcluster config_version: 4 ip_version: ipv4 secauth: on version: 2 interface { bindnetaddr: 10.10.10.1 ringnumber: 0 } }
Now after a final check whether all changed information is correct we save it and see again the edit corosync.conf file section to learn how to bring it in effect.
As our change cannot be enforced live from corosync we have to do an restart.
On a single node execute:
systemctl restart corosync
Now check if everything is fine:
systemctl status corosync
If corosync runs again correct restart corosync also on all other nodes. They will then join the cluster membership one by one on the new network.
4.7.3. Redundant Ring Protocol
To avoid a single point of failure you should implement counter measurements. This can be on the hardware and operating system level through network bonding.
Corosync itself offers also a possibility to add redundancy through the so called Redundant Ring Protocol. This protocol allows running a second totem ring on another network, this network should be physically separated from the other rings network to actually increase availability.
4.7.4. RRP On Cluster Creation
The pvecm create command provides the additional parameters bindnetX_addr, ringX_addr and rrp_mode, can be used for RRP configuration.
|
See the glossary if you do not know what each parameter means. |
So if you have two networks, one on the 10.10.10.1/24 and the other on the 10.10.20.1/24 subnet you would execute:
pvecm create CLUSTERNAME -bindnet0_addr 10.10.10.1 -ring0_addr 10.10.10.1 \ -bindnet1_addr 10.10.20.1 -ring1_addr 10.10.20.1
4.7.5. RRP On A Created Cluster
When enabling an already running cluster to use RRP you will take similar steps as describe in separating the cluster network. You just do it on another ring.
First add a new interface subsection in the totem section, set its ringnumber property to 1. Set the interfaces bindnetaddr property to an address of the subnet you have configured for your new ring. Further set the rrp_mode to passive, this is the only stable mode.
Then add to each node entry in the nodelist section its new ring1_addr property with the nodes additional ring address.
So if you have two networks, one on the 10.10.10.1/24 and the other on the 10.10.20.1/24 subnet, the final configuration file should look like:
totem { cluster_name: tweak config_version: 9 ip_version: ipv4 rrp_mode: passive secauth: on version: 2 interface { bindnetaddr: 10.10.10.1 ringnumber: 0 } interface { bindnetaddr: 10.10.20.1 ringnumber: 1 } } nodelist { node { name: pvecm1 nodeid: 1 quorum_votes: 1 ring0_addr: 10.10.10.1 ring1_addr: 10.10.20.1 } node { name: pvecm2 nodeid: 2 quorum_votes: 1 ring0_addr: 10.10.10.2 ring1_addr: 10.10.20.2 } [...] # other cluster nodes here } [...] # other remaining config sections here
Bring it in effect like described in the edit the corosync.conf file section.
This is a change which cannot take live in effect and needs at least a restart of corosync. Recommended is a restart of the whole cluster.
If you cannot reboot the whole cluster ensure no High Availability services are configured and the stop the corosync service on all nodes. After corosync is stopped on all nodes start it one after the other again.
4.8. Corosync Configuration
The /ect/pve/corosync.conf file plays a central role in Proxmox VE cluster. It controls the cluster member ship and its network. For reading more about it check the corosync.conf man page:
man corosync.conf
For node membership you should always use the pvecm tool provided by Proxmox VE. You may have to edit the configuration file manually for other changes. Here are a few best practice tips for doing this.
4.8.1. Edit corosync.conf
Editing the corosync.conf file can be not always straight forward. There are two on each cluster, one in /etc/pve/corosync.conf and the other in /etc/corosync/corosync.conf. Editing the one in our cluster file system will propagate the changes to the local one, but not vice versa.
The configuration will get updated automatically as soon as the file changes. This means changes which can be integrated in a running corosync will take instantly effect. So you should always make a copy and edit that instead, to avoid triggering some unwanted changes by an in between safe.
cp /etc/pve/corosync.conf /etc/pve/corosync.conf.new
Then open the Config file with your favorite editor, nano and vim.tiny are preinstalled on Proxmox VE for example.
|
Always increment the config_version number on configuration changes, omitting this can lead to problems. |
After making the necessary changes create another copy of the current working configuration file. This serves as a backup if the new configuration fails to apply or makes problems in other ways.
cp /etc/pve/corosync.conf /etc/pve/corosync.conf.bak
Then move the new configuration file over the old one:
mv /etc/pve/corosync.conf.new /etc/pve/corosync.conf
You may check with the commands
systemctl status corosync journalctl -b -u corosync
If the change could applied automatically. If not you may have to restart the corosync service via:
systemctl restart corosync
On errors check the troubleshooting section below.
4.8.2. Troubleshooting
Issue: quorum.expected_votes must be configured
When corosync starts to fail and you get the following message in the system log:
[...] corosync[1647]: [QUORUM] Quorum provider: corosync_votequorum failed to initialize. corosync[1647]: [SERV ] Service engine 'corosync_quorum' failed to load for reason 'configuration error: nodelist or quorum.expected_votes must be configured!' [...]
It means that the hostname you set for corosync ringX_addr in the configuration could not be resolved.
Write Configuration When Not Quorate
If you need to change /etc/pve/corosync.conf on an node with no quorum, and you know what you do, use:
pvecm expected 1
This sets the expected vote count to 1 and makes the cluster quorate. You can now fix your configuration, or revert it back to the last working backup.
This is not enough if corosync cannot start anymore. Here its best to edit the local copy of the corosync configuration in /etc/corosync/corosync.conf so that corosync can start again. Ensure that on all nodes this configuration has the same content to avoid split brains. If you are not sure what went wrong it’s best to ask the Proxmox Community to help you.
4.8.3. Corosync Configuration Glossary
- ringX_addr
-
This names the different ring addresses for the corosync totem rings used for the cluster communication.
- bindnetaddr
-
Defines to which interface the ring should bind to. It may be any address of the subnet configured on the interface we want to use. In general its the recommended to just use an address a node uses on this interface.
- rrp_mode
-
Specifies the mode of the redundant ring protocol and may be passive, active or none. Note that use of active is highly experimental and not official supported. Passive is the preferred mode, it may double the cluster communication throughput and increases availability.
4.9. Cluster Cold Start
It is obvious that a cluster is not quorate when all nodes are offline. This is a common case after a power failure.
|
It is always a good idea to use an uninterruptible power supply (“UPS”, also called “battery backup”) to avoid this state, especially if you want HA. |
On node startup, service pve-manager is started and waits for quorum. Once quorate, it starts all guests which have the onboot flag set.
When you turn on nodes, or when power comes back after power failure, it is likely that some nodes boots faster than others. Please keep in mind that guest startup is delayed until you reach quorum.
5. Proxmox Cluster File System (pmxcfs)
The Proxmox Cluster file system (“pmxcfs”) is a database-driven file system for storing configuration files, replicated in real time to all cluster nodes using corosync. We use this to store all PVE related configuration files.
Although the file system stores all data inside a persistent database on disk, a copy of the data resides in RAM. That imposes restriction on the maximum size, which is currently 30MB. This is still enough to store the configuration of several thousand virtual machines.
This system provides the following advantages:
-
seamless replication of all configuration to all nodes in real time
-
provides strong consistency checks to avoid duplicate VM IDs
-
read-only when a node loses quorum
-
automatic updates of the corosync cluster configuration to all nodes
-
includes a distributed locking mechanism
5.1. POSIX Compatibility
The file system is based on FUSE, so the behavior is POSIX like. But some feature are simply not implemented, because we do not need them:
-
you can just generate normal files and directories, but no symbolic links, …
-
you can’t rename non-empty directories (because this makes it easier to guarantee that VMIDs are unique).
-
you can’t change file permissions (permissions are based on path)
-
O_EXCL creates were not atomic (like old NFS)
-
O_TRUNC creates are not atomic (FUSE restriction)
5.2. File Access Rights
All files and directories are owned by user root and have group www-data. Only root has write permissions, but group www-data can read most files. Files below the following paths:
/etc/pve/priv/ /etc/pve/nodes/${NAME}/priv/
are only accessible by root.
5.3. Technology
We use the Corosync Cluster Engine for cluster communication, and SQlite for the database file. The file system is implemented in user space using FUSE.
5.4. File System Layout
The file system is mounted at:
/etc/pve
5.4.1. Files
corosync.conf |
Corosync cluster configuration file (previous to Proxmox VE 4.x this file was called cluster.conf) |
storage.cfg |
Proxmox VE storage configuration |
datacenter.cfg |
Proxmox VE datacenter wide configuration (keyboard layout, proxy, …) |
user.cfg |
Proxmox VE access control configuration (users/groups/…) |
domains.cfg |
Proxmox VE authentication domains |
authkey.pub |
Public key used by ticket system |
pve-root-ca.pem |
Public certificate of cluster CA |
priv/shadow.cfg |
Shadow password file |
priv/authkey.key |
Private key used by ticket system |
priv/pve-root-ca.key |
Private key of cluster CA |
nodes/<NAME>/pve-ssl.pem |
Public SSL certificate for web server (signed by cluster CA) |
nodes/<NAME>/pve-ssl.key |
Private SSL key for pve-ssl.pem |
nodes/<NAME>/pveproxy-ssl.pem |
Public SSL certificate (chain) for web server (optional override for pve-ssl.pem) |
nodes/<NAME>/pveproxy-ssl.key |
Private SSL key for pveproxy-ssl.pem (optional) |
nodes/<NAME>/qemu-server/<VMID>.conf |
VM configuration data for KVM VMs |
nodes/<NAME>/lxc/<VMID>.conf |
VM configuration data for LXC containers |
firewall/cluster.fw |
Firewall configuration applied to all nodes |
firewall/<NAME>.fw |
Firewall configuration for individual nodes |
firewall/<VMID>.fw |
Firewall configuration for VMs and Containers |
5.4.2. Symbolic links
local |
nodes/<LOCAL_HOST_NAME> |
qemu-server |
nodes/<LOCAL_HOST_NAME>/qemu-server/ |
lxc |
nodes/<LOCAL_HOST_NAME>/lxc/ |
5.4.3. Special status files for debugging (JSON)
.version |
File versions (to detect file modifications) |
.members |
Info about cluster members |
.vmlist |
List of all VMs |
.clusterlog |
Cluster log (last 50 entries) |
.rrd |
RRD data (most recent entries) |
5.4.4. Enable/Disable debugging
You can enable verbose syslog messages with:
echo "1" >/etc/pve/.debug
And disable verbose syslog messages with:
echo "0" >/etc/pve/.debug
5.5. Recovery
If you have major problems with your Proxmox VE host, e.g. hardware issues, it could be helpful to just copy the pmxcfs database file /var/lib/pve-cluster/config.db and move it to a new Proxmox VE host. On the new host (with nothing running), you need to stop the pve-cluster service and replace the config.db file (needed permissions 0600). Second, adapt /etc/hostname and /etc/hosts according to the lost Proxmox VE host, then reboot and check. (And don’t forget your VM/CT data)
5.5.1. Remove Cluster configuration
The recommended way is to reinstall the node after you removed it from your cluster. This makes sure that all secret cluster/ssh keys and any shared configuration data is destroyed.
In some cases, you might prefer to put a node back to local mode without reinstall, which is described in Separate A Node Without Reinstalling
6. Proxmox VE Storage
The Proxmox VE storage model is very flexible. Virtual machine images can either be stored on one or several local storages, or on shared storage like NFS or iSCSI (NAS, SAN). There are no limits, and you may configure as many storage pools as you like. You can use all storage technologies available for Debian Linux.
One major benefit of storing VMs on shared storage is the ability to live-migrate running machines without any downtime, as all nodes in the cluster have direct access to VM disk images. There is no need to copy VM image data, so live migration is very fast in that case.
The storage library (package libpve-storage-perl) uses a flexible plugin system to provide a common interface to all storage types. This can be easily adopted to include further storage types in future.
6.1. Storage Types
There are basically two different classes of storage types:
- Block level storage
-
Allows to store large raw images. It is usually not possible to store other files (ISO, backups, ..) on such storage types. Most modern block level storage implementations support snapshots and clones. RADOS, Sheepdog and DRBD are distributed systems, replicating storage data to different nodes.
- File level storage
-
They allow access to a full featured (POSIX) file system. They are more flexible, and allows you to store any content type. ZFS is probably the most advanced system, and it has full support for snapshots and clones.
Description | PVE type | Level | Shared | Snapshots | Stable |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
ZFS (local) |
zfspool |
file |
no |
yes |
yes |
Directory |
dir |
file |
no |
no |
yes |
NFS |
nfs |
file |
yes |
no |
yes |
GlusterFS |
glusterfs |
file |
yes |
no |
yes |
LVM |
lvm |
block |
no |
no |
yes |
LVM-thin |
lvmthin |
block |
no |
yes |
yes |
iSCSI/kernel |
iscsi |
block |
yes |
no |
yes |
iSCSI/libiscsi |
iscsidirect |
block |
yes |
no |
yes |
Ceph/RBD |
rbd |
block |
yes |
yes |
yes |
Sheepdog |
sheepdog |
block |
yes |
yes |
beta |
DRBD9 |
drbd |
block |
yes |
yes |
beta |
ZFS over iSCSI |
zfs |
block |
yes |
yes |
yes |
|
It is possible to use LVM on top of an iSCSI storage. That way you get a shared LVM storage. |
6.1.1. Thin Provisioning
A number of storages, and the Qemu image format qcow2, support thin provisioning. With thin provisioning activated, only the blocks that the guest system actually use will be written to the storage.
Say for instance you create a VM with a 32GB hard disk, and after installing the guest system OS, the root file system of the VM contains 3 GB of data. In that case only 3GB are written to the storage, even if the guest VM sees a 32GB hard drive. In this way thin provisioning allows you to create disk images which are larger than the currently available storage blocks. You can create large disk images for your VMs, and when the need arises, add more disks to your storage without resizing the VMs' file systems.
All storage types which have the “Snapshots” feature also support thin provisioning.
|
If a storage runs full, all guests using volumes on that storage receives IO error. This can cause file system inconsistencies and may corrupt your data. So it is advisable to avoid over-provisioning of your storage resources, or carefully observe free space to avoid such conditions. |
6.2. Storage Configuration
All Proxmox VE related storage configuration is stored within a single text file at /etc/pve/storage.cfg. As this file is within /etc/pve/, it gets automatically distributed to all cluster nodes. So all nodes share the same storage configuration.
Sharing storage configuration make perfect sense for shared storage, because the same “shared” storage is accessible from all nodes. But is also useful for local storage types. In this case such local storage is available on all nodes, but it is physically different and can have totally different content.
6.2.1. Storage Pools
Each storage pool has a <type>, and is uniquely identified by its <STORAGE_ID>. A pool configuration looks like this:
<type>: <STORAGE_ID> <property> <value> <property> <value> ...
The <type>: <STORAGE_ID> line starts the pool definition, which is then followed by a list of properties. Most properties have values, but some of them come with reasonable default. In that case you can omit the value.
To be more specific, take a look at the default storage configuration after installation. It contains one special local storage pool named local, which refers to the directory /var/lib/vz and is always available. The Proxmox VE installer creates additional storage entries depending on the storage type chosen at installation time.
dir: local path /var/lib/vz content iso,vztmpl,backup # default image store on LVM based installation lvmthin: local-lvm thinpool data vgname pve content rootdir,images # default image store on ZFS based installation zfspool: local-zfs pool rpool/data sparse content images,rootdir
6.2.2. Common Storage Properties
A few storage properties are common among different storage types.
- nodes
-
List of cluster node names where this storage is usable/accessible. One can use this property to restrict storage access to a limited set of nodes.
- content
-
A storage can support several content types, for example virtual disk images, cdrom iso images, container templates or container root directories. Not all storage types support all content types. One can set this property to select for what this storage is used for.
- images
-
KVM-Qemu VM images.
- rootdir
-
Allow to store container data.
- vztmpl
-
Container templates.
- backup
-
Backup files (vzdump).
- iso
-
ISO images
- shared
-
Mark storage as shared.
- disable
-
You can use this flag to disable the storage completely.
- maxfiles
-
Maximum number of backup files per VM. Use 0 for unlimited.
- format
-
Default image format (raw|qcow2|vmdk)
|
It is not advisable to use the same storage pool on different Proxmox VE clusters. Some storage operation need exclusive access to the storage, so proper locking is required. While this is implemented within a cluster, it does not work between different clusters. |
6.3. Volumes
We use a special notation to address storage data. When you allocate data from a storage pool, it returns such a volume identifier. A volume is identified by the <STORAGE_ID>, followed by a storage type dependent volume name, separated by colon. A valid <VOLUME_ID> looks like:
local:230/example-image.raw
local:iso/debian-501-amd64-netinst.iso
local:vztmpl/debian-5.0-joomla_1.5.9-1_i386.tar.gz
iscsi-storage:0.0.2.scsi-14f504e46494c4500494b5042546d2d646744372d31616d61
To get the file system path for a <VOLUME_ID> use:
pvesm path <VOLUME_ID>
6.3.1. Volume Ownership
There exists an ownership relation for image type volumes. Each such volume is owned by a VM or Container. For example volume local:230/example-image.raw is owned by VM 230. Most storage backends encodes this ownership information into the volume name.
When you remove a VM or Container, the system also removes all associated volumes which are owned by that VM or Container.
6.4. Using the Command Line Interface
It is recommended to familiarize yourself with the concept behind storage pools and volume identifiers, but in real life, you are not forced to do any of those low level operations on the command line. Normally, allocation and removal of volumes is done by the VM and Container management tools.
Nevertheless, there is a command line tool called pvesm (“Proxmox VE Storage Manager”), which is able to perform common storage management tasks.
6.4.1. Examples
Add storage pools
pvesm add <TYPE> <STORAGE_ID> <OPTIONS> pvesm add dir <STORAGE_ID> --path <PATH> pvesm add nfs <STORAGE_ID> --path <PATH> --server <SERVER> --export <EXPORT> pvesm add lvm <STORAGE_ID> --vgname <VGNAME> pvesm add iscsi <STORAGE_ID> --portal <HOST[:PORT]> --target <TARGET>
Disable storage pools
pvesm set <STORAGE_ID> --disable 1
Enable storage pools
pvesm set <STORAGE_ID> --disable 0
Change/set storage options
pvesm set <STORAGE_ID> <OPTIONS> pvesm set <STORAGE_ID> --shared 1 pvesm set local --format qcow2 pvesm set <STORAGE_ID> --content iso
Remove storage pools. This does not delete any data, and does not disconnect or unmount anything. It just removes the storage configuration.
pvesm remove <STORAGE_ID>
Allocate volumes
pvesm alloc <STORAGE_ID> <VMID> <name> <size> [--format <raw|qcow2>]
Allocate a 4G volume in local storage. The name is auto-generated if you pass an empty string as <name>
pvesm alloc local <VMID> '' 4G
Free volumes
pvesm free <VOLUME_ID>
|
This really destroys all volume data. |
List storage status
pvesm status
List storage contents
pvesm list <STORAGE_ID> [--vmid <VMID>]
List volumes allocated by VMID
pvesm list <STORAGE_ID> --vmid <VMID>
List iso images
pvesm list <STORAGE_ID> --iso
List container templates
pvesm list <STORAGE_ID> --vztmpl
Show file system path for a volume
pvesm path <VOLUME_ID>
6.5. Directory Backend
Storage pool type: dir
Proxmox VE can use local directories or locally mounted shares for storage. A directory is a file level storage, so you can store any content type like virtual disk images, containers, templates, ISO images or backup files.
|
You can mount additional storages via standard linux /etc/fstab, and then define a directory storage for that mount point. This way you can use any file system supported by Linux. |
This backend assumes that the underlying directory is POSIX compatible, but nothing else. This implies that you cannot create snapshots at the storage level. But there exists a workaround for VM images using the qcow2 file format, because that format supports snapshots internally.
|
Some storage types do not support O_DIRECT, so you can’t use cache mode none with such storages. Simply use cache mode writeback instead. |
We use a predefined directory layout to store different content types into different sub-directories. This layout is used by all file level storage backends.
Content type | Subdir |
---|---|
VM images |
images/<VMID>/ |
ISO images |
template/iso/ |
Container templates |
template/cache/ |
Backup files |
dump/ |
6.5.1. Configuration
This backend supports all common storage properties, and adds an additional property called path to specify the directory. This needs to be an absolute file system path.
dir: backup path /mnt/backup content backup maxfiles 7
Above configuration defines a storage pool called backup. That pool can be used to store up to 7 backups (maxfiles 7) per VM. The real path for the backup files is /mnt/backup/dump/....
6.5.2. File naming conventions
This backend uses a well defined naming scheme for VM images:
vm-<VMID>-<NAME>.<FORMAT>
- <VMID>
-
This specifies the owner VM.
- <NAME>
-
This can be an arbitrary name (ascii) without white space. The backend uses disk-[N] as default, where [N] is replaced by an integer to make the name unique.
- <FORMAT>
-
Specifies the image format (raw|qcow2|vmdk).
When you create a VM template, all VM images are renamed to indicate that they are now read-only, and can be used as a base image for clones:
base-<VMID>-<NAME>.<FORMAT>
|
Such base images are used to generate cloned images. So it is important that those files are read-only, and never get modified. The backend changes the access mode to 0444, and sets the immutable flag (chattr +i) if the storage supports that. |
6.5.3. Storage Features
As mentioned above, most file systems do not support snapshots out of the box. To workaround that problem, this backend is able to use qcow2 internal snapshot capabilities.
Same applies to clones. The backend uses the qcow2 base image feature to create clones.
Content types | Image formats | Shared | Snapshots | Clones |
---|---|---|---|---|
images rootdir vztempl iso backup |
raw qcow2 vmdk subvol |
no |
qcow2 |
qcow2 |
6.5.4. Examples
Please use the following command to allocate a 4GB image on storage local:
# pvesm alloc local 100 vm-100-disk10.raw 4G Formatting '/var/lib/vz/images/100/vm-100-disk10.raw', fmt=raw size=4294967296 successfully created 'local:100/vm-100-disk10.raw'
|
The image name must conform to above naming conventions. |
The real file system path is shown with:
# pvesm path local:100/vm-100-disk10.raw /var/lib/vz/images/100/vm-100-disk10.raw
And you can remove the image with:
# pvesm free local:100/vm-100-disk10.raw
6.6. NFS Backend
Storage pool type: nfs
The NFS backend is based on the directory backend, so it shares most properties. The directory layout and the file naming conventions are the same. The main advantage is that you can directly configure the NFS server properties, so the backend can mount the share automatically. There is no need to modify /etc/fstab. The backend can also test if the server is online, and provides a method to query the server for exported shares.
6.6.1. Configuration
The backend supports all common storage properties, except the shared flag, which is always set. Additionally, the following properties are used to configure the NFS server:
- server
-
Server IP or DNS name. To avoid DNS lookup delays, it is usually preferable to use an IP address instead of a DNS name - unless you have a very reliable DNS server, or list the server in the local /etc/hosts file.
- export
-
NFS export path (as listed by pvesm nfsscan).
You can also set NFS mount options:
- path
-
The local mount point (defaults to /mnt/pve/<STORAGE_ID>/).
- options
-
NFS mount options (see man nfs).
nfs: iso-templates path /mnt/pve/iso-templates server 10.0.0.10 export /space/iso-templates options vers=3,soft content iso,vztmpl
|
After an NFS request times out, NFS request are retried indefinitely by default. This can lead to unexpected hangs on the client side. For read-only content, it is worth to consider the NFS soft option, which limits the number of retries to three. |
6.6.2. Storage Features
NFS does not support snapshots, but the backend uses qcow2 features to implement snapshots and cloning.
Content types | Image formats | Shared | Snapshots | Clones |
---|---|---|---|---|
images rootdir vztempl iso backup |
raw qcow2 vmdk subvol |
yes |
qcow2 |
qcow2 |
6.6.3. Examples
You can get a list of exported NFS shares with:
# pvesm nfsscan <server>
6.7. GlusterFS Backend
Storage pool type: glusterfs
GlusterFS is a salable network file system. The system uses a modular design, runs on commodity hardware, and can provide a highly available enterprise storage at low costs. Such system is capable of scaling to several petabytes, and can handle thousands of clients.
|
After a node/brick crash, GlusterFS does a full rsync to make sure data is consistent. This can take a very long time with large files, so this backend is not suitable to store large VM images. |
6.7.1. Configuration
The backend supports all common storage properties, and adds the following GlusterFS specific options:
- server
-
GlusterFS volfile server IP or DNS name.
- server2
-
Backup volfile server IP or DNS name.
- volume
-
GlusterFS Volume.
- transport
-
GlusterFS transport: tcp, unix or rdma
glusterfs: Gluster server 10.2.3.4 server2 10.2.3.5 volume glustervol content images,iso
6.7.2. File naming conventions
The directory layout and the file naming conventions are inherited from the dir backend.
6.7.3. Storage Features
The storage provides a file level interface, but no native snapshot/clone implementation.
Content types | Image formats | Shared | Snapshots | Clones |
---|---|---|---|---|
images vztempl iso backup |
raw qcow2 vmdk |
yes |
qcow2 |
qcow2 |
6.8. Local ZFS Pool Backend
Storage pool type: zfspool
This backend allows you to access local ZFS pools (or ZFS file systems inside such pools).
6.8.1. Configuration
The backend supports the common storage properties content, nodes, disable, and the following ZFS specific properties:
- pool
-
Select the ZFS pool/filesystem. All allocations are done within that pool.
- blocksize
-
Set ZFS blocksize parameter.
- sparse
-
Use ZFS thin-provisioning. A sparse volume is a volume whose reservation is not equal to the volume size.
zfspool: vmdata pool tank/vmdata content rootdir,images sparse
6.8.2. File naming conventions
The backend uses the following naming scheme for VM images:
vm-<VMID>-<NAME> // normal VM images base-<VMID>-<NAME> // template VM image (read-only) subvol-<VMID>-<NAME> // subvolumes (ZFS filesystem for containers)
- <VMID>
-
This specifies the owner VM.
- <NAME>
-
This can be an arbitrary name (ascii) without white space. The backend uses disk[N] as default, where [N] is replaced by an integer to make the name unique.
6.8.3. Storage Features
ZFS is probably the most advanced storage type regarding snapshot and cloning. The backend uses ZFS datasets for both VM images (format raw) and container data (format subvol). ZFS properties are inherited from the parent dataset, so you can simply set defaults on the parent dataset.
Content types | Image formats | Shared | Snapshots | Clones |
---|---|---|---|---|
images rootdir |
raw subvol |
no |
yes |
yes |
6.8.4. Examples
It is recommended to create an extra ZFS file system to store your VM images:
# zfs create tank/vmdata
To enable compression on that newly allocated file system:
# zfs set compression=on tank/vmdata
You can get a list of available ZFS filesystems with:
# pvesm zfsscan
6.9. LVM Backend
Storage pool type: lvm
LVM is a thin software layer on top of hard disks and partitions. It can be used to split available disk space into smaller logical volumes. LVM is widely used on Linux and makes managing hard drives easier.
Another use case is to put LVM on top of a big iSCSI LUN. That way you can easily manage space on that iSCSI LUN, which would not be possible otherwise, because the iSCSI specification does not define a management interface for space allocation.
6.9.1. Configuration
The LVM backend supports the common storage properties content, nodes, disable, and the following LVM specific properties:
- vgname
-
LVM volume group name. This must point to an existing volume group.
- base
-
Base volume. This volume is automatically activated before accessing the storage. This is mostly useful when the LVM volume group resides on a remote iSCSI server.
- saferemove
-
Zero-out data when removing LVs. When removing a volume, this makes sure that all data gets erased.
- saferemove_throughput
-
Wipe throughput (cstream -t parameter value).
lvm: myspace vgname myspace content rootdir,images
6.9.2. File naming conventions
The backend use basically the same naming conventions as the ZFS pool backend.
vm-<VMID>-<NAME> // normal VM images
6.9.3. Storage Features
LVM is a typical block storage, but this backend does not support snapshot and clones. Unfortunately, normal LVM snapshots are quite inefficient, because they interfere all writes on the whole volume group during snapshot time.
One big advantage is that you can use it on top of a shared storage, for example an iSCSI LUN. The backend itself implement proper cluster wide locking.
|
The newer LVM-thin backend allows snapshot and clones, but does not support shared storage. |
Content types | Image formats | Shared | Snapshots | Clones |
---|---|---|---|---|
images rootdir |
raw |
possible |
no |
no |
6.9.4. Examples
List available volume groups:
# pvesm lvmscan
6.10. LVM thin Backend
Storage pool type: lvmthin
LVM normally allocates blocks when you create a volume. LVM thin pools instead allocates blocks when they are written. This behaviour is called thin-provisioning, because volumes can be much larger than physically available space.
You can use the normal LVM command line tools to manage and create LVM thin pools (see man lvmthin for details). Assuming you already have a LVM volume group called pve, the following commands create a new LVM thin pool (size 100G) called data:
lvcreate -L 100G -n data pve lvconvert --type thin-pool pve/data
6.10.1. Configuration
The LVM thin backend supports the common storage properties content, nodes, disable, and the following LVM specific properties:
- vgname
-
LVM volume group name. This must point to an existing volume group.
- thinpool
-
The name of the LVM thin pool.
lvmthin: local-lvm thinpool data vgname pve content rootdir,images
6.10.2. File naming conventions
The backend use basically the same naming conventions as the ZFS pool backend.
vm-<VMID>-<NAME> // normal VM images
6.10.3. Storage Features
LVM thin is a block storage, but fully supports snapshots and clones efficiently. New volumes are automatically initialized with zero.
It must be mentioned that LVM thin pools cannot be shared across multiple nodes, so you can only use them as local storage.
Content types | Image formats | Shared | Snapshots | Clones |
---|---|---|---|---|
images rootdir |
raw |
no |
yes |
yes |
6.10.4. Examples
List available LVM thin pools on volume group pve:
# pvesm lvmthinscan pve
6.11. Open-iSCSI initiator
Storage pool type: iscsi
iSCSI is a widely employed technology used to connect to storage servers. Almost all storage vendors support iSCSI. There are also open source iSCSI target solutions available, e.g. OpenMediaVault, which is based on Debian.
To use this backend, you need to install the open-iscsi package. This is a standard Debian package, but it is not installed by default to save resources.
# apt-get install open-iscsi
Low-level iscsi management task can be done using the iscsiadm tool.
6.11.1. Configuration
The backend supports the common storage properties content, nodes, disable, and the following iSCSI specific properties:
- portal
-
iSCSI portal (IP or DNS name with optional port).
- target
-
iSCSI target.
iscsi: mynas portal 10.10.10.1 target iqn.2006-01.openfiler.com:tsn.dcb5aaaddd content none
|
If you want to use LVM on top of iSCSI, it make sense to set content none. That way it is not possible to create VMs using iSCSI LUNs directly. |
6.11.2. File naming conventions
The iSCSI protocol does not define an interface to allocate or delete data. Instead, that needs to be done on the target side and is vendor specific. The target simply exports them as numbered LUNs. So Proxmox VE iSCSI volume names just encodes some information about the LUN as seen by the linux kernel.
6.11.3. Storage Features
iSCSI is a block level type storage, and provides no management interface. So it is usually best to export one big LUN, and setup LVM on top of that LUN. You can then use the LVM plugin to manage the storage on that iSCSI LUN.
Content types | Image formats | Shared | Snapshots | Clones |
---|---|---|---|---|
images none |
raw |
yes |
no |
no |
6.11.4. Examples
Scan a remote iSCSI portal, and returns a list of possible targets:
pvesm iscsiscan -portal <HOST[:PORT]>
6.12. User Mode iSCSI Backend
Storage pool type: iscsidirect
This backend provides basically the same functionality as the Open-iSCSI backed, but uses a user-level library (package libiscsi2) to implement it.
It should be noted that there are no kernel drivers involved, so this can be viewed as performance optimization. But this comes with the drawback that you cannot use LVM on top of such iSCSI LUN. So you need to manage all space allocations at the storage server side.
6.12.1. Configuration
The user mode iSCSI backend uses the same configuration options as the Open-iSCSI backed.
iscsidirect: faststore portal 10.10.10.1 target iqn.2006-01.openfiler.com:tsn.dcb5aaaddd
6.12.2. Storage Features
|
This backend works with VMs only. Containers cannot use this driver. |
Content types | Image formats | Shared | Snapshots | Clones |
---|---|---|---|---|
images |
raw |
yes |
no |
no |
6.13. Ceph RADOS Block Devices (RBD)
Storage pool type: rbd
Ceph is a distributed object store and file system designed to provide excellent performance, reliability and scalability. RADOS block devices implement a feature rich block level storage, and you get the following advantages:
-
thin provisioning
-
resizable volumes
-
distributed and redundant (striped over multiple OSDs)
-
full snapshot and clone capabilities
-
self healing
-
no single point of failure
-
scalable to the exabyte level
-
kernel and user space implementation available
|
For smaller deployments, it is also possible to run Ceph services directly on your Proxmox VE nodes. Recent hardware has plenty of CPU power and RAM, so running storage services and VMs on same node is possible. |
6.13.1. Configuration
This backend supports the common storage properties nodes, disable, content, and the following rbd specific properties:
- monhost
-
List of monitor daemon IPs.
- pool
-
Ceph pool name.
- username
-
RBD user Id.
- krbd
-
Access rbd through krbd kernel module. This is required if you want to use the storage for containers.
rbd: ceph3 monhost 10.1.1.20 10.1.1.21 10.1.1.22 pool ceph3 content images username admin
|
You can use the rbd utility to do low-level management tasks. |
6.13.2. Authentication
If you use cephx authentication, you need to copy the keyfile from Ceph to Proxmox VE host.
Create the directory /etc/pve/priv/ceph with
mkdir /etc/pve/priv/ceph
Then copy the keyring
scp <cephserver>:/etc/ceph/ceph.client.admin.keyring /etc/pve/priv/ceph/<STORAGE_ID>.keyring
The keyring must be named to match your <STORAGE_ID>. Copying the keyring generally requires root privileges.
6.13.3. Storage Features
The rbd backend is a block level storage, and implements full snapshot and clone functionality.
Content types | Image formats | Shared | Snapshots | Clones |
---|---|---|---|---|
images rootdir |
raw |
yes |
yes |
yes |
7. Qemu/KVM Virtual Machines
Qemu (short form for Quick Emulator) is an open source hypervisor that emulates a physical computer. From the perspective of the host system where Qemu is running, Qemu is a user program which has access to a number of local resources like partitions, files, network cards which are then passed to an emulated computer which sees them as if they were real devices.
A guest operating system running in the emulated computer accesses these devices, and runs as it were running on real hardware. For instance you can pass an iso image as a parameter to Qemu, and the OS running in the emulated computer will see a real CDROM inserted in a CD drive.
Qemu can emulates a great variety of hardware from ARM to Sparc, but Proxmox VE is only concerned with 32 and 64 bits PC clone emulation, since it represents the overwhelming majority of server hardware. The emulation of PC clones is also one of the fastest due to the availability of processor extensions which greatly speed up Qemu when the emulated architecture is the same as the host architecture.
|
You may sometimes encounter the term KVM (Kernel-based Virtual Machine). It means that Qemu is running with the support of the virtualization processor extensions, via the Linux kvm module. In the context of Proxmox VE Qemu and KVM can be use interchangeably as Qemu in Proxmox VE will always try to load the kvm module. |
Qemu inside Proxmox VE runs as a root process, since this is required to access block and PCI devices.
7.1. Emulated devices and paravirtualized devices
The PC hardware emulated by Qemu includes a mainboard, network controllers, scsi, ide and sata controllers, serial ports (the complete list can be seen in the kvm(1) man page) all of them emulated in software. All these devices are the exact software equivalent of existing hardware devices, and if the OS running in the guest has the proper drivers it will use the devices as if it were running on real hardware. This allows Qemu to runs unmodified operating systems.
This however has a performance cost, as running in software what was meant to run in hardware involves a lot of extra work for the host CPU. To mitigate this, Qemu can present to the guest operating system paravirtualized devices, where the guest OS recognizes it is running inside Qemu and cooperates with the hypervisor.
Qemu relies on the virtio virtualization standard, and is thus able to presente paravirtualized virtio devices, which includes a paravirtualized generic disk controller, a paravirtualized network card, a paravirtualized serial port, a paravirtualized SCSI controller, etc …
It is highly recommended to use the virtio devices whenever you can, as they
provide a big performance improvement. Using the virtio generic disk controller
versus an emulated IDE controller will double the sequential write throughput,
as measured with bonnie++(8). Using the virtio network interface can deliver
up to three times the throughput of an emulated Intel E1000 network card, as
measured with iperf(1).
[See this benchmark on the KVM wiki
http://www.linux-kvm.org/page/Using_VirtIO_NIC]
7.2. Virtual Machines settings
Generally speaking Proxmox VE tries to choose sane defaults for virtual machines (VM). Make sure you understand the meaning of the settings you change, as it could incur a performance slowdown, or putting your data at risk.
7.2.1. General Settings
General settings of a VM include
-
the Node : the physical server on which the VM will run
-
the VM ID: a unique number in this Proxmox VE installation used to identify your VM
-
Name: a free form text string you can use to describe the VM
-
Resource Pool: a logical group of VMs
7.2.2. OS Settings
When creating a VM, setting the proper Operating System(OS) allows Proxmox VE to optimize some low level parameters. For instance Windows OS expect the BIOS clock to use the local time, while Unix based OS expect the BIOS clock to have the UTC time.
7.2.3. Hard Disk
Qemu can emulate a number of storage controllers:
-
the IDE controller, has a design which goes back to the 1984 PC/AT disk controller. Even if this controller has been superseded by more more designs, each and every OS you can think has support for it, making it a great choice if you want to run an OS released before 2003. You can connect up to 4 devices on this controller.
-
the SATA (Serial ATA) controller, dating from 2003, has a more modern design, allowing higher throughput and a greater number of devices to be connected. You can connect up to 6 devices on this controller.
-
the SCSI controller, designed in 1985, is commonly found on server grade hardware, and can connect up to 14 storage devices. Proxmox VE emulates by default a LSI 53C895A controller.
A SCSI controller of type Virtio is the recommended setting if you aim for performance and is automatically selected for newly created Linux VMs since Proxmox VE 4.3. Linux distributions have support for this controller since 2012, and FreeBSD since 2014. For Windows OSes, you need to provide an extra iso containing the drivers during the installation. -
The Virtio controller, also called virtio-blk to distinguish from the Virtio SCSI controller, is an older type of paravirtualized controller which has been superseded in features by the Virtio SCSI Controller.
On each controller you attach a number of emulated hard disks, which are backed by a file or a block device residing in the configured storage. The choice of a storage type will determine the format of the hard disk image. Storages which present block devices (LVM, ZFS, Ceph) will require the raw disk image format, whereas files based storages (Ext4, NFS, GlusterFS) will let you to choose either the raw disk image format or the QEMU image format.
-
the QEMU image format is a copy on write format which allows snapshots, and thin provisioning of the disk image.
-
the raw disk image is a bit-to-bit image of a hard disk, similar to what you would get when executing the dd command on a block device in Linux. This format do not support thin provisioning or snapshotting by itself, requiring cooperation from the storage layer for these tasks. It is however 10% faster than the QEMU image format.
[See this benchmark for details http://events.linuxfoundation.org/sites/events/files/slides/CloudOpen2013_Khoa_Huynh_v3.pdf]
-
the VMware image format only makes sense if you intend to import/export the disk image to other hypervisors.
Setting the Cache mode of the hard drive will impact how the host system will notify the guest systems of block write completions. The No cache default means that the guest system will be notified that a write is complete when each block reaches the physical storage write queue, ignoring the host page cache. This provides a good balance between safety and speed.
If you want the Proxmox VE backup manager to skip a disk when doing a backup of a VM, you can set the No backup option on that disk.
If your storage supports thin provisioning (see the storage chapter in the Proxmox VE guide), and your VM has a SCSI controller you can activate the Discard option on the hard disks connected to that controller. With Discard enabled, when the filesystem of a VM marks blocks as unused after removing files, the emulated SCSI controller will relay this information to the storage, which will then shrink the disk image accordingly.
The option IO Thread can only be enabled when using a disk with the VirtIO controller, or with the SCSI controller, when the emulated controller type is VirtIO SCSI. With this enabled, Qemu uses one thread per disk, instead of one thread for all, so it should increase performance when using multiple disks. Note that backups do not currently work with IO Thread enabled.
7.2.4. CPU
A CPU socket is a physical slot on a PC motherboard where you can plug a CPU.
This CPU can then contain one or many cores, which are independent
processing units. Whether you have a single CPU socket with 4 cores, or two CPU
sockets with two cores is mostly irrelevant from a performance point of view.
However some software is licensed depending on the number of sockets you have in
your machine, in that case it makes sense to set the number of of sockets to
what the license allows you, and increase the number of cores.
Increasing the number of virtual cpus (cores and sockets) will usually provide a
performance improvement though that is heavily dependent on the use of the VM.
Multithreaded applications will of course benefit from a large number of
virtual cpus, as for each virtual cpu you add, Qemu will create a new thread of
execution on the host system. If you’re not sure about the workload of your VM,
it is usually a safe bet to set the number of Total cores to 2.
|
It is perfectly safe to set the overall number of total cores in all your VMs to be greater than the number of of cores you have on your server (ie. 4 VMs with each 4 Total cores running in a 8 core machine is OK) In that case the host system will balance the Qemu execution threads between your server cores just like if you were running a standard multithreaded application. However Proxmox VE will prevent you to allocate on a single machine more vcpus than physically available, as this will only bring the performance down due to the cost of context switches. |
Qemu can emulate a number different of CPU types from 486 to the latest Xeon
processors. Each new processor generation adds new features, like hardware
assisted 3d rendering, random number generation, memory protection, etc …
Usually you should select for your VM a processor type which closely matches the
CPU of the host system, as it means that the host CPU features (also called CPU
flags ) will be available in your VMs. If you want an exact match, you can set
the CPU type to host in which case the VM will have exactly the same CPU flags
as your host system.
This has a downside though. If you want to do a live migration of VMs between
different hosts, your VM might end up on a new system with a different CPU type.
If the CPU flags passed to the guest are missing, the qemu process will stop. To
remedy this Qemu has also its own CPU type kvm64, that Proxmox VE uses by defaults.
kvm64 is a Pentium 4 look a like CPU type, which has a reduced CPU flags set,
but is guaranteed to work everywhere.
In short, if you care about live migration and moving VMs between nodes, leave
the kvm64 default. If you don’t care about live migration, set the CPU type to
host, as in theory this will give your guests maximum performance.
You can also optionally emulate a NUMA architecture in your VMs. The basics of
the NUMA architecture mean that instead of having a global memory pool available
to all your cores, the memory is spread into local banks close to each socket.
This can bring speed improvements as the memory bus is not a bottleneck
anymore. If your system has a NUMA architecture
[if the command
numactl --hardware | grep available returns more than one node, then your host
system has a NUMA architecture]
we recommend to activate the option, as this
will allow proper distribution of the VM resources on the host system. This
option is also required in Proxmox VE to allow hotplugging of cores and RAM to a VM.
If the NUMA option is used, it is recommended to set the number of sockets to the number of sockets of the host system.
7.2.5. Memory
For each VM you have the option to set a fixed size memory or asking Proxmox VE to dynamically allocate memory based on the current RAM usage of the host.
When choosing a fixed size memory Proxmox VE will simply allocate what you specify to your VM.
When choosing to automatically allocate memory, Proxmox VE will make sure that the
minimum amount you specified is always available to the VM, and if RAM usage on
the host is below 80%, will dynamically add memory to the guest up to the
maximum memory specified.
When the host is becoming short on RAM, the VM will then release some memory
back to the host, swapping running processes if needed and starting the oom
killer in last resort. The passing around of memory between host and guest is
done via a special balloon kernel driver running inside the guest, which will
grab or release memory pages from the host.
[A good explanation of the inner workings of the balloon driver can be found here https://rwmj.wordpress.com/2010/07/17/virtio-balloon/]
When multiple VMs use the autoallocate facility, it is possible to set a Shares coefficient which indicates the relative amount of the free host memory that each VM shoud take. Suppose for instance you have four VMs, three of them running a HTTP server and the last one is a database server. To cache more database blocks in the database server RAM, you would like to prioritize the database VM when spare RAM is available. For this you assign a Shares property of 3000 to the database VM, leaving the other VMs to the Shares default setting of 1000. The host server has 32GB of RAM, and is curring using 16GB, leaving 32 * 80/100 - 16 = 9GB RAM to be allocated to the VMs. The database VM will get 9 * 3000 / (3000 + 1000 + 1000 + 1000) = 4.5 GB extra RAM and each HTTP server will get 1/5 GB.
All Linux distributions released after 2010 have the balloon kernel driver included. For Windows OSes, the balloon driver needs to be added manually and can incur a slowdown of the guest, so we don’t recommend using it on critical systems.
When allocating RAMs to your VMs, a good rule of thumb is always to leave 1GB of RAM available to the host.
7.2.6. Network Device
Each VM can have many Network interface controllers (NIC), of four different types:
-
Intel E1000 is the default, and emulates an Intel Gigabit network card.
-
the VirtIO paravirtualized NIC should be used if you aim for maximum performance. Like all VirtIO devices, the guest OS should have the proper driver installed.
-
the Realtek 8139 emulates an older 100 MB/s network card, and should only be used when emulating older operating systems ( released before 2002 )
-
the vmxnet3 is another paravirtualized device, which should only be used when importing a VM from another hypervisor.
Proxmox VE will generate for each NIC a random MAC address, so that your VM is addressable on Ethernet networks.
The NIC you added to the VM can follow one of two differents models:
-
in the default Bridged mode each virtual NIC is backed on the host by a tap device, ( a software loopback device simulating an Ethernet NIC ). This tap device is added to a bridge, by default vmbr0 in Proxmox VE. In this mode, VMs have direct access to the Ethernet LAN on which the host is located.
-
in the alternative NAT mode, each virtual NIC will only communicate with the Qemu user networking stack, where a builting router and DHCP server can provide network access. This built-in DHCP will serve adresses in the private 10.0.2.0/24 range. The NAT mode is much slower than the bridged mode, and should only be used for testing.
You can also skip adding a network device when creating a VM by selecting No network device.
If you are using the VirtIO driver, you can optionally activate the Multiqueue option. This option allows the guest OS to process networking packets using multiple virtual CPUs, providing an increase in the total number of packets transfered.
When using the VirtIO driver with Proxmox VE, each NIC network queue is passed to the host kernel, where the queue will be processed by a kernel thread spawn by the vhost driver. With this option activated, it is possible to pass multiple network queues to the host kernel for each NIC.
When using Multiqueue, it is recommended to set it to a value equal to the number of Total Cores of your guest. You also need to set in the VM the number of multi-purpose channels on each VirtIO NIC with the ethtool command:
ethtool -L eth0 combined X
where X is the number of the number of vcpus of the VM.
You should note that setting the Multiqueue parameter to a value greater than one will increase the CPU load on the host and guest systems as the traffic increases. We recommend to set this option only when the VM has to process a great number of incoming connections, such as when the VM is running as a router, reverse proxy or a busy HTTP server doing long polling.
7.2.7. USB Passthrough
There are two different types of USB passthrough devices:
-
Host USB passtrough
-
SPICE USB passthrough
Host USB passthrough works by giving a VM a USB device of the host. This can either be done via the vendor- and product-id, or via the host bus and port.
The vendor/product-id looks like this: 0123:abcd, where 0123 is the id of the vendor, and abcd is the id of the product, meaning two pieces of the same usb device have the same id.
The bus/port looks like this: 1-2.3.4, where 1 is the bus and 2.3.4 is the port path. This represents the physical ports of your host (depending of the internal order of the usb controllers).
If a device is present in a VM configuration when the VM starts up, but the device is not present in the host, the VM can boot without problems. As soon as the device/port ist available in the host, it gets passed through.
|
Using this kind of USB passthrough, means that you cannot move a VM online to another host, since the hardware is only available on the host the VM is currently residing. |
The second type of passthrough is SPICE USB passthrough. This is useful if you use a SPICE client which supports it. If you add a SPICE USB port to your VM, you can passthrough a USB device from where your SPICE client is, directly to the VM (for example an input device or hardware dongle).
7.2.8. BIOS and UEFI
In order to properly emulate a computer, QEMU needs to use a firmware. By default QEMU uses SeaBIOS for this, which is an open-source, x86 BIOS implementation. SeaBIOS is a good choice for most standard setups.
There are, however, some scenarios in which a BIOS is not a good firmware
to boot from, e.g. if you want to do VGA passthrough.
[Alex Williamson has a very good blog entry about this.
http://vfio.blogspot.co.at/2014/08/primary-graphics-assignment-without-vga.html]
In such cases, you should rather use OVMF, which is an open-source UEFI implemenation.
[See the OVMF Project http://www.tianocore.org/ovmf/]
If you want to use OVMF, there are several things to consider:
In order to save things like the boot order, there needs to be an EFI Disk. This disk will be included in backups and snapshots, and there can only be one.
You can create such a disk with the following command:
qm set <vmid> -efidisk0 <storage>:1,format=<format>
Where <storage> is the storage where you want to have the disk, and <format> is a format which the storage supports. Alternatively, you can create such a disk through the web interface with Add → EFI Disk in the hardware section of a VM.
When using OVMF with a virtual display (without VGA passthrough), you need to set the client resolution in the OVMF menu(which you can reach with a press of the ESC button during boot), or you have to choose SPICE as the display type.
7.2.9. Automatic Start and Shutdown of Virtual Machines
After creating your VMs, you probably want them to start automatically when the host system boots. For this you need to select the option Start at boot from the Options Tab of your VM in the web interface, or set it with the following command:
qm set <vmid> -onboot 1
In some case you want to be able to fine tune the boot order of your VMs, for instance if one of your VM is providing firewalling or DHCP to other guest systems. For this you can use the following parameters:
-
Start/Shutdown order: Defines the start order priority. E.g. set it to 1 if you want the VM to be the first to be started. (We use the reverse startup order for shutdown, so a machine with a start order of 1 would be the last to be shut down)
-
Startup delay: Defines the interval between this VM start and subsequent VMs starts . E.g. set it to 240 if you want to wait 240 seconds before starting other VMs.
-
Shutdown timeout: Defines the duration in seconds Proxmox VE should wait for the VM to be offline after issuing a shutdown command. By default this value is set to 60, which means that Proxmox VE will issue a shutdown request, wait 60s for the machine to be offline, and if after 60s the machine is still online will notify that the shutdown action failed.
Please note that machines without a Start/Shutdown order parameter will always start after those where the parameter is set, and this parameter only makes sense between the machines running locally on a host, and not cluster-wide.
7.3. Managing Virtual Machines with qm
qm is the tool to manage Qemu/Kvm virtual machines on Proxmox VE. You can create and destroy virtual machines, and control execution (start/stop/suspend/resume). Besides that, you can use qm to set parameters in the associated config file. It is also possible to create and delete virtual disks.
7.3.1. CLI Usage Examples
Create a new VM with 4 GB IDE disk.
qm create 300 -ide0 4 -net0 e1000 -cdrom proxmox-mailgateway_2.1.iso
Start the new VM
qm start 300
Send a shutdown request, then wait until the VM is stopped.
qm shutdown 300 && qm wait 300
Same as above, but only wait for 40 seconds.
qm shutdown 300 && qm wait 300 -timeout 40
7.4. Configuration
All configuration files consists of lines in the form
PARAMETER: value
Configuration files are stored inside the Proxmox cluster file system, and can be accessed at /etc/pve/qemu-server/<VMID>.conf.
7.4.1. Options
- acpi: boolean (default=1)
-
Enable/disable ACPI.
- agent: boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable Qemu GuestAgent.
- args: string
-
Arbitrary arguments passed to kvm, for example:
args: -no-reboot -no-hpet
this option is for experts only. - autostart: boolean (default=0)
-
Automatic restart after crash (currently ignored).
- balloon: integer (0 - N)
-
Amount of target RAM for the VM in MB. Using zero disables the ballon driver.
- bios: (ovmf | seabios) (default=seabios)
-
Select BIOS implementation.
- boot: [acdn]{1,4} (default=cdn)
-
Boot on floppy (a), hard disk (c), CD-ROM (d), or network (n).
- bootdisk: (ide|sata|scsi|virtio)\d+
-
Enable booting from specified disk.
- cdrom: volume
-
This is an alias for option -ide2
- cores: integer (1 - N) (default=1)
-
The number of cores per socket.
- cpu: [cputype=]<cputype> [,hidden=<1|0>]
-
Emulated CPU type.
- cputype=<cputype> (default=kvm64)
-
Emulated CPU type.
- hidden=boolean (default=0)
-
Do not identify as a KVM virtual machine.
- cpulimit: number (0 - 128) (default=0)
-
Limit of CPU usage.
If the computer has 2 CPUs, it has total of 2 CPU time. Value 0 indicates no CPU limit. - cpuunits: integer (0 - 500000) (default=1000)
-
CPU weight for a VM. Argument is used in the kernel fair scheduler. The larger the number is, the more CPU time this VM gets. Number is relative to weights of all the other running VMs.
You can disable fair-scheduler configuration by setting this to 0. - description: string
-
Description for the VM. Only used on the configuration web interface. This is saved as comment inside the configuration file.
- efidisk0: [file=]<volume> [,format=<image format>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
-
Configure a Disk for storing EFI vars
- file=<volume>
-
The drive’s backing volume.
- format=<image format>
-
The drive’s backing file’s data format.
- size=<DiskSize>
-
Disk size. This is purely informational and has no effect.
- freeze: boolean
-
Freeze CPU at startup (use c monitor command to start execution).
- hostpci[n]: [host=]<HOSTPCIID[;HOSTPCIID2...]> [,pcie=<1|0>] [,rombar=<1|0>] [,x-vga=<1|0>]
-
Map host PCI devices into guest.
This option allows direct access to host hardware. So it is no longer possible to migrate such machines - use with special care. Experimental! User reported problems with this option. - host=<HOSTPCIID[;HOSTPCIID2...]>
-
Host PCI device pass through. The PCI ID of a host’s PCI device or a list of PCI virtual functions of the host. HOSTPCIID syntax is:
bus:dev.func (hexadecimal numbers)
You can us the lspci command to list existing PCI devices.
- pcie=boolean (default=0)
-
Choose the PCI-express bus (needs the q35 machine model).
- rombar=boolean (default=1)
-
Specify whether or not the device’s ROM will be visible in the guest’s memory map.
- x-vga=boolean (default=0)
-
Enable vfio-vga device support.
- hotplug: string (default=network,disk,usb)
-
Selectively enable hotplug features. This is a comma separated list of hotplug features: network, disk, cpu, memory and usb. Use 0 to disable hotplug completely. Value 1 is an alias for the default network,disk,usb.
- hugepages: (1024 | 2 | any)
-
Enable/disable hugepages memory.
- ide[n]: [file=]<volume> [,aio=<native|threads>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,bps=<bps>] [,bps_rd=<bps>] [,bps_wr=<bps>] [,cache=<none|writethrough|writeback|unsafe|directsync>] [,cyls=<integer>] [,detect_zeroes=<1|0>] [,discard=<ignore|on>] [,format=<image format>] [,heads=<integer>] [,iops=<iops>] [,iops_max=<iops>] [,iops_rd=<iops>] [,iops_rd_max=<iops>] [,iops_wr=<iops>] [,iops_wr_max=<iops>] [,mbps=<mbps>] [,mbps_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr_max=<mbps>] [,media=<cdrom|disk>] [,model=<model>] [,rerror=<ignore|report|stop>] [,secs=<integer>] [,serial=<serial>] [,size=<DiskSize>] [,snapshot=<1|0>] [,trans=<none|lba|auto>] [,werror=<enospc|ignore|report|stop>]
-
Use volume as IDE hard disk or CD-ROM (n is 0 to 3).
- aio=(native | threads)
-
AIO type to use.
- backup=boolean
-
Whether the drive should be included when making backups.
- bps=<bps>
-
Maximum r/w speed speed in bytes per second.
- bps_rd=<bps>
-
Maximum read speed speed in bytes per second.
- bps_wr=<bps>
-
Maximum write speed speed in bytes per second.
- cache=(directsync | none | unsafe | writeback | writethrough)
-
The drive’s cache mode
- cyls=integer
-
Force the drive’s physical geometry to have a specific cylinder count.
- detect_zeroes=boolean
-
Controls whether to detect and try to optimize writes of zeroes.
- discard=(ignore | on)
-
Controls whether to pass discard/trim requests to the underlying storage.
- file=<volume>
-
The drive’s backing volume.
- format=<image format>
-
The drive’s backing file’s data format.
- heads=integer
-
Force the drive’s physical geometry to have a specific head count.
- iops=<iops>
-
Maximum r/w I/O speed in operations per second.
- iops_max=<iops>
-
Maximum unthrottled r/w I/O pool speed in operations per second.
- iops_rd=<iops>
-
Maximum read I/O speed in operations per second.
- iops_rd_max=<iops>
-
Maximum unthrottled read I/O pool speed in operations per second.
- iops_wr=<iops>
-
Maximum write I/O speed in operations per second.
- iops_wr_max=<iops>
-
Maximum unthrottled write I/O pool speed in operations per second.
- mbps=<mbps>
-
Maximum r/w speed speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_max=<mbps>
-
Maximum unthrottled r/w pool speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_rd=<mbps>
-
Maximum read speed speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_rd_max=<mbps>
-
Maximum unthrottled read pool speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_wr=<mbps>
-
Maximum write speed speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_wr_max=<mbps>
-
Maximum unthrottled write pool speed in megabytes per second.
- media=(cdrom | disk) (default=disk)
-
The drive’s media type.
- model=<model>
-
The drive’s reported model name, url-encoded, up to 40 bytes long.
- rerror=(ignore | report | stop)
-
Read error action.
- secs=integer
-
Force the drive’s physical geometry to have a specific sector count.
- serial=<serial>
-
The drive’s reported serial number, url-encoded, up to 20 bytes long.
- size=<DiskSize>
-
Disk size. This is purely informational and has no effect.
- snapshot=boolean
-
Whether the drive should be included when making snapshots.
- trans=(auto | lba | none)
-
Force disk geometry bios translation mode.
- werror=(enospc | ignore | report | stop)
-
Write error action.
- keyboard: (da | de | de-ch | en-gb | en-us | es | fi | fr | fr-be | fr-ca | fr-ch | hu | is | it | ja | lt | mk | nl | no | pl | pt | pt-br | sl | sv | tr) (default=en-us)
-
Keybord layout for vnc server. Default is read from the /etc/pve/datacenter.conf configuration file.
- kvm: boolean (default=1)
-
Enable/disable KVM hardware virtualization.
- localtime: boolean
-
Set the real time clock to local time. This is enabled by default if ostype indicates a Microsoft OS.
- lock: (backup | migrate | rollback | snapshot)
-
Lock/unlock the VM.
- machine: (pc|pc(-i440fx)?-\d+\.\d+(\.pxe)?|q35|pc-q35-\d+\.\d+(\.pxe)?)
-
Specific the Qemu machine type.
- memory: integer (16 - N) (default=512)
-
Amount of RAM for the VM in MB. This is the maximum available memory when you use the balloon device.
- migrate_downtime: number (0 - N) (default=0.1)
-
Set maximum tolerated downtime (in seconds) for migrations.
- migrate_speed: integer (0 - N) (default=0)
-
Set maximum speed (in MB/s) for migrations. Value 0 is no limit.
- name: string
-
Set a name for the VM. Only used on the configuration web interface.
- net[n]: [model=]<model> [,bridge=<bridge>] [,firewall=<1|0>] [,link_down=<1|0>] [,macaddr=<XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX>] [,queues=<integer>] [,rate=<number>] [,tag=<integer>] [,trunks=<vlanid[;vlanid...]>] [,<model>=<macaddr>]
-
Specify network devices.
- bridge=<bridge>
-
Bridge to attach the network device to. The Proxmox VE standard bridge is called vmbr0.
If you do not specify a bridge, we create a kvm user (NATed) network device, which provides DHCP and DNS services. The following addresses are used:
10.0.2.2 Gateway 10.0.2.3 DNS Server 10.0.2.4 SMB Server
The DHCP server assign addresses to the guest starting from 10.0.2.15.
- firewall=boolean
-
Whether this interface should be protected by the firewall.
- link_down=boolean
-
Whether this interface should be disconnected (like pulling the plug).
- macaddr=<XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX>
-
MAC address. That address must be unique withing your network. This is automatically generated if not specified.
- model=<model>
-
Network Card Model. The virtio model provides the best performance with very low CPU overhead. If your guest does not support this driver, it is usually best to use e1000.
- queues=integer (0 - 16)
-
Number of packet queues to be used on the device.
- rate=number (0 - N)
-
Rate limit in mbps (megabytes per second) as floating point number.
- tag=integer (1 - 4094)
-
VLAN tag to apply to packets on this interface.
- trunks=<vlanid[;vlanid...]>
-
VLAN trunks to pass through this interface.
- numa: boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable NUMA.
- numa[n]: cpus=<id[-id];...> [,hostnodes=<id[-id];...>] [,memory=<number>] [,policy=<preferred|bind|interleave>]
-
NUMA topology.
- cpus=<id[-id];...>
-
CPUs accessing this NUMA node.
- hostnodes=<id[-id];...>
-
Host NUMA nodes to use.
- memory=number
-
Amount of memory this NUMA node provides.
- policy=(bind | interleave | preferred)
-
NUMA allocation policy.
- onboot: boolean (default=0)
-
Specifies whether a VM will be started during system bootup.
- ostype: (l24 | l26 | other | solaris | w2k | w2k3 | w2k8 | win7 | win8 | wvista | wxp)
-
Specify guest operating system. This is used to enable special optimization/features for specific operating systems:
other
unspecified OS
wxp
Microsoft Windows XP
w2k
Microsoft Windows 2000
w2k3
Microsoft Windows 2003
w2k8
Microsoft Windows 2008
wvista
Microsoft Windows Vista
win7
Microsoft Windows 7
win8
Microsoft Windows 8/2012
l24
Linux 2.4 Kernel
l26
Linux 2.6/3.X Kernel
solaris
Solaris/OpenSolaris/OpenIndiania kernel
- parallel[n]: /dev/parport\d+|/dev/usb/lp\d+
-
Map host parallel devices (n is 0 to 2).
This option allows direct access to host hardware. So it is no longer possible to migrate such machines - use with special care. Experimental! User reported problems with this option. - protection: boolean (default=0)
-
Sets the protection flag of the VM. This will disable the remove VM and remove disk operations.
- reboot: boolean (default=1)
-
Allow reboot. If set to 0 the VM exit on reboot.
- sata[n]: [file=]<volume> [,aio=<native|threads>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,bps=<bps>] [,bps_rd=<bps>] [,bps_wr=<bps>] [,cache=<none|writethrough|writeback|unsafe|directsync>] [,cyls=<integer>] [,detect_zeroes=<1|0>] [,discard=<ignore|on>] [,format=<image format>] [,heads=<integer>] [,iops=<iops>] [,iops_max=<iops>] [,iops_rd=<iops>] [,iops_rd_max=<iops>] [,iops_wr=<iops>] [,iops_wr_max=<iops>] [,mbps=<mbps>] [,mbps_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr_max=<mbps>] [,media=<cdrom|disk>] [,rerror=<ignore|report|stop>] [,secs=<integer>] [,serial=<serial>] [,size=<DiskSize>] [,snapshot=<1|0>] [,trans=<none|lba|auto>] [,werror=<enospc|ignore|report|stop>]
-
Use volume as SATA hard disk or CD-ROM (n is 0 to 5).
- aio=(native | threads)
-
AIO type to use.
- backup=boolean
-
Whether the drive should be included when making backups.
- bps=<bps>
-
Maximum r/w speed speed in bytes per second.
- bps_rd=<bps>
-
Maximum read speed speed in bytes per second.
- bps_wr=<bps>
-
Maximum write speed speed in bytes per second.
- cache=(directsync | none | unsafe | writeback | writethrough)
-
The drive’s cache mode
- cyls=integer
-
Force the drive’s physical geometry to have a specific cylinder count.
- detect_zeroes=boolean
-
Controls whether to detect and try to optimize writes of zeroes.
- discard=(ignore | on)
-
Controls whether to pass discard/trim requests to the underlying storage.
- file=<volume>
-
The drive’s backing volume.
- format=<image format>
-
The drive’s backing file’s data format.
- heads=integer
-
Force the drive’s physical geometry to have a specific head count.
- iops=<iops>
-
Maximum r/w I/O speed in operations per second.
- iops_max=<iops>
-
Maximum unthrottled r/w I/O pool speed in operations per second.
- iops_rd=<iops>
-
Maximum read I/O speed in operations per second.
- iops_rd_max=<iops>
-
Maximum unthrottled read I/O pool speed in operations per second.
- iops_wr=<iops>
-
Maximum write I/O speed in operations per second.
- iops_wr_max=<iops>
-
Maximum unthrottled write I/O pool speed in operations per second.
- mbps=<mbps>
-
Maximum r/w speed speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_max=<mbps>
-
Maximum unthrottled r/w pool speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_rd=<mbps>
-
Maximum read speed speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_rd_max=<mbps>
-
Maximum unthrottled read pool speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_wr=<mbps>
-
Maximum write speed speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_wr_max=<mbps>
-
Maximum unthrottled write pool speed in megabytes per second.
- media=(cdrom | disk) (default=disk)
-
The drive’s media type.
- rerror=(ignore | report | stop)
-
Read error action.
- secs=integer
-
Force the drive’s physical geometry to have a specific sector count.
- serial=<serial>
-
The drive’s reported serial number, url-encoded, up to 20 bytes long.
- size=<DiskSize>
-
Disk size. This is purely informational and has no effect.
- snapshot=boolean
-
Whether the drive should be included when making snapshots.
- trans=(auto | lba | none)
-
Force disk geometry bios translation mode.
- werror=(enospc | ignore | report | stop)
-
Write error action.
- scsi[n]: [file=]<volume> [,aio=<native|threads>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,bps=<bps>] [,bps_rd=<bps>] [,bps_wr=<bps>] [,cache=<none|writethrough|writeback|unsafe|directsync>] [,cyls=<integer>] [,detect_zeroes=<1|0>] [,discard=<ignore|on>] [,format=<image format>] [,heads=<integer>] [,iops=<iops>] [,iops_max=<iops>] [,iops_rd=<iops>] [,iops_rd_max=<iops>] [,iops_wr=<iops>] [,iops_wr_max=<iops>] [,iothread=<1|0>] [,mbps=<mbps>] [,mbps_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr_max=<mbps>] [,media=<cdrom|disk>] [,queues=<integer>] [,secs=<integer>] [,serial=<serial>] [,size=<DiskSize>] [,snapshot=<1|0>] [,trans=<none|lba|auto>] [,werror=<enospc|ignore|report|stop>]
-
Use volume as SCSI hard disk or CD-ROM (n is 0 to 13).
- aio=(native | threads)
-
AIO type to use.
- backup=boolean
-
Whether the drive should be included when making backups.
- bps=<bps>
-
Maximum r/w speed speed in bytes per second.
- bps_rd=<bps>
-
Maximum read speed speed in bytes per second.
- bps_wr=<bps>
-
Maximum write speed speed in bytes per second.
- cache=(directsync | none | unsafe | writeback | writethrough)
-
The drive’s cache mode
- cyls=integer
-
Force the drive’s physical geometry to have a specific cylinder count.
- detect_zeroes=boolean
-
Controls whether to detect and try to optimize writes of zeroes.
- discard=(ignore | on)
-
Controls whether to pass discard/trim requests to the underlying storage.
- file=<volume>
-
The drive’s backing volume.
- format=<image format>
-
The drive’s backing file’s data format.
- heads=integer
-
Force the drive’s physical geometry to have a specific head count.
- iops=<iops>
-
Maximum r/w I/O speed in operations per second.
- iops_max=<iops>
-
Maximum unthrottled r/w I/O pool speed in operations per second.
- iops_rd=<iops>
-
Maximum read I/O speed in operations per second.
- iops_rd_max=<iops>
-
Maximum unthrottled read I/O pool speed in operations per second.
- iops_wr=<iops>
-
Maximum write I/O speed in operations per second.
- iops_wr_max=<iops>
-
Maximum unthrottled write I/O pool speed in operations per second.
- iothread=boolean
-
Whether to use iothreads for this drive
- mbps=<mbps>
-
Maximum r/w speed speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_max=<mbps>
-
Maximum unthrottled r/w pool speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_rd=<mbps>
-
Maximum read speed speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_rd_max=<mbps>
-
Maximum unthrottled read pool speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_wr=<mbps>
-
Maximum write speed speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_wr_max=<mbps>
-
Maximum unthrottled write pool speed in megabytes per second.
- media=(cdrom | disk) (default=disk)
-
The drive’s media type.
- queues=integer (2 - N)
-
Number of queues.
- secs=integer
-
Force the drive’s physical geometry to have a specific sector count.
- serial=<serial>
-
The drive’s reported serial number, url-encoded, up to 20 bytes long.
- size=<DiskSize>
-
Disk size. This is purely informational and has no effect.
- snapshot=boolean
-
Whether the drive should be included when making snapshots.
- trans=(auto | lba | none)
-
Force disk geometry bios translation mode.
- werror=(enospc | ignore | report | stop)
-
Write error action.
- scsihw: (lsi | lsi53c810 | megasas | pvscsi | virtio-scsi-pci | virtio-scsi-single) (default=lsi)
-
SCSI controller model
- serial[n]: (/dev/.+|socket)
-
Create a serial device inside the VM (n is 0 to 3), and pass through a host serial device (i.e. /dev/ttyS0), or create a unix socket on the host side (use qm terminal to open a terminal connection).
If you pass through a host serial device, it is no longer possible to migrate such machines - use with special care. Experimental! User reported problems with this option. - shares: integer (0 - 50000) (default=1000)
-
Amount of memory shares for auto-ballooning. The larger the number is, the more memory this VM gets. Number is relative to weights of all other running VMs. Using zero disables auto-ballooning
- smbios1: [family=<string>] [,manufacturer=<string>] [,product=<string>] [,serial=<string>] [,sku=<string>] [,uuid=<UUID>] [,version=<string>]
-
Specify SMBIOS type 1 fields.
- family=<string>
-
Set SMBIOS1 family string.
- manufacturer=<string>
-
Set SMBIOS1 manufacturer.
- product=<string>
-
Set SMBIOS1 product ID.
- serial=<string>
-
Set SMBIOS1 serial number.
- sku=<string>
-
Set SMBIOS1 SKU string.
- uuid=<UUID>
-
Set SMBIOS1 UUID.
- version=<string>
-
Set SMBIOS1 version.
- smp: integer (1 - N) (default=1)
-
The number of CPUs. Please use option -sockets instead.
- sockets: integer (1 - N) (default=1)
-
The number of CPU sockets.
- startdate: (now | YYYY-MM-DD | YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS) (default=now)
-
Set the initial date of the real time clock. Valid format for date are: now or 2006-06-17T16:01:21 or 2006-06-17.
- startup: `[[order=]\d+] [,up=\d+] [,down=\d+] `
-
Startup and shutdown behavior. Order is a non-negative number defining the general startup order. Shutdown in done with reverse ordering. Additionally you can set the up or down delay in seconds, which specifies a delay to wait before the next VM is started or stopped.
- tablet: boolean (default=1)
-
Enable/disable the USB tablet device. This device is usually needed to allow absolute mouse positioning with VNC. Else the mouse runs out of sync with normal VNC clients. If you’re running lots of console-only guests on one host, you may consider disabling this to save some context switches. This is turned off by default if you use spice (-vga=qxl).
- tdf: boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable time drift fix.
- template: boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable Template.
- unused[n]: string
-
Reference to unused volumes. This is used internally, and should not be modified manually.
- usb[n]: [host=]<HOSTUSBDEVICE|spice> [,usb3=<1|0>]
-
Configure an USB device (n is 0 to 4).
- host=<HOSTUSBDEVICE|spice>
-
The Host USB device or port or the value spice. HOSTUSBDEVICE syntax is:
'bus-port(.port)*' (decimal numbers) or 'vendor_id:product_id' (hexadeciaml numbers) or 'spice'
You can use the lsusb -t command to list existing usb devices.
This option allows direct access to host hardware. So it is no longer possible to migrate such machines - use with special care. The value spice can be used to add a usb redirection devices for spice.
- usb3=boolean (default=0)
-
Specifies whether if given host option is a USB3 device or port (this does currently not work reliably with spice redirection and is then ignored).
- vcpus: integer (1 - N) (default=0)
-
Number of hotplugged vcpus.
- vga: (cirrus | qxl | qxl2 | qxl3 | qxl4 | serial0 | serial1 | serial2 | serial3 | std | vmware)
-
Select the VGA type. If you want to use high resolution modes (>= 1280x1024x16) then you should use the options std or vmware. Default is std for win8/win7/w2k8, and cirrus for other OS types. The qxl option enables the SPICE display sever. For win* OS you can select how many independent displays you want, Linux guests can add displays them self. You can also run without any graphic card, using a serial device as terminal.
- virtio[n]: [file=]<volume> [,aio=<native|threads>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,bps=<bps>] [,bps_rd=<bps>] [,bps_wr=<bps>] [,cache=<none|writethrough|writeback|unsafe|directsync>] [,cyls=<integer>] [,detect_zeroes=<1|0>] [,discard=<ignore|on>] [,format=<image format>] [,heads=<integer>] [,iops=<iops>] [,iops_max=<iops>] [,iops_rd=<iops>] [,iops_rd_max=<iops>] [,iops_wr=<iops>] [,iops_wr_max=<iops>] [,iothread=<1|0>] [,mbps=<mbps>] [,mbps_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr_max=<mbps>] [,media=<cdrom|disk>] [,rerror=<ignore|report|stop>] [,secs=<integer>] [,serial=<serial>] [,size=<DiskSize>] [,snapshot=<1|0>] [,trans=<none|lba|auto>] [,werror=<enospc|ignore|report|stop>]
-
Use volume as VIRTIO hard disk (n is 0 to 15).
- aio=(native | threads)
-
AIO type to use.
- backup=boolean
-
Whether the drive should be included when making backups.
- bps=<bps>
-
Maximum r/w speed speed in bytes per second.
- bps_rd=<bps>
-
Maximum read speed speed in bytes per second.
- bps_wr=<bps>
-
Maximum write speed speed in bytes per second.
- cache=(directsync | none | unsafe | writeback | writethrough)
-
The drive’s cache mode
- cyls=integer
-
Force the drive’s physical geometry to have a specific cylinder count.
- detect_zeroes=boolean
-
Controls whether to detect and try to optimize writes of zeroes.
- discard=(ignore | on)
-
Controls whether to pass discard/trim requests to the underlying storage.
- file=<volume>
-
The drive’s backing volume.
- format=<image format>
-
The drive’s backing file’s data format.
- heads=integer
-
Force the drive’s physical geometry to have a specific head count.
- iops=<iops>
-
Maximum r/w I/O speed in operations per second.
- iops_max=<iops>
-
Maximum unthrottled r/w I/O pool speed in operations per second.
- iops_rd=<iops>
-
Maximum read I/O speed in operations per second.
- iops_rd_max=<iops>
-
Maximum unthrottled read I/O pool speed in operations per second.
- iops_wr=<iops>
-
Maximum write I/O speed in operations per second.
- iops_wr_max=<iops>
-
Maximum unthrottled write I/O pool speed in operations per second.
- iothread=boolean
-
Whether to use iothreads for this drive
- mbps=<mbps>
-
Maximum r/w speed speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_max=<mbps>
-
Maximum unthrottled r/w pool speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_rd=<mbps>
-
Maximum read speed speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_rd_max=<mbps>
-
Maximum unthrottled read pool speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_wr=<mbps>
-
Maximum write speed speed in megabytes per second.
- mbps_wr_max=<mbps>
-
Maximum unthrottled write pool speed in megabytes per second.
- media=(cdrom | disk) (default=disk)
-
The drive’s media type.
- rerror=(ignore | report | stop)
-
Read error action.
- secs=integer
-
Force the drive’s physical geometry to have a specific sector count.
- serial=<serial>
-
The drive’s reported serial number, url-encoded, up to 20 bytes long.
- size=<DiskSize>
-
Disk size. This is purely informational and has no effect.
- snapshot=boolean
-
Whether the drive should be included when making snapshots.
- trans=(auto | lba | none)
-
Force disk geometry bios translation mode.
- werror=(enospc | ignore | report | stop)
-
Write error action.
- watchdog: [[model=]<i6300esb|ib700>] [,action=<reset|shutdown|poweroff|pause|debug|none>]
-
Create a virtual hardware watchdog device. Once enabled (by a guest action), the watchdog must be periodically polled by an agent inside the guest or else the watchdog will reset the guest (or execute the respective action specified)
- action=(debug | none | pause | poweroff | reset | shutdown)
-
The action to perform if after activation the guest fails to poll the watchdog in time.
- model=(i6300esb | ib700) (default=i6300esb)
-
Watchdog type to emulate.
7.5. Locks
Online migrations and backups (vzdump) set a lock to prevent incompatible concurrent actions on the affected VMs. Sometimes you need to remove such a lock manually (e.g., after a power failure).
qm unlock <vmid>
8. Proxmox Container Toolkit
Containers are a lightweight alternative to fully virtualized VMs. Instead of emulating a complete Operating System (OS), containers simply use the OS of the host they run on. This implies that all containers use the same kernel, and that they can access resources from the host directly.
This is great because containers do not waste CPU power nor memory due to kernel emulation. Container run-time costs are close to zero and usually negligible. But there are also some drawbacks you need to consider:
-
You can only run Linux based OS inside containers, i.e. it is not possible to run FreeBSD or MS Windows inside.
-
For security reasons, access to host resources needs to be restricted. This is done with AppArmor, SecComp filters and other kernel features. Be prepared that some syscalls are not allowed inside containers.
Proxmox VE uses LXC as underlying container technology. We consider LXC as low-level library, which provides countless options. It would be too difficult to use those tools directly. Instead, we provide a small wrapper called pct, the "Proxmox Container Toolkit".
The toolkit is tightly coupled with Proxmox VE. That means that it is aware of the cluster setup, and it can use the same network and storage resources as fully virtualized VMs. You can even use the Proxmox VE firewall, or manage containers using the HA framework.
Our primary goal is to offer an environment as one would get from a VM, but without the additional overhead. We call this "System Containers".
|
If you want to run micro-containers (with docker, rkt, …), it is best to run them inside a VM. |
8.1. Security Considerations
Containers use the same kernel as the host, so there is a big attack surface for malicious users. You should consider this fact if you provide containers to totally untrusted people. In general, fully virtualized VMs provide better isolation.
The good news is that LXC uses many kernel security features like AppArmor, CGroups and PID and user namespaces, which makes containers usage quite secure. We distinguish two types of containers:
8.1.1. Privileged Containers
Security is done by dropping capabilities, using mandatory access control (AppArmor), SecComp filters and namespaces. The LXC team considers this kind of container as unsafe, and they will not consider new container escape exploits to be security issues worthy of a CVE and quick fix. So you should use this kind of containers only inside a trusted environment, or when no untrusted task is running as root in the container.
8.1.2. Unprivileged Containers
This kind of containers use a new kernel feature called user namespaces. The root UID 0 inside the container is mapped to an unprivileged user outside the container. This means that most security issues (container escape, resource abuse, …) in those containers will affect a random unprivileged user, and so would be a generic kernel security bug rather than an LXC issue. The LXC team thinks unprivileged containers are safe by design.
8.2. Configuration
The /etc/pve/lxc/<CTID>.conf file stores container configuration, where <CTID> is the numeric ID of the given container. Like all other files stored inside /etc/pve/, they get automatically replicated to all other cluster nodes.
|
CTIDs < 100 are reserved for internal purposes, and CTIDs need to be unique cluster wide. |
ostype: debian arch: amd64 hostname: www memory: 512 swap: 512 net0: bridge=vmbr0,hwaddr=66:64:66:64:64:36,ip=dhcp,name=eth0,type=veth rootfs: local:107/vm-107-disk-1.raw,size=7G
Those configuration files are simple text files, and you can edit them using a normal text editor (vi, nano, …). This is sometimes useful to do small corrections, but keep in mind that you need to restart the container to apply such changes.
For that reason, it is usually better to use the pct command to generate and modify those files, or do the whole thing using the GUI. Our toolkit is smart enough to instantaneously apply most changes to running containers. This feature is called "hot plug", and there is no need to restart the container in that case.
8.2.1. File Format
Container configuration files use a simple colon separated key/value format. Each line has the following format:
# this is a comment OPTION: value
Blank lines in those files are ignored, and lines starting with a # character are treated as comments and are also ignored.
It is possible to add low-level, LXC style configuration directly, for example:
lxc.init_cmd: /sbin/my_own_init
or
lxc.init_cmd = /sbin/my_own_init
Those settings are directly passed to the LXC low-level tools.
8.2.2. Snapshots
When you create a snapshot, pct stores the configuration at snapshot time into a separate snapshot section within the same configuration file. For example, after creating a snapshot called “testsnapshot”, your configuration file will look like this:
memory: 512 swap: 512 parent: testsnaphot ... [testsnaphot] memory: 512 swap: 512 snaptime: 1457170803 ...
There are a few snapshot related properties like parent and snaptime. The parent property is used to store the parent/child relationship between snapshots. snaptime is the snapshot creation time stamp (Unix epoch).
8.2.3. Guest Operating System Configuration
We normally try to detect the operating system type inside the container, and then modify some files inside the container to make them work as expected. Here is a short list of things we do at container startup:
- set /etc/hostname
-
to set the container name
- modify /etc/hosts
-
to allow lookup of the local hostname
- network setup
-
pass the complete network setup to the container
- configure DNS
-
pass information about DNS servers
- adapt the init system
-
for example, fix the number of spawned getty processes
- set the root password
-
when creating a new container
- rewrite ssh_host_keys
-
so that each container has unique keys
- randomize crontab
-
so that cron does not start at the same time on all containers
Changes made by Proxmox VE are enclosed by comment markers:
# --- BEGIN PVE --- <data> # --- END PVE ---
Those markers will be inserted at a reasonable location in the file. If such a section already exists, it will be updated in place and will not be moved.
Modification of a file can be prevented by adding a .pve-ignore. file for it. For instance, if the file /etc/.pve-ignore.hosts exists then the /etc/hosts file will not be touched. This can be a simple empty file creatd via:
# touch /etc/.pve-ignore.hosts
Most modifications are OS dependent, so they differ between different distributions and versions. You can completely disable modifications by manually setting the ostype to unmanaged.
OS type detection is done by testing for certain files inside the container:
- Ubuntu
-
inspect /etc/lsb-release (DISTRIB_ID=Ubuntu)
- Debian
-
test /etc/debian_version
- Fedora
-
test /etc/fedora-release
- RedHat or CentOS
-
test /etc/redhat-release
- ArchLinux
-
test /etc/arch-release
- Alpine
-
test /etc/alpine-release
- Gentoo
-
test /etc/gentoo-release
|
Container start fails if the configured ostype differs from the auto detected type. |
8.2.4. Options
- arch: (amd64 | i386) (default=amd64)
-
OS architecture type.
- cmode: (console | shell | tty) (default=tty)
-
Console mode. By default, the console command tries to open a connection to one of the available tty devices. By setting cmode to console it tries to attach to /dev/console instead. If you set cmode to shell, it simply invokes a shell inside the container (no login).
- console: boolean (default=1)
-
Attach a console device (/dev/console) to the container.
- cpulimit: number (0 - 128) (default=0)
-
Limit of CPU usage.
If the computer has 2 CPUs, it has a total of 2 CPU time. Value 0 indicates no CPU limit. - cpuunits: integer (0 - 500000) (default=1024)
-
CPU weight for a VM. Argument is used in the kernel fair scheduler. The larger the number is, the more CPU time this VM gets. Number is relative to the weights of all the other running VMs.
You can disable fair-scheduler configuration by setting this to 0. - description: string
-
Container description. Only used on the configuration web interface.
- hostname: string
-
Set a host name for the container.
- lock: (backup | migrate | rollback | snapshot)
-
Lock/unlock the VM.
- memory: integer (16 - N) (default=512)
-
Amount of RAM for the VM in MB.
- mp[n]: [volume=]<volume> ,mp=<Path> [,acl=<1|0>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,quota=<1|0>] [,ro=<1|0>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
-
Use volume as container mount point.
- acl=boolean
-
Explicitly enable or disable ACL support.
- backup=boolean
-
Whether to include the mountpoint in backups (only used for volume mountpoints).
- mp=<Path>
-
Path to the mountpoint as seen from inside the container.
Must not contain any symlinks for security reasons. - quota=boolean
-
Enable user quotas inside the container (not supported with zfs subvolumes)
- ro=boolean
-
Read-only mountpoint
- size=<DiskSize>
-
Volume size (read only value).
- volume=<volume>
-
Volume, device or directory to mount into the container.
- nameserver: string
-
Sets DNS server IP address for a container. Create will automatically use the setting from the host if you neither set searchdomain nor nameserver.
- net[n]: name=<string> [,bridge=<bridge>] [,firewall=<1|0>] [,gw=<GatewayIPv4>] [,gw6=<GatewayIPv6>] [,hwaddr=<XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX>] [,ip=<IPv4Format/CIDR>] [,ip6=<IPv6Format/CIDR>] [,mtu=<integer>] [,rate=<mbps>] [,tag=<integer>] [,trunks=<vlanid[;vlanid...]>] [,type=<veth>]
-
Specifies network interfaces for the container.
- bridge=<bridge>
-
Bridge to attach the network device to.
- firewall=boolean
-
Controls whether this interface’s firewall rules should be used.
- gw=<GatewayIPv4>
-
Default gateway for IPv4 traffic.
- gw6=<GatewayIPv6>
-
Default gateway for IPv6 traffic.
- hwaddr=<XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX>
-
The interface MAC address. This is dynamically allocated by default, but you can set that statically if needed, for example to always have the same link-local IPv6 address. (lxc.network.hwaddr)
- ip=<IPv4Format/CIDR>
-
IPv4 address in CIDR format.
- ip6=<IPv6Format/CIDR>
-
IPv6 address in CIDR format.
- mtu=integer (64 - N)
-
Maximum transfer unit of the interface. (lxc.network.mtu)
- name=<string>
-
Name of the network device as seen from inside the container. (lxc.network.name)
- rate=<mbps>
-
Apply rate limiting to the interface
- tag=integer (1 - 4094)
-
VLAN tag for this interface.
- trunks=<vlanid[;vlanid...]>
-
VLAN ids to pass through the interface
- type=(veth)
-
Network interface type.
- onboot: boolean (default=0)
-
Specifies whether a VM will be started during system bootup.
- ostype: (alpine | archlinux | centos | debian | fedora | gentoo | opensuse | ubuntu | unmanaged)
-
OS type. This is used to setup configuration inside the container, and corresponds to lxc setup scripts in /usr/share/lxc/config/<ostype>.common.conf. Value unmanaged can be used to skip and OS specific setup.
- protection: boolean (default=0)
-
Sets the protection flag of the container. This will prevent the CT or CT’s disk remove/update operation.
- rootfs: [volume=]<volume> [,acl=<1|0>] [,quota=<1|0>] [,ro=<1|0>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
-
Use volume as container root.
- acl=boolean
-
Explicitly enable or disable ACL support.
- quota=boolean
-
Enable user quotas inside the container (not supported with zfs subvolumes)
- ro=boolean
-
Read-only mountpoint
- size=<DiskSize>
-
Volume size (read only value).
- volume=<volume>
-
Volume, device or directory to mount into the container.
- searchdomain: string
-
Sets DNS search domains for a container. Create will automatically use the setting from the host if you neither set searchdomain nor nameserver.
- startup: `[[order=]\d+] [,up=\d+] [,down=\d+] `
-
Startup and shutdown behavior. Order is a non-negative number defining the general startup order. Shutdown in done with reverse ordering. Additionally you can set the up or down delay in seconds, which specifies a delay to wait before the next VM is started or stopped.
- swap: integer (0 - N) (default=512)
-
Amount of SWAP for the VM in MB.
- template: boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable Template.
- tty: integer (0 - 6) (default=2)
-
Specify the number of tty available to the container
- unprivileged: boolean (default=0)
-
Makes the container run as unprivileged user. (Should not be modified manually.)
- unused[n]: string
-
Reference to unused volumes. This is used internally, and should not be modified manually.
8.3. Container Images
Container images, sometimes also referred to as “templates” or “appliances”, are tar archives which contain everything to run a container. You can think of it as a tidy container backup. Like most modern container toolkits, pct uses those images when you create a new container, for example:
pct create 999 local:vztmpl/debian-8.0-standard_8.0-1_amd64.tar.gz
Proxmox VE itself ships a set of basic templates for most common operating systems, and you can download them using the pveam (short for Proxmox VE Appliance Manager) command line utility. You can also download TurnKey Linux containers using that tool (or the graphical user interface).
Our image repositories contain a list of available images, and there is a cron job run each day to download that list. You can trigger that update manually with:
pveam update
After that you can view the list of available images using:
pveam available
You can restrict this large list by specifying the section you are interested in, for example basic system images:
# pveam available --section system system archlinux-base_2015-24-29-1_x86_64.tar.gz system centos-7-default_20160205_amd64.tar.xz system debian-6.0-standard_6.0-7_amd64.tar.gz system debian-7.0-standard_7.0-3_amd64.tar.gz system debian-8.0-standard_8.0-1_amd64.tar.gz system ubuntu-12.04-standard_12.04-1_amd64.tar.gz system ubuntu-14.04-standard_14.04-1_amd64.tar.gz system ubuntu-15.04-standard_15.04-1_amd64.tar.gz system ubuntu-15.10-standard_15.10-1_amd64.tar.gz
Before you can use such a template, you need to download them into one of your storages. You can simply use storage local for that purpose. For clustered installations, it is preferred to use a shared storage so that all nodes can access those images.
pveam download local debian-8.0-standard_8.0-1_amd64.tar.gz
You are now ready to create containers using that image, and you can list all downloaded images on storage local with:
# pveam list local local:vztmpl/debian-8.0-standard_8.0-1_amd64.tar.gz 190.20MB
The above command shows you the full Proxmox VE volume identifiers. They include the storage name, and most other Proxmox VE commands can use them. For example you can delete that image later with:
pveam remove local:vztmpl/debian-8.0-standard_8.0-1_amd64.tar.gz
8.4. Container Storage
Traditional containers use a very simple storage model, only allowing a single mount point, the root file system. This was further restricted to specific file system types like ext4 and nfs. Additional mounts are often done by user provided scripts. This turned out to be complex and error prone, so we try to avoid that now.
Our new LXC based container model is more flexible regarding storage. First, you can have more than a single mount point. This allows you to choose a suitable storage for each application. For example, you can use a relatively slow (and thus cheap) storage for the container root file system. Then you can use a second mount point to mount a very fast, distributed storage for your database application.
The second big improvement is that you can use any storage type supported by the Proxmox VE storage library. That means that you can store your containers on local lvmthin or zfs, shared iSCSI storage, or even on distributed storage systems like ceph. It also enables us to use advanced storage features like snapshots and clones. vzdump can also use the snapshot feature to provide consistent container backups.
Last but not least, you can also mount local devices directly, or mount local directories using bind mounts. That way you can access local storage inside containers with zero overhead. Such bind mounts also provide an easy way to share data between different containers.
8.4.1. Mount Points
The root mount point is configured with the rootfs property, and you can configure up to 10 additional mount points. The corresponding options are called mp0 to mp9, and they can contain the following setting:
rootfs: [volume=]<volume> [,acl=<1|0>] [,quota=<1|0>] [,ro=<1|0>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
mp[n]: [volume=]<volume> ,mp=<Path> [,acl=<1|0>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,quota=<1|0>] [,ro=<1|0>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
- acl: boolean
-
Explicitly enable or disable ACL support.
- backup: boolean
-
Whether to include the mountpoint in backups (only used for volume mountpoints).
- mp: <Path>
-
Path to the mountpoint as seen from inside the container.
Must not contain any symlinks for security reasons. - quota: boolean
-
Enable user quotas inside the container (not supported with zfs subvolumes)
- ro: boolean
-
Read-only mountpoint
- size: <DiskSize>
-
Volume size (read only value).
- volume: <volume>
-
Volume, device or directory to mount into the container.
Currently there are basically three types of mount points: storage backed mount points, bind mounts and device mounts.
rootfs: thin1:base-100-disk-1,size=8G
Storage Backed Mount Points
Storage backed mount points are managed by the Proxmox VE storage subsystem and come in three different flavors:
-
Image based: these are raw images containing a single ext4 formatted file system.
-
ZFS subvolumes: these are technically bind mounts, but with managed storage, and thus allow resizing and snapshotting.
-
Directories: passing size=0 triggers a special case where instead of a raw image a directory is created.
Bind Mount Points
Bind mounts allow you to access arbitrary directories from your Proxmox VE host inside a container. Some potential use cases are:
-
Accessing your home directory in the guest
-
Accessing an USB device directory in the guest
-
Accessing an NFS mount from the host in the guest
Bind mounts are considered to not be managed by the storage subsystem, so you cannot make snapshots or deal with quotas from inside the container. With unprivileged containers you might run into permission problems caused by the user mapping and cannot use ACLs.
|
The contents of bind mount points are not backed up when using vzdump. |
|
For security reasons, bind mounts should only be established using source directories especially reserved for this purpose, e.g., a directory hierarchy under /mnt/bindmounts. Never bind mount system directories like /, /var or /etc into a container - this poses a great security risk. |
|
The bind mount source path must not contain any symlinks. |
For example, to make the directory /mnt/bindmounts/shared accessible in the container with ID 100 under the path /shared, use a configuration line like mp0: /mnt/bindmounts/shared,mp=/shared in /etc/pve/lxc/100.conf. Alternatively, use pct set 100 -mp0 /mnt/bindmounts/shared,mp=/shared to achieve the same result.
Device Mount Points
Device mount points allow to mount block devices of the host directly into the container. Similar to bind mounts, device mounts are not managed by Proxmox VE’s storage subsystem, but the quota and acl options will be honored.
|
Device mount points should only be used under special circumstances. In most cases a storage backed mount point offers the same performance and a lot more features. |
|
The contents of device mount points are not backed up when using vzdump. |
8.4.2. FUSE Mounts
|
Because of existing issues in the Linux kernel’s freezer subsystem the usage of FUSE mounts inside a container is strongly advised against, as containers need to be frozen for suspend or snapshot mode backups. |
If FUSE mounts cannot be replaced by other mounting mechanisms or storage technologies, it is possible to establish the FUSE mount on the Proxmox host and use a bind mount point to make it accessible inside the container.
8.4.3. Using Quotas Inside Containers
Quotas allow to set limits inside a container for the amount of disk space that each user can use. This only works on ext4 image based storage types and currently does not work with unprivileged containers.
Activating the quota option causes the following mount options to be used for a mount point: usrjquota=aquota.user,grpjquota=aquota.group,jqfmt=vfsv0
This allows quotas to be used like you would on any other system. You can initialize the /aquota.user and /aquota.group files by running
quotacheck -cmug / quotaon /
and edit the quotas via the edquota command. Refer to the documentation of the distribution running inside the container for details.
|
You need to run the above commands for every mount point by passing the mount point’s path instead of just /. |
8.4.4. Using ACLs Inside Containers
The standard Posix Access Control Lists are also available inside containers. ACLs allow you to set more detailed file ownership than the traditional user/ group/others model.
8.5. Container Network
You can configure up to 10 network interfaces for a single container. The corresponding options are called net0 to net9, and they can contain the following setting:
net[n]: name=<string> [,bridge=<bridge>] [,firewall=<1|0>] [,gw=<GatewayIPv4>] [,gw6=<GatewayIPv6>] [,hwaddr=<XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX>] [,ip=<IPv4Format/CIDR>] [,ip6=<IPv6Format/CIDR>] [,mtu=<integer>] [,rate=<mbps>] [,tag=<integer>] [,trunks=<vlanid[;vlanid...]>] [,type=<veth>]
- bridge: <bridge>
-
Bridge to attach the network device to.
- firewall: boolean
-
Controls whether this interface’s firewall rules should be used.
- gw: <GatewayIPv4>
-
Default gateway for IPv4 traffic.
- gw6: <GatewayIPv6>
-
Default gateway for IPv6 traffic.
- hwaddr: <XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX>
-
The interface MAC address. This is dynamically allocated by default, but you can set that statically if needed, for example to always have the same link-local IPv6 address. (lxc.network.hwaddr)
- ip: <IPv4Format/CIDR>
-
IPv4 address in CIDR format.
- ip6: <IPv6Format/CIDR>
-
IPv6 address in CIDR format.
- mtu: integer (64 - N)
-
Maximum transfer unit of the interface. (lxc.network.mtu)
- name: <string>
-
Name of the network device as seen from inside the container. (lxc.network.name)
- rate: <mbps>
-
Apply rate limiting to the interface
- tag: integer (1 - 4094)
-
VLAN tag for this interface.
- trunks: <vlanid[;vlanid...]>
-
VLAN ids to pass through the interface
- type: (veth)
-
Network interface type.
8.6. Backup and Restore
8.6.1. Container Backup
It is possible to use the vzdump tool for container backup. Please refer to the vzdump manual page for details.
8.6.2. Restoring Container Backups
Restoring container backups made with vzdump is possible using the pct restore command. By default, pct restore will attempt to restore as much of the backed up container configuration as possible. It is possible to override the backed up configuration by manually setting container options on the command line (see the pct manual page for details).
|
pvesm extractconfig can be used to view the backed up configuration contained in a vzdump archive. |
There are two basic restore modes, only differing by their handling of mount points:
“Simple” Restore Mode
If neither the rootfs parameter nor any of the optional mpX parameters are explicitly set, the mount point configuration from the backed up configuration file is restored using the following steps:
-
Extract mount points and their options from backup
-
Create volumes for storage backed mount points (on storage provided with the storage parameter, or default local storage if unset)
-
Extract files from backup archive
-
Add bind and device mount points to restored configuration (limited to root user)
|
Since bind and device mount points are never backed up, no files are restored in the last step, but only the configuration options. The assumption is that such mount points are either backed up with another mechanism (e.g., NFS space that is bind mounted into many containers), or not intended to be backed up at all. |
This simple mode is also used by the container restore operations in the web interface.
“Advanced” Restore Mode
By setting the rootfs parameter (and optionally, any combination of mpX parameters), the pct restore command is automatically switched into an advanced mode. This advanced mode completely ignores the rootfs and mpX configuration options contained in the backup archive, and instead only uses the options explicitly provided as parameters.
This mode allows flexible configuration of mount point settings at restore time, for example:
-
Set target storages, volume sizes and other options for each mount point individually
-
Redistribute backed up files according to new mount point scheme
-
Restore to device and/or bind mount points (limited to root user)
8.7. Managing Containers with pct
pct is the tool to manage Linux Containers on Proxmox VE. You can create and destroy containers, and control execution (start, stop, migrate, …). You can use pct to set parameters in the associated config file, like network configuration or memory limits.
8.7.1. CLI Usage Examples
Create a container based on a Debian template (provided you have already downloaded the template via the web interface)
pct create 100 /var/lib/vz/template/cache/debian-8.0-standard_8.0-1_amd64.tar.gz
Start container 100
pct start 100
Start a login session via getty
pct console 100
Enter the LXC namespace and run a shell as root user
pct enter 100
Display the configuration
pct config 100
Add a network interface called eth0, bridged to the host bridge vmbr0, set the address and gateway, while it’s running
pct set 100 -net0 name=eth0,bridge=vmbr0,ip=192.168.15.147/24,gw=192.168.15.1
Reduce the memory of the container to 512MB
pct set 100 -memory 512
8.7.2. Obtaining Debugging Logs
In case pct start is unable to start a specific container, it might be helpful to collect debugging output by running lxc-start (replace ID with the container’s ID):
lxc-start -n ID -F -l DEBUG -o /tmp/lxc-ID.log
This command will attempt to start the container in foreground mode, to stop the container run pct shutdown ID or pct stop ID in a second terminal.
The collected debug log is written to /tmp/lxc-ID.log.
|
If you have changed the container’s configuration since the last start attempt with pct start, you need to run pct start at least once to also update the configuration used by lxc-start. |
8.8. Files
- /etc/pve/lxc/<CTID>.conf
-
Configuration file for the container <CTID>.
8.9. Container Advantages
-
Simple, and fully integrated into Proxmox VE. Setup looks similar to a normal VM setup.
-
Storage (ZFS, LVM, NFS, Ceph, …)
-
Network
-
Authentication
-
Cluster
-
-
Fast: minimal overhead, as fast as bare metal
-
High density (perfect for idle workloads)
-
REST API
-
Direct hardware access
8.10. Technology Overview
-
Integrated into Proxmox VE graphical user interface (GUI)
-
lxcfs to provide containerized /proc file system
-
AppArmor
-
CRIU: for live migration (planned)
-
We use latest available kernels (4.4.X)
-
Image based deployment (templates)
-
Container setup from host (network, DNS, storage, …)
9. Proxmox VE Firewall
Proxmox VE Firewall provides an easy way to protect your IT infrastructure. You can setup firewall rules for all hosts inside a cluster, or define rules for virtual machines and containers. Features like firewall macros, security groups, IP sets and aliases help to make that task easier.
While all configuration is stored on the cluster file system, the iptables-based firewall runs on each cluster node, and thus provides full isolation between virtual machines. The distributed nature of this system also provides much higher bandwidth than a central firewall solution.
The firewall has full support for IPv4 and IPv6. IPv6 support is fully transparent, and we filter traffic for both protocols by default. So there is no need to maintain a different set of rules for IPv6.
9.1. Zones
The Proxmox VE firewall groups the network into the following logical zones:
- Host
-
Traffic from/to a cluster node
- VM
-
Traffic from/to a specific VM
For each zone, you can define firewall rules for incoming and/or outgoing traffic.
9.2. Configuration Files
All firewall related configuration is stored on the proxmox cluster file system. So those files are automatically distributed to all cluster nodes, and the pve-firewall service updates the underlying iptables rules automatically on changes.
You can configure anything using the GUI (i.e. Datacenter → Firewall, or on a Node → Firewall), or you can edit the configuration files directly using your preferred editor.
Firewall configuration files contains sections of key-value pairs. Lines beginning with a # and blank lines are considered comments. Sections starts with a header line containing the section name enclosed in [ and ].
9.2.1. Cluster Wide Setup
The cluster wide firewall configuration is stored at:
/etc/pve/firewall/cluster.fw
The configuration can contain the following sections:
- [OPTIONS]
-
This is used to set cluster wide firewall options.
- enable: integer (0 - N)
-
Enable or disable the firewall cluster wide.
- policy_in: (ACCEPT | DROP | REJECT)
-
Input policy.
- policy_out: (ACCEPT | DROP | REJECT)
-
Output policy.
- [RULES]
-
This sections contains cluster wide firewall rules for all nodes.
- [IPSET <name>]
-
Cluster wide IP set definitions.
- [GROUP <name>]
-
Cluster wide security group definitions.
- [ALIASES]
-
Cluster wide Alias definitions.
Enabling the Firewall
The firewall is completely disabled by default, so you need to set the enable option here:
[OPTIONS] # enable firewall (cluster wide setting, default is disabled) enable: 1
|
If you enable the firewall, traffic to all hosts is blocked by default. Only exceptions is WebGUI(8006) and ssh(22) from your local network. |
If you want to administrate your Proxmox VE hosts from remote, you need to create rules to allow traffic from those remote IPs to the web GUI (port 8006). You may also want to allow ssh (port 22), and maybe SPICE (port 3128).
|
Please open a SSH connection to one of your Proxmox VE hosts before enabling the firewall. That way you still have access to the host if something goes wrong . |
To simplify that task, you can instead create an IPSet called “management”, and add all remote IPs there. This creates all required firewall rules to access the GUI from remote.
9.2.2. Host Specific Configuration
Host related configuration is read from:
/etc/pve/nodes/<nodename>/host.fw
This is useful if you want to overwrite rules from cluster.fw config. You can also increase log verbosity, and set netfilter related options. The configuration can contain the following sections:
- [OPTIONS]
-
This is used to set host related firewall options.
- enable: boolean
-
Enable host firewall rules.
- log_level_in: (alert | crit | debug | emerg | err | info | nolog | notice | warning)
-
Log level for incoming traffic.
- log_level_out: (alert | crit | debug | emerg | err | info | nolog | notice | warning)
-
Log level for outgoing traffic.
- ndp: boolean
-
Enable NDP.
- nf_conntrack_max: integer (32768 - N)
-
Maximum number of tracked connections.
- nf_conntrack_tcp_timeout_established: integer (7875 - N)
-
Conntrack established timeout.
- nosmurfs: boolean
-
Enable SMURFS filter.
- smurf_log_level: (alert | crit | debug | emerg | err | info | nolog | notice | warning)
-
Log level for SMURFS filter.
- tcp_flags_log_level: (alert | crit | debug | emerg | err | info | nolog | notice | warning)
-
Log level for illegal tcp flags filter.
- tcpflags: boolean
-
Filter illegal combinations of TCP flags.
- [RULES]
-
This sections contains host specific firewall rules.
9.2.3. VM/Container Configuration
VM firewall configuration is read from:
/etc/pve/firewall/<VMID>.fw
and contains the following data:
- [OPTIONS]
-
This is used to set VM/Container related firewall options.
- dhcp: boolean
-
Enable DHCP.
- enable: boolean
-
Enable/disable firewall rules.
- ipfilter: boolean
-
Enable default IP filters. This is equivalent to adding an empty ipfilter-net<id> ipset for every interface. Such ipsets implicitly contain sane default restrictions such as restricting IPv6 link local addresses to the one derived from the interface’s MAC address. For containers the configured IP addresses will be implicitly added.
- log_level_in: (alert | crit | debug | emerg | err | info | nolog | notice | warning)
-
Log level for incoming traffic.
- log_level_out: (alert | crit | debug | emerg | err | info | nolog | notice | warning)
-
Log level for outgoing traffic.
- macfilter: boolean
-
Enable/disable MAC address filter.
- ndp: boolean
-
Enable NDP.
- policy_in: (ACCEPT | DROP | REJECT)
-
Input policy.
- policy_out: (ACCEPT | DROP | REJECT)
-
Output policy.
- radv: boolean
-
Allow sending Router Advertisement.
- [RULES]
-
This sections contains VM/Container firewall rules.
- [IPSET <name>]
-
IP set definitions.
- [ALIASES]
-
IP Alias definitions.
Enabling the Firewall for VMs and Containers
Each virtual network device has its own firewall enable flag. So you can selectively enable the firewall for each interface. This is required in addition to the general firewall enable option.
The firewall requires a special network device setup, so you need to restart the VM/container after enabling the firewall on a network interface.
9.3. Firewall Rules
Firewall rules consists of a direction (IN or OUT) and an action (ACCEPT, DENY, REJECT). You can also specify a macro name. Macros contain predefined sets of rules and options. Rules can be disabled by prefixing them with |.
[RULES] DIRECTION ACTION [OPTIONS] |DIRECTION ACTION [OPTIONS] # disabled rule DIRECTION MACRO(ACTION) [OPTIONS] # use predefined macro
The following options can be used to refine rule matches.
- -dest string
-
Restrict packet destination address. This can refer to a single IP address, an IP set (+ipsetname) or an IP alias definition. You can also specify an address range like 20.34.101.207-201.3.9.99, or a list of IP addresses and networks (entries are separated by comma). Please do not mix IPv4 and IPv6 addresses inside such lists.
- -dport string
-
Restrict TCP/UDP destination port. You can use service names or simple numbers (0-65535), as defined in /etc/services. Port ranges can be specified with \d+:\d+, for example 80:85, and you can use comma separated list to match several ports or ranges.
- -iface string
-
Network interface name. You have to use network configuration key names for VMs and containers (net\d+). Host related rules can use arbitrary strings.
- -proto string
-
IP protocol. You can use protocol names (tcp/udp) or simple numbers, as defined in /etc/protocols.
- -source string
-
Restrict packet source address. This can refer to a single IP address, an IP set (+ipsetname) or an IP alias definition. You can also specify an address range like 20.34.101.207-201.3.9.99, or a list of IP addresses and networks (entries are separated by comma). Please do not mix IPv4 and IPv6 addresses inside such lists.
- -sport string
-
Restrict TCP/UDP source port. You can use service names or simple numbers (0-65535), as defined in /etc/services. Port ranges can be specified with \d+:\d+, for example 80:85, and you can use comma separated list to match several ports or ranges.
Here are some examples:
[RULES] IN SSH(ACCEPT) -i net0 IN SSH(ACCEPT) -i net0 # a comment IN SSH(ACCEPT) -i net0 -source 192.168.2.192 # only allow SSH from 192.168.2.192 IN SSH(ACCEPT) -i net0 -source 10.0.0.1-10.0.0.10 # accept SSH for ip range IN SSH(ACCEPT) -i net0 -source 10.0.0.1,10.0.0.2,10.0.0.3 #accept ssh for ip list IN SSH(ACCEPT) -i net0 -source +mynetgroup # accept ssh for ipset mynetgroup IN SSH(ACCEPT) -i net0 -source myserveralias #accept ssh for alias myserveralias |IN SSH(ACCEPT) -i net0 # disabled rule IN DROP # drop all incoming packages OUT ACCEPT # accept all outgoing packages
9.4. Security Groups
A security group is a collection of rules, defined at cluster level, which can be used in all VMs' rules. For example you can define a group named “webserver” with rules to open the http and https ports.
# /etc/pve/firewall/cluster.fw [group webserver] IN ACCEPT -p tcp -dport 80 IN ACCEPT -p tcp -dport 443
Then, you can add this group to a VM’s firewall
# /etc/pve/firewall/<VMID>.fw [RULES] GROUP webserver
9.5. IP Aliases
IP Aliases allow you to associate IP addresses of networks with a name. You can then refer to those names:
-
inside IP set definitions
-
in source and dest properties of firewall rules
9.5.1. Standard IP Alias local_network
This alias is automatically defined. Please use the following command to see assigned values:
# pve-firewall localnet local hostname: example local IP address: 192.168.2.100 network auto detect: 192.168.0.0/20 using detected local_network: 192.168.0.0/20
The firewall automatically sets up rules to allow everything needed for cluster communication (corosync, API, SSH) using this alias.
The user can overwrite these values in the cluster.fw alias section. If you use a single host on a public network, it is better to explicitly assign the local IP address
# /etc/pve/firewall/cluster.fw [ALIASES] local_network 1.2.3.4 # use the single ip address
9.6. IP Sets
IP sets can be used to define groups of networks and hosts. You can refer to them with ‘+name` in the firewall rules’ source and dest properties.
The following example allows HTTP traffic from the management IP set.
IN HTTP(ACCEPT) -source +management
9.6.1. Standard IP set management
This IP set applies only to host firewalls (not VM firewalls). Those IPs are allowed to do normal management tasks (PVE GUI, VNC, SPICE, SSH).
The local cluster network is automatically added to this IP set (alias cluster_network), to enable inter-host cluster communication. (multicast,ssh,…)
# /etc/pve/firewall/cluster.fw [IPSET management] 192.168.2.10 192.168.2.10/24
9.6.2. Standard IP set blacklist
Traffic from these IPs is dropped by every host’s and VM’s firewall.
# /etc/pve/firewall/cluster.fw [IPSET blacklist] 77.240.159.182 213.87.123.0/24
9.6.3. Standard IP set ipfilter-net*
These filters belong to a VM’s network interface and are mainly used to prevent IP spoofing. If such a set exists for an interface then any outgoing traffic with a source IP not matching its interface’s corresponding ipfilter set will be dropped.
For containers with configured IP addresses these sets, if they exist (or are activated via the general IP Filter option in the VM’s firewall’s options tab), implicitly contain the associated IP addresses.
For both virtual machines and containers they also implicitly contain the standard MAC-derived IPv6 link-local address in order to allow the neighbor discovery protocol to work.
/etc/pve/firewall/<VMID>.fw [IPSET ipfilter-net0] # only allow specified IPs on net0 192.168.2.10
9.7. Services and Commands
The firewall runs two service daemons on each node:
-
pvefw-logger: NFLOG daemon (ulogd replacement).
-
pve-firewall: updates iptables rules
There is also a CLI command named pve-firewall, which can be used to start and stop the firewall service:
# pve-firewall start # pve-firewall stop
To get the status use:
# pve-firewall status
The above command reads and compiles all firewall rules, so you will see warnings if your firewall configuration contains any errors.
If you want to see the generated iptables rules you can use:
# iptables-save
9.8. Tips and Tricks
9.8.1. How to allow FTP
FTP is an old style protocol which uses port 21 and several other dynamic ports. So you need a rule to accept port 21. In addition, you need to load the ip_conntrack_ftp module. So please run:
modprobe ip_conntrack_ftp
and add ip_conntrack_ftp to /etc/modules (so that it works after a reboot).
9.8.2. Suricata IPS integration
If you want to use the Suricata IPS (Intrusion Prevention System), it’s possible.
Packets will be forwarded to the IPS only after the firewall ACCEPTed them.
Rejected/Dropped firewall packets don’t go to the IPS.
Install suricata on proxmox host:
# apt-get install suricata # modprobe nfnetlink_queue
Don’t forget to add nfnetlink_queue to /etc/modules for next reboot.
Then, enable IPS for a specific VM with:
# /etc/pve/firewall/<VMID>.fw [OPTIONS] ips: 1 ips_queues: 0
ips_queues will bind a specific cpu queue for this VM.
Available queues are defined in
# /etc/default/suricata NFQUEUE=0
9.9. Notes on IPv6
The firewall contains a few IPv6 specific options. One thing to note is that IPv6 does not use the ARP protocol anymore, and instead uses NDP (Neighbor Discovery Protocol) which works on IP level and thus needs IP addresses to succeed. For this purpose link-local addresses derived from the interface’s MAC address are used. By default the NDP option is enabled on both host and VM level to allow neighbor discovery (NDP) packets to be sent and received.
Beside neighbor discovery NDP is also used for a couple of other things, like autoconfiguration and advertising routers.
By default VMs are allowed to send out router solicitation messages (to query for a router), and to receive router advertisement packets. This allows them to use stateless auto configuration. On the other hand VMs cannot advertise themselves as routers unless the “Allow Router Advertisement” (radv: 1) option is set.
As for the link local addresses required for NDP, there’s also an “IP Filter” (ipfilter: 1) option which can be enabled which has the same effect as adding an ipfilter-net* ipset for each of the VM’s network interfaces containing the corresponding link local addresses. (See the Standard IP set ipfilter-net* section for details.)
9.10. Ports used by Proxmox VE
-
Web interface: 8006
-
VNC Web console: 5900-5999
-
SPICE proxy: 3128
-
sshd (used for cluster actions): 22
-
rpcbind: 111
-
corosync multicast (if you run a cluster): 5404, 5405 UDP
10. User Management
Proxmox VE supports multiple authentication sources, e.g. Linux PAM, an integrated Proxmox VE authentication server, LDAP, Microsoft Active Directory.
By using the role based user- and permission management for all objects (VMs, storages, nodes, etc.) granular access can be defined.
10.1. Users
Proxmox VE stores user attributes in /etc/pve/user.cfg. Passwords are not stored here, users are instead associated with authentication realms described below. Therefore a user is internally often identified by its name and realm in the form <userid>@<realm>.
Each user entry in this file contains the following information:
-
First name
-
Last name
-
E-mail address
-
Group memberships
-
An optional Expiration date
-
A comment or note about this user
-
Whether this user is enabled or disabled
-
Optional two factor authentication keys
10.1.1. System administrator
The system’s root user can always log in via the Linux PAM realm and is an unconfined administrator. This user cannot be deleted, but attributes can still be changed and system mails will be sent to the email address assigned to this user.
10.1.2. Groups
Each user can be member of several groups. Groups are the preferred way to organize access permissions. You should always grant permission to groups instead of using individual users. That way you will get a much shorter access control list which is easier to handle.
10.2. Authentication Realms
As Proxmox VE users are just counterparts for users existing on some external realm, the realms have to be configured in /etc/pve/domains.cfg. The following realms (authentication methods) are available:
- Linux PAM standard authentication
-
In this case a system user has to exist (eg. created via the adduser command) on all nodes the user is allowed to login, and the user authenticates with their usual system password.
useradd heinz passwd heinz groupadd watchman usermod -a -G watchman heinz
- Proxmox VE authentication server
-
This is a unix like password store (/etc/pve/priv/shadow.cfg). Password are encrypted using the SHA-256 hash method. This is the most convenient method for for small (or even medium) installations where users do not need access to anything outside of Proxmox VE. In this case users are fully managed by Proxmox VE and are able to change their own passwords via the GUI.
- LDAP
-
It is possible to authenticate users via an LDAP server (eq. openldap). The server and an optional fallback server can be configured and the connection can be encrypted via SSL.
Users are searched under a Base Domain Name (base_dn), with the user name found in the attribute specified in the User Attribute Name (user_attr) field.
For instance, if a user is represented via the following ldif dataset:
# user1 of People at ldap-test.com dn: uid=user1,ou=People,dc=ldap-test,dc=com objectClass: top objectClass: person objectClass: organizationalPerson objectClass: inetOrgPerson uid: user1 cn: Test User 1 sn: Testers description: This is the first test user.
The Base Domain Name would be ou=People,dc=ldap-test,dc=com and the user attribute would be uid.
If Proxmox VE needs to authenticate (bind) to the ldap server before being able to query and authenticate users, a bind domain name can be configured via the bind_dn property in /etc/pve/domains.cfg. Its password then has to be stored in /etc/pve/priv/ldap/<realmname>.pw (eg. /etc/pve/priv/ldap/my-ldap.pw). This file should contain a single line containing the raw password.
- Microsoft Active Directory
-
A server and authentication domain need to be specified. Like with ldap an optional fallback server, optional port, and SSL encryption can be configured.
10.3. Two factor authentication
Each realm can optionally be secured additionally by two factor authentication. This can be done by selecting one of the available methods via the TFA dropdown box when adding or editing an Authentication Realm. When a realm has TFA enabled it becomes a requirement and only users with configured TFA will be able to login.
Currently there are two methods available:
- Time based OATH (TOTP)
-
This uses the standard HMAC-SHA1 algorithm where the current time is hashed with the user’s configured key. The time step and password length parameters are configured.
A user can have multiple keys configured (separated by spaces), and the keys can be specified in Base32 (RFC3548) or hexadecimal notation.
Proxmox VE provides a key generation tool (oathkeygen) which prints out a random key in Base32 notation which can be used directly with various OTP tools, such as the oathtool command line tool, the Google authenticator or FreeOTP Android apps.
- YubiKey OTP
-
For authenticating via a YubiKey a Yubico API ID, API KEY and validation server URL must be configured, and users must have a YubiKey available. In order to get the key ID from a YubiKey, you can trigger the YubiKey once after connecting it to USB and copy the first 12 characters of the typed password into the user’s Key IDs field.
Please refer to the YubiKey OTP documentation for how to use the YubiCloud or host your own verification server.
10.4. Permission Management
In order for a user to perform an action (such as listing, modifying or deleting a parts of a VM configuration), the user needs to have the appropriate permissions.
Proxmox VE uses a role and path based permission management system. An entry in the permissions table allows a user or group to take on a specific role when accessing an object or path. This means an such an access rule can be represented as a triple of (path, user, role) or (path, group, role), with the role containing a set of allowed actions, and the path representing the target of these actions.
10.4.1. Roles
A role is simply a list of privileges. Proxmox VE comes with a number of predefined roles which satisfies most needs.
-
Administrator: has all privileges
-
NoAccess: has no privileges (used to forbid access)
-
PVEAdmin: can do most things, but miss rights to modify system settings (Sys.PowerMgmt, Sys.Modify, Realm.Allocate).
-
PVEAuditor: read only access
-
PVEDatastoreAdmin: create and allocate backup space and templates
-
PVEDatastoreUser: allocate backup space and view storage
-
PVEPoolAdmin: allocate pools
-
PVESysAdmin: User ACLs, audit, system console and system logs
-
PVETemplateUser: view and clone templates
-
PVEUserAdmin: user administration
-
PVEVMAdmin: fully administer VMs
-
PVEVMUser: view, backup, config CDROM, VM console, VM power management
You can see the whole set of predefined roles on the GUI.
Adding new roles can currently only be done from the command line, like this:
pveum roleadd PVE_Power-only -privs "VM.PowerMgmt VM.Console" pveum roleadd Sys_Power-only -privs "Sys.PowerMgmt Sys.Console"
10.4.2. Privileges
A privilege is the right to perform a specific action. To simplify management, lists of privileges are grouped into roles, which can then be used in the permission table. Note that privileges cannot directly be assigned to users and paths without being part of a role.
We currently use the following privileges:
- Node / System related privileges
-
-
Permissions.Modify: modify access permissions
-
Sys.PowerMgmt: Node power management (start, stop, reset, shutdown, …)
-
Sys.Console: console access to Node
-
Sys.Syslog: view Syslog
-
Sys.Audit: view node status/config
-
Sys.Modify: create/remove/modify node network parameters
-
Group.Allocate: create/remove/modify groups
-
Pool.Allocate: create/remove/modify a pool
-
Realm.Allocate: create/remove/modify authentication realms
-
Realm.AllocateUser: assign user to a realm
-
User.Modify: create/remove/modify user access and details.
-
- Virtual machine related privileges
-
-
VM.Allocate: create/remove new VM to server inventory
-
VM.Migrate: migrate VM to alternate server on cluster
-
VM.PowerMgmt: power management (start, stop, reset, shutdown, …)
-
VM.Console: console access to VM
-
VM.Monitor: access to VM monitor (kvm)
-
VM.Backup: backup/restore VMs
-
VM.Audit: view VM config
-
VM.Clone: clone/copy a VM
-
VM.Config.Disk: add/modify/delete Disks
-
VM.Config.CDROM: eject/change CDROM
-
VM.Config.CPU: modify CPU settings
-
VM.Config.Memory: modify Memory settings
-
VM.Config.Network: add/modify/delete Network devices
-
VM.Config.HWType: modify emulated HW type
-
VM.Config.Options: modify any other VM configuration
-
VM.Snapshot: create/remove VM snapshots
-
- Storage related privileges
-
-
Datastore.Allocate: create/remove/modify a data store, delete volumes
-
Datastore.AllocateSpace: allocate space on a datastore
-
Datastore.AllocateTemplate: allocate/upload templates and iso images
-
Datastore.Audit: view/browse a datastore
-
10.4.3. Objects and Paths
Access permissions are assigned to objects, such as a virtual machines, storages or pools of resources. We use file system like paths to address these objects. These paths form a natural tree, and permissions of higher levels (shorter path) can optionally be propagated down within this hierarchy.
Paths can be templated. When an API call requires permissions on a templated path, the path may contain references to parameters of the API call. These references are specified in curly braces. Some parameters are implicitly taken from the API call’s URI. For instance the permission path /nodes/{node} when calling /nodes/mynode/status requires permissions on /nodes/mynode, while the path {path} in a PUT request to /access/acl refers to the method’s path parameter.
Some examples are:
-
/nodes/{node}: Access to Proxmox VE server machines
-
/vms: Covers all VMs
-
/vms/{vmid}: Access to specific VMs
-
/storage/{storeid}: Access to a storages
-
/pool/{poolname}: Access to VMs part of a pool
-
/access/groups: Group administration
-
/access/realms/{realmid}: Administrative access to realms
Inheritance
As mentioned earlier, object paths form a file system like tree, and permissions can be inherited down that tree (the propagate flag is set by default). We use the following inheritance rules:
-
Permissions for individual users always replace group permissions.
-
Permissions for groups apply when the user is member of that group.
-
Permissions replace the ones inherited from an upper level.
10.4.4. Pools
Pools can be used to group a set of virtual machines and data stores. You can then simply set permissions on pools (/pool/{poolid}), which are inherited to all pool members. This is a great way simplify access control.
10.4.5. What permission do I need?
The required API permissions are documented for each individual method, and can be found at http://pve.proxmox.com/pve-docs/api-viewer/
The permissions are specified as a list which can be interpreted as a tree of logic and access-check functions:
- ["and", <subtests>...] and ["or", <subtests>...]
-
Each(and) or any(or) further element in the current list has to be true.
- ["perm", <path>, [ <privileges>... ], <options>...]
-
The path is a templated parameter (see Objects and Paths). All (or , if the any option is used, any) of the listed privileges must be allowed on the specified path. If a require-param option is specified, then its specified parameter is required even if the API call’s schema otherwise lists it as being optional.
- ["userid-group", [ <privileges>... ], <options>...]
-
The callermust have any of the listed privileges on /access/groups. In addition there are two possible checks depending on whether the groups_param option is set:
-
groups_param is set: The API call has a non-optional groups parameter and the caller must have any of the listed privileges on all of the listed groups.
-
groups_param is not set: The user passed via the userid parameter must exist and be part of a group on which the caller has any of the listed privileges (via the /access/groups/<group> path).
-
- ["userid-param", "self"]
-
The value provided for the API call’s userid parameter must refer to the user performing the action. (Usually in conjunction with or, to allow users to perform an action on themselves even if they don’t have elevated privileges.)
- ["userid-param", "Realm.AllocateUser"]
-
The user needs Realm.AllocateUser access to /access/realm/<realm>, with <realm> refering to the realm of the user passed via the userid parameter. Note that the user does not need to exist in order to be associated with a realm, since user IDs are passed in the form of <username>@<realm>.
- ["perm-modify", <path>]
-
The path is a templated parameter (see Objects and Paths). The user needs either the Permissions.Modify privilege, or, depending on the path, the following privileges as a possible substitute:
-
/storage/...: additionally requires 'Datastore.Allocate`
-
/vms/...: additionally requires 'VM.Allocate`
-
/pool/...: additionally requires 'Pool.Allocate`
If the path is empty, Permission.Modify on /access is required.
-
10.5. Command Line Tool
Most users will simply use the GUI to manage users. But there is also a full featured command line tool called pveum (short for “Proxmox VE User Manager”). Please note that all Proxmox VE command line tools are wrappers around the API, so you can also access those function through the REST API.
Here are some simple usage examples. To show help type:
pveum
or (to show detailed help about a specific command)
pveum help useradd
Create a new user:
pveum useradd testuser@pve -comment "Just a test"
Set or Change the password (not all realms support that):
pveum passwd testuser@pve
Disable a user:
pveum usermod testuser@pve -enable 0
Create a new group:
pveum groupadd testgroup
Create a new role:
pveum roleadd PVE_Power-only -privs "VM.PowerMgmt VM.Console"
10.6. Real World Examples
10.6.1. Administrator Group
One of the most wanted features was the ability to define a group of users with full administrator rights (without using the root account).
Define the group:
pveum groupadd admin -comment "System Administrators"
Then add the permission:
pveum aclmod / -group admin -role Administrator
You can finally add users to the new admin group:
pveum usermod testuser@pve -group admin
10.6.2. Auditors
You can give read only access to users by assigning the PVEAuditor role to users or groups.
Example1: Allow user joe@pve to see everything
pveum aclmod / -user joe@pve -role PVEAuditor
Example1: Allow user joe@pve to see all virtual machines
pveum aclmod /vms -user joe@pve -role PVEAuditor
10.6.3. Delegate User Management
If you want to delegate user managenent to user joe@pve you can do that with:
pveum aclmod /access -user joe@pve -role PVEUserAdmin
User joe@pve can now add and remove users, change passwords and other user attributes. This is a very powerful role, and you most likely want to limit that to selected realms and groups. The following example allows joe@pve to modify users within realm pve if they are members of group customers:
pveum aclmod /access/realm/pve -user joe@pve -role PVEUserAdmin pveum aclmod /access/groups/customers -user joe@pve -role PVEUserAdmin
|
The user is able to add other users, but only if they are members of group customers and within realm pve. |
10.6.4. Pools
An enterprise is usually structured into several smaller departments, and it is common that you want to assign resources to them and delegate management tasks. A pool is simply a set of virtual machines and data stores. You can create pools on the GUI. After that you can add resources to the pool (VMs, Storage).
You can also assign permissions to the pool. Those permissions are inherited to all pool members.
Lets assume you have a software development department, so we first create a group
pveum groupadd developers -comment "Our software developers"
Now we create a new user which is a member of that group
pveum useradd developer1@pve -group developers -password
|
The -password parameter will prompt you for a password |
I assume we already created a pool called “dev-pool” on the GUI. So we can now assign permission to that pool:
pveum aclmod /pool/dev-pool/ -group developers -role PVEAdmin
Our software developers can now administrate the resources assigned to that pool.
11. High Availability
Our modern society depends heavily on information provided by computers over the network. Mobile devices amplified that dependency, because people can access the network any time from anywhere. If you provide such services, it is very important that they are available most of the time.
We can mathematically define the availability as the ratio of (A) the total time a service is capable of being used during a given interval to (B) the length of the interval. It is normally expressed as a percentage of uptime in a given year.
Availability % | Downtime per year |
---|---|
99 |
3.65 days |
99.9 |
8.76 hours |
99.99 |
52.56 minutes |
99.999 |
5.26 minutes |
99.9999 |
31.5 seconds |
99.99999 |
3.15 seconds |
There are several ways to increase availability. The most elegant solution is to rewrite your software, so that you can run it on several host at the same time. The software itself need to have a way to detect errors and do failover. This is relatively easy if you just want to serve read-only web pages. But in general this is complex, and sometimes impossible because you cannot modify the software yourself. The following solutions works without modifying the software:
-
Use reliable “server” components
|
Computer components with same functionality can have varying reliability numbers, depending on the component quality. Most vendors sell components with higher reliability as “server” components - usually at higher price. |
-
Eliminate single point of failure (redundant components)
-
use an uninterruptible power supply (UPS)
-
use redundant power supplies on the main boards
-
use ECC-RAM
-
use redundant network hardware
-
use RAID for local storage
-
use distributed, redundant storage for VM data
-
-
Reduce downtime
-
rapidly accessible administrators (24/7)
-
availability of spare parts (other nodes in a Proxmox VE cluster)
-
automatic error detection (provided by ha-manager)
-
automatic failover (provided by ha-manager)
-
Virtualization environments like Proxmox VE make it much easier to reach high availability because they remove the “hardware” dependency. They also support to setup and use redundant storage and network devices. So if one host fail, you can simply start those services on another host within your cluster.
Even better, Proxmox VE provides a software stack called ha-manager, which can do that automatically for you. It is able to automatically detect errors and do automatic failover.
Proxmox VE ha-manager works like an “automated” administrator. First, you configure what resources (VMs, containers, …) it should manage. ha-manager then observes correct functionality, and handles service failover to another node in case of errors. ha-manager can also handle normal user requests which may start, stop, relocate and migrate a service.
But high availability comes at a price. High quality components are more expensive, and making them redundant duplicates the costs at least. Additional spare parts increase costs further. So you should carefully calculate the benefits, and compare with those additional costs.
|
Increasing availability from 99% to 99.9% is relatively simply. But increasing availability from 99.9999% to 99.99999% is very hard and costly. ha-manager has typical error detection and failover times of about 2 minutes, so you can get no more than 99.999% availability. |
11.1. Requirements
-
at least three cluster nodes (to get reliable quorum)
-
shared storage for VMs and containers
-
hardware redundancy (everywhere)
-
hardware watchdog - if not available we fall back to the linux kernel software watchdog (softdog)
-
optional hardware fencing devices
11.2. Resources
We call the primary management unit handled by ha-manager a resource. A resource (also called “service”) is uniquely identified by a service ID (SID), which consists of the resource type and an type specific ID, e.g.: vm:100. That example would be a resource of type vm (virtual machine) with the ID 100.
For now we have two important resources types - virtual machines and containers. One basic idea here is that we can bundle related software into such VM or container, so there is no need to compose one big service from other services, like it was done with rgmanager. In general, a HA enabled resource should not depend on other resources.
11.3. How It Works
This section provides an in detail description of the Proxmox VE HA-manager internals. It describes how the CRM and the LRM work together.
To provide High Availability two daemons run on each node:
- pve-ha-lrm
-
The local resource manager (LRM), it controls the services running on the local node. It reads the requested states for its services from the current manager status file and executes the respective commands.
- pve-ha-crm
-
The cluster resource manager (CRM), it controls the cluster wide actions of the services, processes the LRM results and includes the state machine which controls the state of each service.
|
Locks in the LRM & CRM Locks are provided by our distributed configuration file system (pmxcfs).
They are used to guarantee that each LRM is active once and working. As a
LRM only executes actions when it holds its lock we can mark a failed node
as fenced if we can acquire its lock. This lets us then recover any failed
HA services securely without any interference from the now unknown failed node.
This all gets supervised by the CRM which holds currently the manager master
lock. |
11.3.1. Local Resource Manager
The local resource manager (pve-ha-lrm) is started as a daemon on boot and waits until the HA cluster is quorate and thus cluster wide locks are working.
It can be in three states:
- wait for agent lock
-
The LRM waits for our exclusive lock. This is also used as idle state if no service is configured.
- active
-
The LRM holds its exclusive lock and has services configured.
- lost agent lock
-
The LRM lost its lock, this means a failure happened and quorum was lost.
After the LRM gets in the active state it reads the manager status file in /etc/pve/ha/manager_status and determines the commands it has to execute for the services it owns. For each command a worker gets started, this workers are running in parallel and are limited to at most 4 by default. This default setting may be changed through the datacenter configuration key max_worker. When finished the worker process gets collected and its result saved for the CRM.
|
Maximum Concurrent Worker Adjustment Tips The default value of at most 4 concurrent workers may be unsuited for
a specific setup. For example may 4 live migrations happen at the same
time, which can lead to network congestions with slower networks and/or
big (memory wise) services. Ensure that also in the worst case no congestion
happens and lower the max_worker value if needed. In the contrary, if you
have a particularly powerful high end setup you may also want to increase it. |
Each command requested by the CRM is uniquely identifiable by an UID, when the worker finished its result will be processed and written in the LRM status file /etc/pve/nodes/<nodename>/lrm_status. There the CRM may collect it and let its state machine - respective the commands output - act on it.
The actions on each service between CRM and LRM are normally always synced. This means that the CRM requests a state uniquely marked by an UID, the LRM then executes this action one time and writes back the result, also identifiable by the same UID. This is needed so that the LRM does not executes an outdated command. With the exception of the stop and the error command, those two do not depend on the result produced and are executed always in the case of the stopped state and once in the case of the error state.
|
Read the Logs The HA Stack logs every action it makes. This helps to understand what
and also why something happens in the cluster. Here its important to see
what both daemons, the LRM and the CRM, did. You may use
journalctl -u pve-ha-lrm on the node(s) where the service is and
the same command for the pve-ha-crm on the node which is the current master. |
11.3.2. Cluster Resource Manager
The cluster resource manager (pve-ha-crm) starts on each node and waits there for the manager lock, which can only be held by one node at a time. The node which successfully acquires the manager lock gets promoted to the CRM master.
It can be in three states:
- wait for agent lock
-
The CRM waits for our exclusive lock. This is also used as idle state if no service is configured
- active
-
The CRM holds its exclusive lock and has services configured
- lost agent lock
-
The CRM lost its lock, this means a failure happened and quorum was lost.
It main task is to manage the services which are configured to be highly available and try to always enforce them to the wanted state, e.g.: a enabled service will be started if its not running, if it crashes it will be started again. Thus it dictates the LRM the actions it needs to execute.
When an node leaves the cluster quorum, its state changes to unknown. If the current CRM then can secure the failed nodes lock, the services will be stolen and restarted on another node.
When a cluster member determines that it is no longer in the cluster quorum, the LRM waits for a new quorum to form. As long as there is no quorum the node cannot reset the watchdog. This will trigger a reboot after the watchdog then times out, this happens after 60 seconds.
11.4. Configuration
The HA stack is well integrated in the Proxmox VE API2. So, for example, HA can be configured via ha-manager or the PVE web interface, which both provide an easy to use tool.
The resource configuration file can be located at /etc/pve/ha/resources.cfg and the group configuration file at /etc/pve/ha/groups.cfg. Use the provided tools to make changes, there shouldn’t be any need to edit them manually.
11.5. Node Power Status
If a node needs maintenance you should migrate and or relocate all services which are required to run always on another node first. After that you can stop the LRM and CRM services. But note that the watchdog triggers if you stop it with active services.
11.6. Package Updates
When updating the ha-manager you should do one node after the other, never all at once for various reasons. First, while we test our software thoughtfully, a bug affecting your specific setup cannot totally be ruled out. Upgrading one node after the other and checking the functionality of each node after finishing the update helps to recover from an eventual problems, while updating all could render you in a broken cluster state and is generally not good practice.
Also, the Proxmox VE HA stack uses a request acknowledge protocol to perform actions between the cluster and the local resource manager. For restarting, the LRM makes a request to the CRM to freeze all its services. This prevents that they get touched by the Cluster during the short time the LRM is restarting. After that the LRM may safely close the watchdog during a restart. Such a restart happens on a update and as already stated a active master CRM is needed to acknowledge the requests from the LRM, if this is not the case the update process can be too long which, in the worst case, may result in a watchdog reset.
11.7. Fencing
11.7.1. What is Fencing
Fencing secures that on a node failure the dangerous node gets will be rendered unable to do any damage and that no resource runs twice when it gets recovered from the failed node. This is a really important task and one of the base principles to make a system Highly Available.
If a node would not get fenced it would be in an unknown state where it may have still access to shared resources, this is really dangerous! Imagine that every network but the storage one broke, now while not reachable from the public network the VM still runs and writes on the shared storage. If we would not fence the node and just start up this VM on another Node we would get dangerous race conditions, atomicity violations the whole VM could be rendered unusable. The recovery could also simply fail if the storage protects from multiple mounts and thus defeat the purpose of HA.
11.7.2. How Proxmox VE Fences
There are different methods to fence a node, for example fence devices which cut off the power from the node or disable their communication completely.
Those are often quite expensive and bring additional critical components in a system, because if they fail you cannot recover any service.
We thus wanted to integrate a simpler method in the HA Manager first, namely self fencing with watchdogs.
Watchdogs are widely used in critical and dependable systems since the beginning of micro controllers, they are often independent and simple integrated circuit which programs can use to watch them. After opening they need to report periodically. If, for whatever reason, a program becomes unable to do so the watchdogs triggers a reset of the whole server.
Server motherboards often already include such hardware watchdogs, these need to be configured. If no watchdog is available or configured we fall back to the Linux Kernel softdog while still reliable it is not independent of the servers Hardware and thus has a lower reliability then a hardware watchdog.
11.7.3. Configure Hardware Watchdog
By default all watchdog modules are blocked for security reasons as they are like a loaded gun if not correctly initialized. If you have a hardware watchdog available remove its kernel module from the blacklist, load it with insmod and restart the watchdog-mux service or reboot the node.
11.7.4. Recover Fenced Services
After a node failed and its fencing was successful we start to recover services to other available nodes and restart them there so that they can provide service again.
The selection of the node on which the services gets recovered is influenced by the users group settings, the currently active nodes and their respective active service count. First we build a set out of the intersection between user selected nodes and available nodes. Then the subset with the highest priority of those nodes gets chosen as possible nodes for recovery. We select the node with the currently lowest active service count as a new node for the service. That minimizes the possibility of an overload, which else could cause an unresponsive node and as a result a chain reaction of node failures in the cluster.
11.8. Groups
A group is a collection of cluster nodes which a service may be bound to.
11.8.1. Group Settings
- nodes
-
List of group node members where a priority can be given to each node. A service bound to this group will run on the nodes with the highest priority available. If more nodes are in the highest priority class the services will get distributed to those node if not already there. The priorities have a relative meaning only.
- Example
-
You want to run all services from a group on node1 if possible. If this node is not available, you want them to run equally splitted on node2 and node3, and if those fail it should use node4. To achieve this you could set the node list to:
ha-manager groupset mygroup -nodes "node1:2,node2:1,node3:1,node4"
- restricted
-
Resources bound to this group may only run on nodes defined by the group. If no group node member is available the resource will be placed in the stopped state.
- Example
-
Lets say a service uses resources only available on node1 and node2, so we need to make sure that HA manager does not use other nodes. We need to create a restricted group with said nodes:
ha-manager groupset mygroup -nodes "node1,node2" -restricted
- nofailback
-
The resource won’t automatically fail back when a more preferred node (re)joins the cluster.
- Examples
-
-
You need to migrate a service to a node which hasn’t the highest priority in the group at the moment, to tell the HA manager to not move this service instantly back set the nofailback option and the service will stay on the current node.
-
A service was fenced and it got recovered to another node. The admin repaired the node and brought it up online again but does not want that the recovered services move straight back to the repaired node as he wants to first investigate the failure cause and check if it runs stable. He can use the nofailback option to achieve this.
-
11.9. Start Failure Policy
The start failure policy comes in effect if a service failed to start on a node once ore more times. It can be used to configure how often a restart should be triggered on the same node and how often a service should be relocated so that it gets a try to be started on another node. The aim of this policy is to circumvent temporary unavailability of shared resources on a specific node. For example, if a shared storage isn’t available on a quorate node anymore, e.g. network problems, but still on other nodes, the relocate policy allows then that the service gets started nonetheless.
There are two service start recover policy settings which can be configured specific for each resource.
- max_restart
-
Maximum number of tries to restart an failed service on the actual node. The default is set to one.
- max_relocate
-
Maximum number of tries to relocate the service to a different node. A relocate only happens after the max_restart value is exceeded on the actual node. The default is set to one.
|
The relocate count state will only reset to zero when the service had at least one successful start. That means if a service is re-enabled without fixing the error only the restart policy gets repeated. |
11.10. Error Recovery
If after all tries the service state could not be recovered it gets placed in an error state. In this state the service won’t get touched by the HA stack anymore. To recover from this state you should follow these steps:
-
bring the resource back into a safe and consistent state (e.g., killing its process)
-
disable the ha resource to place it in an stopped state
-
fix the error which led to this failures
-
after you fixed all errors you may enable the service again
11.11. Service Operations
This are how the basic user-initiated service operations (via ha-manager) work.
- enable
-
The service will be started by the LRM if not already running.
- disable
-
The service will be stopped by the LRM if running.
- migrate/relocate
-
The service will be relocated (live) to another node.
- remove
-
The service will be removed from the HA managed resource list. Its current state will not be touched.
- start/stop
-
start and stop commands can be issued to the resource specific tools (like qm or pct), they will forward the request to the ha-manager which then will execute the action and set the resulting service state (enabled, disabled).
11.12. Service States
- stopped
-
Service is stopped (confirmed by LRM), if detected running it will get stopped again.
- request_stop
-
Service should be stopped. Waiting for confirmation from LRM.
- started
-
Service is active an LRM should start it ASAP if not already running. If the Service fails and is detected to be not running the LRM restarts it.
- fence
-
Wait for node fencing (service node is not inside quorate cluster partition). As soon as node gets fenced successfully the service will be recovered to another node, if possible.
- freeze
-
Do not touch the service state. We use this state while we reboot a node, or when we restart the LRM daemon.
- migrate
-
Migrate service (live) to other node.
- error
-
Service disabled because of LRM errors. Needs manual intervention.
12. Backup and Restore
Backups are a requirements for any sensible IT deployment, and Proxmox VE provides a fully integrated solution, using the capabilities of each storage and each guest system type. This allows the system administrator to fine tune via the mode option between consistency of the backups and downtime of the guest system.
Proxmox VE backups are always full backups - containing the VM/CT configuration and all data. Backups can be started via the GUI or via the vzdump command line tool.
Before a backup can run, a backup storage must be defined. Refer to the Storage documentation on how to add a storage. A backup storage must be a file level storage, as backups are stored as regular files. In most situations, using a NFS server is a good way to store backups. You can save those backups later to a tape drive, for off-site archiving.
Backup jobs can be scheduled so that they are executed automatically on specific days and times, for selectable nodes and guest systems. Configuration of scheduled backups is done at the Datacenter level in the GUI, which will generate a cron entry in /etc/cron.d/vzdump.
12.1. Backup modes
There are several ways to provide consistency (option mode), depending on the guest type.
- stop mode
-
This mode provides the highest consistency of the backup, at the cost of a downtime in the VM operation. It works by executing an orderly shutdown of the VM, and then runs a background Qemu process to backup the VM data. After the backup is complete, the Qemu process resumes the VM to full operation mode if it was previously running.
- suspend mode
-
This mode is provided for compatibility reason, and suspends the VM before calling the snapshot mode. Since suspending the VM results in a longer downtime and does not necessarily improve the data consistency, the use of the snapshot mode is recommended instead.
- snapshot mode
-
This mode provides the lowest operation downtime, at the cost of a small inconstancy risk. It works by performing a Proxmox VE live backup, in which data blocks are copied while the VM is running. If the guest agent is enabled (agent: 1) and running, it calls guest-fsfreeze-freeze and guest-fsfreeze-thaw to improve consistency.
A technical overview of the Proxmox VE live backup for QemuServer can be found online here.
|
Proxmox VE live backup provides snapshot-like semantics on any storage type. It does not require that the underlying storage supports snapshots. |
- stop mode
-
Stop the container for the duration of the backup. This potentially results in a very long downtime.
- suspend mode
-
This mode uses rsync to copy the container data to a temporary location (see option --tmpdir). Then the container is suspended and a second rsync copies changed files. After that, the container is started (resumed) again. This results in minimal downtime, but needs additional space to hold the container copy.
When the container is on a local file system and the target storage of the backup is an NFS server, you should set --tmpdir to reside on a local file system too, as this will result in a many fold performance improvement. Use of a local tmpdir is also required if you want to backup a local container using ACLs in suspend mode if the backup storage is an NFS server.
- snapshot mode
-
This mode uses the snapshotting facilities of the underlying storage. First, the container will be suspended to ensure data consistency. A temporary snapshot of the container’s volumes will be made and the snapshot content will be archived in a tar file. Finally, the temporary snapshot is deleted again.
|
snapshot mode requires that all backed up volumes are on a storage that supports snapshots. Using the backup=no mount point option individual volumes can be excluded from the backup (and thus this requirement). |
|
bind and device mount points are skipped during backup operations, like volume mount points with the backup option disabled. |
12.2. Backup File Names
Newer versions of vzdump encode the guest type and the backup time into the filename, for example
vzdump-lxc-105-2009_10_09-11_04_43.tar
That way it is possible to store several backup in the same directory. The parameter maxfiles can be used to specify the maximum number of backups to keep.
12.3. Restore
The resulting archive files can be restored with the following programs.
- pct restore
-
Container restore utility
- qmrestore
-
QemuServer restore utility
For details see the corresponding manual pages.
12.4. Configuration
Global configuration is stored in /etc/vzdump.conf. The file uses a simple colon separated key/value format. Each line has the following format:
OPTION: value
Blank lines in the file are ignored, and lines starting with a # character are treated as comments and are also ignored. Values from this file are used as default, and can be overwritten on the command line.
We currently support the following options:
- bwlimit: integer (0 - N) (default=0)
-
Limit I/O bandwidth (KBytes per second).
- compress: (0 | 1 | gzip | lzo) (default=0)
-
Compress dump file.
- dumpdir: string
-
Store resulting files to specified directory.
- exclude-path: string
-
Exclude certain files/directories (shell globs).
- ionice: integer (0 - 8) (default=7)
-
Set CFQ ionice priority.
- lockwait: integer (0 - N) (default=180)
-
Maximal time to wait for the global lock (minutes).
- mailnotification: (always | failure) (default=always)
-
Specify when to send an email
- mailto: string
-
Comma-separated list of email addresses that should receive email notifications.
- maxfiles: integer (1 - N) (default=1)
-
Maximal number of backup files per guest system.
- mode: (snapshot | stop | suspend) (default=snapshot)
-
Backup mode.
- pigz: integer (default=0)
-
Use pigz instead of gzip when N>0. N=1 uses half of cores, N>1 uses N as thread count.
- remove: boolean (default=1)
-
Remove old backup files if there are more than maxfiles backup files.
- script: string
-
Use specified hook script.
- stdexcludes: boolean (default=1)
-
Exclude temporary files and logs.
- stopwait: integer (0 - N) (default=10)
-
Maximal time to wait until a guest system is stopped (minutes).
- storage: string
-
Store resulting file to this storage.
- tmpdir: string
-
Store temporary files to specified directory.
tmpdir: /mnt/fast_local_disk storage: my_backup_storage mode: snapshot bwlimit: 10000
12.5. Hook Scripts
You can specify a hook script with option --script. This script is called at various phases of the backup process, with parameters accordingly set. You can find an example in the documentation directory (vzdump-hook-script.pl).
12.6. File Exclusions
|
this option is only available for container backups. |
vzdump skips the following files by default (disable with the option --stdexcludes 0)
/tmp/?* /var/tmp/?* /var/run/?*pid
You can also manually specify (additional) exclude paths, for example:
# vzdump 777 --exclude-path /tmp/ --exclude-path '/var/foo*'
(only excludes tmp directories)
Configuration files are also stored inside the backup archive (in ./etc/vzdump/) and will be correctly restored.
12.7. Examples
Simply dump guest 777 - no snapshot, just archive the guest private area and configuration files to the default dump directory (usually /var/lib/vz/dump/).
# vzdump 777
Use rsync and suspend/resume to create a snapshot (minimal downtime).
# vzdump 777 --mode suspend
Backup all guest systems and send notification mails to root and admin.
# vzdump --all --mode suspend --mailto root --mailto admin
Use snapshot mode (no downtime) and non-default dump directory.
# vzdump 777 --dumpdir /mnt/backup --mode snapshot
Backup more than one guest (selectively)
# vzdump 101 102 103 --mailto root
Backup all guests excluding 101 and 102
# vzdump --mode suspend --exclude 101,102
Restore a container to a new CT 600
# pct restore 600 /mnt/backup/vzdump-lxc-777.tar
Restore a QemuServer VM to VM 601
# qmrestore /mnt/backup/vzdump-qemu-888.vma 601
Clone an existing container 101 to a new container 300 with a 4GB root file system, using pipes
# vzdump 101 --stdout | pct restore --rootfs 4 300 -
13. Important Service Daemons
13.1. pvedaemon - Proxmox VE API Daemon
This daemon exposes the whole Proxmox VE API on 127.0.0.1:85. It runs as root and has permission to do all privileged operations.
|
The daemon listens to a local address only, so you cannot access it from outside. The pveproxy daemon exposes the API to the outside world. |
13.2. pveproxy - Proxmox VE API Proxy Daemon
This daemon exposes the whole Proxmox VE API on TCP port 8006 using HTTPS. It runs as user www-data and has very limited permissions. Operation requiring more permissions are forwarded to the local pvedaemon.
Requests targeted for other nodes are automatically forwarded to those nodes. This means that you can manage your whole cluster by connecting to a single Proxmox VE node.
13.2.1. Host based Access Control
It is possible to configure “apache2”-like access control lists. Values are read from file /etc/default/pveproxy. For example:
ALLOW_FROM="10.0.0.1-10.0.0.5,192.168.0.0/22" DENY_FROM="all" POLICY="allow"
IP addresses can be specified using any syntax understood by Net::IP. The name all is an alias for 0/0.
The default policy is allow.
Match | POLICY=deny | POLICY=allow |
---|---|---|
Match Allow only |
allow |
allow |
Match Deny only |
deny |
deny |
No match |
deny |
allow |
Match Both Allow & Deny |
deny |
allow |
13.2.2. SSL Cipher Suite
You can define the cipher list in /etc/default/pveproxy, for example
CIPHERS="HIGH:MEDIUM:!aNULL:!MD5"
Above is the default. See the ciphers(1) man page from the openssl package for a list of all available options.
13.2.3. Diffie-Hellman Parameters
You can define the used Diffie-Hellman parameters in /etc/default/pveproxy by setting DHPARAMS to the path of a file containing DH parameters in PEM format, for example
DHPARAMS="/path/to/dhparams.pem"
If this option is not set, the built-in skip2048 parameters will be used.
|
DH parameters are only used if a cipher suite utilizing the DH key exchange algorithm is negotiated. |
13.2.4. Alternative HTTPS certificate
By default, pveproxy uses the certificate /etc/pve/local/pve-ssl.pem (and private key /etc/pve/local/pve-ssl.key) for HTTPS connections. This certificate is signed by the cluster CA certificate, and therefor not trusted by browsers and operating systems by default.
In order to use a different certificate and private key for HTTPS, store the server certificate and any needed intermediate / CA certificates in PEM format in the file /etc/pve/local/pveproxy-ssl.pem and the associated private key in PEM format without a password in the file /etc/pve/local/pveproxy-ssl.key.
|
Do not replace the automatically generated node certificate files in /etc/pve/local/pve-ssl.pem and etc/pve/local/pve-ssl.key or the cluster CA files in /etc/pve/pve-root-ca.pem and /etc/pve/priv/pve-root-ca.key. |
|
There is a detailed HOWTO for configuring commercial HTTPS certificates on the wiki, including setup instructions for obtaining certificates from the popular free Let’s Encrypt certificate authority. |
13.3. pvestatd - Proxmox VE Status Daemon
This daemon queries the status of VMs, storages and containers at regular intervals. The result is sent to all nodes in the cluster.
13.4. spiceproxy - SPICE Proxy Service
SPICE (the Simple Protocol for Independent Computing Environments) is an open remote computing solution, providing client access to remote displays and devices (e.g. keyboard, mouse, audio). The main use case is to get remote access to virtual machines and container.
This daemon listens on TCP port 3128, and implements an HTTP proxy to forward CONNECT request from the SPICE client to the correct Proxmox VE VM. It runs as user www-data and has very limited permissions.
13.4.1. Host based Access Control
It is possible to configure "apache2" like access control lists. Values are read from file /etc/default/pveproxy. See pveproxy documentation for details.
14. Useful Command Line Tools
14.1. pveceph - Manage CEPH Services on Proxmox VE Nodes
Tool to manage CEPH services on Proxmox VE nodes.
14.2. pvesubscription - Subscription Management
This tool is used to handle Proxmox VE subscriptions.
14.3. pveperf - Proxmox VE Benchmark Script
Tries to gather some CPU/hard disk performance data on the hard disk mounted at PATH (/ is used as default):
- CPU BOGOMIPS
-
bogomips sum of all CPUs
- REGEX/SECOND
-
regular expressions per second (perl performance test), should be above 300000
- HD SIZE
-
hard disk size
- BUFFERED READS
-
simple HD read test. Modern HDs should reach at least 40 MB/sec
- AVERAGE SEEK TIME
-
tests average seek time. Fast SCSI HDs reach values < 8 milliseconds. Common IDE/SATA disks get values from 15 to 20 ms.
- FSYNCS/SECOND
-
value should be greater than 200 (you should enable write back cache mode on you RAID controller - needs a battery backed cache (BBWC)).
- DNS EXT
-
average time to resolve an external DNS name
- DNS INT
-
average time to resolve a local DNS name
15. Frequently Asked Questions
|
New FAQs are appended to the bottom of this section. |
-
What distribution is Proxmox VE based on?
Proxmox VE is based on Debian GNU/Linux
-
What license does the Proxmox VE project use?
Proxmox VE code is licensed under the GNU Affero General Public License, version 3.
-
Will Proxmox VE run on a 32bit processor?
Proxmox VE works only on 64-bit CPUs (AMD or Intel). There is no plan for 32-bit for the platform.
VMs and Containers can be both 32-bit and/or 64-bit. -
Does my CPU support virtualization?
To check if your CPU is virtualization compatible, check for the vmx or svm tag in this command output:
egrep '(vmx|svm)' /proc/cpuinfo
-
Supported Intel CPUs
64-bit processors with Intel Virtualization Technology (Intel VT-x) support. (List of processors with Intel VT and 64-bit)
-
Supported AMD CPUs
64-bit processors with AMD Virtualization Technology (AMD-V) support.
-
What is a container, CT, VE, Virtual Private Server, VPS?
Operating-system-level virtualization is a server-virtualization method where the kernel of an operating system allows for multiple isolated user-space instances, instead of just one. We call such instances containers. As containers use the host’s kernel they are limited to Linux guests.
-
What is a QEMU/KVM guest (or VM)?
A QEMU/KVM guest (or VM) is a guest system running virtualized under Proxmox VE using QEMU and the Linux KVM kernel module.
-
What is QEMU?
QEMU is a generic and open source machine emulator and virtualizer. QEMU uses the Linux KVM kernel module to achieve near native performance by executing the guest code directly on the host CPU. It is not limited to Linux guests but allows arbitrary operating systems to run.
-
How long will my Proxmox VE version be supported?
Proxmox VE versions are supported at least as long as the corresponding Debian Version is oldstable. Proxmox VE uses a rolling release model and using the latest stable version is always recommended.
Proxmox VE Version Debian Version First Release Debian EOL Proxmox EOL Proxmox VE 4.x
Debian 8 (Jessie)
2015-10
2018-05
tba
Proxmox VE 3.x
Debian 7 (Wheezy)
2013-05
2016-04
2017-02
Proxmox VE 2.x
Debian 6 (Squeeze)
2012-04
2014-05
2014-05
Proxmox VE 1.x
Debian 5 (Lenny)
2008-10
2012-03
2013-01
-
LXC vs LXD vs Proxmox Containers vs Docker
LXC is a userspace interface for the Linux kernel containment features. Through a powerful API and simple tools, it lets Linux users easily create and manage system containers. LXC, as well as the former OpenVZ, aims at system virtualization, i.e. allows you to run a complete OS inside a container, where you log in as ssh, add users, run apache, etc…
LXD is building on top of LXC to provide a new, better user experience. Under the hood, LXD uses LXC through liblxc and its Go binding to create and manage the containers. It’s basically an alternative to LXC’s tools and distribution template system with the added features that come from being controllable over the network.
Proxmox Containers also aims at system virtualization, and thus uses LXC as the basis of its own container offer. The Proxmox Container Toolkit is called pct, and is tightly coupled with Proxmox VE. That means that it is aware of the cluster setup, and it can use the same network and storage resources as fully virtualized VMs. You can even use the Proxmox VE firewall, create and restore backups, or manage containers using the HA framework. Everything can be controlled over the network using the Proxmox VE API.
Docker aims at running a single application running in a contained environment. Hence you’re managing a docker instance from the host with the docker toolkit. It is not recommended to run docker directly on your Proxmox VE host.
You can however perfectly install and use docker inside a Proxmox Qemu VM, and thus getting the benefit of software containerization with the very strong isolation that VMs provide.
16. Bibliography
-
[Ahmed16] Wasim Ahmed. Mastering Proxmox - Second Edition. Packt Publishing, 2016. ISBN 978-1785888243
-
[Ahmed15] Wasim Ahmed. Proxmox Cookbook. Packt Publishing, 2015. ISBN 978-1783980901
-
[Cheng14] Simon M.C. Cheng. Proxmox High Availability. Packt Publishing, 2014. ISBN 978-1783980888
-
[Goldman16] Rik Goldman. Learning Proxmox VE. Packt Publishing, 2016. ISBN 978-1783981786
-
[Surber16]] Lee R. Surber. Virtualization Complete: Business Basic Edition. Linux Solutions (LRS-TEK), 2016. ASIN B01BBVQZT6
-
[Hertzog13] Raphaël Hertzog & Roland Mas. The Debian Administrator's Handbook: Debian Jessie from Discovery to Mastery, Freexian, 2013. ISBN 979-1091414050
-
[Bir96] Kenneth P. Birman. Building Secure and Reliable Network Applications. Manning Publications Co, 1996. ISBN 978-1884777295
-
[Walsh10] Norman Walsh. DocBook 5: The Definitive Guide. O’Reilly & Associates, 2010. ISBN 978-0596805029
-
[Richardson07] Leonard Richardson & Sam Ruby. RESTful Web Services. O’Reilly Media, 2007. ISBN 978-0596529260
-
[Singh15] Karan Singh. Learning Ceph. Packt Publishing, 2015. ISBN 978-1783985623
-
[Singh16] Karan Signh. Ceph Cookbook Packt Publishing, 2016. ISBN 978-1784393502
-
[Mauerer08] Wolfgang Mauerer. Professional Linux Kernel Architecture. John Wiley & Sons, 2008. ISBN 978-0470343432
-
[Loshin03] Pete Loshin, IPv6: Theory, Protocol, and Practice, 2nd Edition. Morgan Kaufmann, 2003. ISBN 978-1558608108
-
[Loeliger12] Jon Loeliger & Matthew McCullough. Version Control with Git: Powerful tools and techniques for collaborative software development. O’Reilly and Associates, 2012. ISBN 978-1449316389
-
[Kreibich10] Jay A. Kreibich. Using SQLite, O’Reilly and Associates, 2010. ISBN 978-0596521189
17. Appendix A: Command Line Interface
17.1. pvesm - Proxmox VE Storage Manager
pvesm <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pvesm add <type> <storage> [OPTIONS]
Create a new storage.
- <type> (dir | drbd | glusterfs | iscsi | iscsidirect | lvm | lvmthin | nfs | rbd | sheepdog | zfs | zfspool)
-
Storage type.
- <storage> string
-
The storage identifier.
- -authsupported string
-
Authsupported.
- -base string
-
Base volume. This volume is automatically activated.
- -blocksize string
-
block size
- -comstar_hg string
-
host group for comstar views
- -comstar_tg string
-
target group for comstar views
- -content string
-
Allowed content types.
the value rootdir is used for Containers, and value images for VMs. - -disable boolean
-
Flag to disable the storage.
- -export string
-
NFS export path.
- -format string
-
Default image format.
- -is_mountpoint boolean (default=no)
-
Assume the directory is an externally managed mountpoint. If nothing is mounted the storage will be considered offline.
- -iscsiprovider string
-
iscsi provider
- -krbd boolean
-
Access rbd through krbd kernel module.
- -maxfiles integer (0 - N)
-
Maximal number of backup files per VM. Use 0 for unlimted.
- -mkdir boolean (default=yes)
-
Create the directory if it doesn’t exist.
- -monhost string
-
Monitors daemon ips.
- -nodes string
-
List of cluster node names.
- -nowritecache boolean
-
disable write caching on the target
- -options string
-
NFS mount options (see man nfs)
- -path string
-
File system path.
- -pool string
-
Pool.
- -portal string
-
iSCSI portal (IP or DNS name with optional port).
- -redundancy integer (1 - 16) (default=2)
-
The redundancy count specifies the number of nodes to which the resource should be deployed. It must be at least 1 and at most the number of nodes in the cluster.
- -saferemove boolean
-
Zero-out data when removing LVs.
- -saferemove_throughput string
-
Wipe throughput (cstream -t parameter value).
- -server string
-
Server IP or DNS name.
- -server2 string
-
Backup volfile server IP or DNS name.
Requires option(s): server - -shared boolean
-
Mark storage as shared.
- -sparse boolean
-
use sparse volumes
- -tagged_only boolean
-
Only use logical volumes tagged with pve-vm-ID.
- -target string
-
iSCSI target.
- -thinpool string
-
LVM thin pool LV name.
- -transport (rdma | tcp | unix)
-
Gluster transport: tcp or rdma
- -username string
-
RBD Id.
- -vgname string
-
Volume group name.
- -volume string
-
Glusterfs Volume.
pvesm alloc <storage> <vmid> <filename> <size> [OPTIONS]
Allocate disk images.
- <storage> string
-
The storage identifier.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
Specify owner VM
- <filename> string
-
The name of the file to create.
- <size> \d+[MG]?
-
Size in kilobyte (1024 bytes). Optional suffixes M (megabyte, 1024K) and G (gigabyte, 1024M)
- -format (qcow2 | raw | subvol)
-
no description available
Requires option(s): size
pvesm extractconfig <volume>
Extract configuration from vzdump backup archive.
- <volume> string
-
Volume identifier
pvesm free <volume> [OPTIONS]
Delete volume
- <volume> string
-
Volume identifier
- -storage string
-
The storage identifier.
pvesm glusterfsscan <server>
Scan remote GlusterFS server.
- <server> string
-
no description available
pvesm help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pvesm iscsiscan -portal <string> [OPTIONS]
Scan remote iSCSI server.
- -portal string
-
no description available
pvesm list <storage> [OPTIONS]
List storage content.
- <storage> string
-
The storage identifier.
- -content string
-
Only list content of this type.
- -vmid integer (1 - N)
-
Only list images for this VM
pvesm lvmscan
List local LVM volume groups.
pvesm lvmthinscan <vg>
List local LVM Thin Pools.
- <vg> [a-zA-Z0-9\.\+\_][a-zA-Z0-9\.\+\_\-]+
-
no description available
pvesm nfsscan <server>
Scan remote NFS server.
- <server> string
-
no description available
pvesm path <volume>
Get filesystem path for specified volume
- <volume> string
-
Volume identifier
pvesm remove <storage>
Delete storage configuration.
- <storage> string
-
The storage identifier.
pvesm set <storage> [OPTIONS]
Update storage configuration.
- <storage> string
-
The storage identifier.
- -blocksize string
-
block size
- -comstar_hg string
-
host group for comstar views
- -comstar_tg string
-
target group for comstar views
- -content string
-
Allowed content types.
the value rootdir is used for Containers, and value images for VMs. - -delete string
-
A list of settings you want to delete.
- -digest string
-
Prevent changes if current configuration file has different SHA1 digest. This can be used to prevent concurrent modifications.
- -disable boolean
-
Flag to disable the storage.
- -format string
-
Default image format.
- -is_mountpoint boolean (default=no)
-
Assume the directory is an externally managed mountpoint. If nothing is mounted the storage will be considered offline.
- -krbd boolean
-
Access rbd through krbd kernel module.
- -maxfiles integer (0 - N)
-
Maximal number of backup files per VM. Use 0 for unlimted.
- -mkdir boolean (default=yes)
-
Create the directory if it doesn’t exist.
- -nodes string
-
List of cluster node names.
- -nowritecache boolean
-
disable write caching on the target
- -options string
-
NFS mount options (see man nfs)
- -pool string
-
Pool.
- -redundancy integer (1 - 16) (default=2)
-
The redundancy count specifies the number of nodes to which the resource should be deployed. It must be at least 1 and at most the number of nodes in the cluster.
- -saferemove boolean
-
Zero-out data when removing LVs.
- -saferemove_throughput string
-
Wipe throughput (cstream -t parameter value).
- -server string
-
Server IP or DNS name.
- -server2 string
-
Backup volfile server IP or DNS name.
Requires option(s): server - -shared boolean
-
Mark storage as shared.
- -sparse boolean
-
use sparse volumes
- -tagged_only boolean
-
Only use logical volumes tagged with pve-vm-ID.
- -transport (rdma | tcp | unix)
-
Gluster transport: tcp or rdma
- -username string
-
RBD Id.
pvesm status [OPTIONS]
Get status for all datastores.
- -content string
-
Only list stores which support this content type.
- -enabled boolean (default=0)
-
Only list stores which are enabled (not disabled in config).
- -storage string
-
Only list status for specified storage
- -target string
-
If target is different to node, we only lists shared storages which content is accessible on this node and the specified target node.
pvesm zfsscan
Scan zfs pool list on local node.
17.2. pvesubscription - Proxmox VE Subscription Manager
pvesubscription <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pvesubscription get
Read subscription info.
pvesubscription help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pvesubscription set <key>
Set subscription key.
- <key> string
-
Proxmox VE subscription key
pvesubscription update [OPTIONS]
Update subscription info.
- -force boolean (default=0)
-
Always connect to server, even if we have up to date info inside local cache.
17.3. pveperf - Proxmox VE Benchmark Script
pveperf [PATH]
17.4. pveceph - Manage CEPH Services on Proxmox VE Nodes
pveceph <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pveceph createmon
Create Ceph Monitor
pveceph createosd <dev> [OPTIONS]
Create OSD
- <dev> string
-
Block device name.
- -fstype (btrfs | ext4 | xfs) (default=xfs)
-
File system type.
- -journal_dev string
-
Block device name for journal.
pveceph createpool <name> [OPTIONS]
Create POOL
- <name> string
-
The name of the pool. It must be unique.
- -crush_ruleset integer (0 - 32768) (default=0)
-
The ruleset to use for mapping object placement in the cluster.
- -min_size integer (1 - 3) (default=1)
-
Minimum number of replicas per object
- -pg_num integer (8 - 32768) (default=64)
-
Number of placement groups.
- -size integer (1 - 3) (default=2)
-
Number of replicas per object
pveceph destroymon <monid>
Destroy Ceph monitor.
- <monid> integer
-
Monitor ID
pveceph destroyosd <osdid> [OPTIONS]
Destroy OSD
- <osdid> integer
-
OSD ID
- -cleanup boolean (default=0)
-
If set, we remove partition table entries.
pveceph destroypool <name> [OPTIONS]
Destroy pool
- <name> string
-
The name of the pool. It must be unique.
- -force boolean (default=0)
-
If true, destroys pool even if in use
pveceph help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pveceph init [OPTIONS]
Create initial ceph default configuration and setup symlinks.
- -network string
-
Use specific network for all ceph related traffic
- -pg_bits integer (6 - 14) (default=6)
-
Placement group bits, used to specify the default number of placement groups.
osd pool default pg num does not work for default pools. - -size integer (1 - 3) (default=2)
-
Number of replicas per object
pveceph install [OPTIONS]
Install ceph related packages.
- -version (hammer)
-
no description available
pveceph lspools
List all pools.
pveceph purge
Destroy ceph related data and configuration files.
pveceph start [<service>]
Start ceph services.
- <service> (mon|mds|osd)\.[A-Za-z0-9]{1,32}
-
Ceph service name.
pveceph status
Get ceph status.
pveceph stop [<service>]
Stop ceph services.
- <service> (mon|mds|osd)\.[A-Za-z0-9]{1,32}
-
Ceph service name.
17.5. qm - Qemu/KVM Virtual Machine Manager
qm <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
qm clone <vmid> <newid> [OPTIONS]
Create a copy of virtual machine/template.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <newid> integer (1 - N)
-
VMID for the clone.
- -description string
-
Description for the new VM.
- -format (qcow2 | raw | vmdk)
-
Target format for file storage.
Requires option(s): full - -full boolean (default=0)
-
Create a full copy of all disk. This is always done when you clone a normal VM. For VM templates, we try to create a linked clone by default.
- -name string
-
Set a name for the new VM.
- -pool string
-
Add the new VM to the specified pool.
- -snapname string
-
The name of the snapshot.
- -storage string
-
Target storage for full clone.
Requires option(s): full - -target string
-
Target node. Only allowed if the original VM is on shared storage.
qm config <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Get current virtual machine configuration. This does not include pending configuration changes (see pending API).
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -current boolean (default=0)
-
Get current values (instead of pending values).
qm create <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Create or restore a virtual machine.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -acpi boolean (default=1)
-
Enable/disable ACPI.
- -agent boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable Qemu GuestAgent.
- -archive string
-
The backup file.
- -args string
-
Arbitrary arguments passed to kvm.
- -autostart boolean (default=0)
-
Automatic restart after crash (currently ignored).
- -balloon integer (0 - N)
-
Amount of target RAM for the VM in MB. Using zero disables the ballon driver.
- -bios (ovmf | seabios) (default=seabios)
-
Select BIOS implementation.
- -boot [acdn]{1,4} (default=cdn)
-
Boot on floppy (a), hard disk (c), CD-ROM (d), or network (n).
- -bootdisk (ide|sata|scsi|virtio)\d+
-
Enable booting from specified disk.
- -cdrom volume
-
This is an alias for option -ide2
- -cores integer (1 - N) (default=1)
-
The number of cores per socket.
- -cpu [cputype=]<cputype> [,hidden=<1|0>]
-
Emulated CPU type.
- -cpulimit number (0 - 128) (default=0)
-
Limit of CPU usage.
- -cpuunits integer (0 - 500000) (default=1000)
-
CPU weight for a VM.
- -description string
-
Description for the VM. Only used on the configuration web interface. This is saved as comment inside the configuration file.
- -efidisk0 [file=]<volume> [,format=<image format>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
-
Configure a Disk for storing EFI vars
- -force boolean
-
Allow to overwrite existing VM.
Requires option(s): archive - -freeze boolean
-
Freeze CPU at startup (use c monitor command to start execution).
- -hostpci[n] [host=]<HOSTPCIID[;HOSTPCIID2...]> [,pcie=<1|0>] [,rombar=<1|0>] [,x-vga=<1|0>]
-
Map host PCI devices into guest.
- -hotplug string (default=network,disk,usb)
-
Selectively enable hotplug features. This is a comma separated list of hotplug features: network, disk, cpu, memory and usb. Use 0 to disable hotplug completely. Value 1 is an alias for the default network,disk,usb.
- -hugepages (1024 | 2 | any)
-
Enable/disable hugepages memory.
- -ide[n] [file=]<volume> [,aio=<native|threads>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,bps=<bps>] [,bps_rd=<bps>] [,bps_wr=<bps>] [,cache=<none|writethrough|writeback|unsafe|directsync>] [,cyls=<integer>] [,detect_zeroes=<1|0>] [,discard=<ignore|on>] [,format=<image format>] [,heads=<integer>] [,iops=<iops>] [,iops_max=<iops>] [,iops_rd=<iops>] [,iops_rd_max=<iops>] [,iops_wr=<iops>] [,iops_wr_max=<iops>] [,mbps=<mbps>] [,mbps_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr_max=<mbps>] [,media=<cdrom|disk>] [,model=<model>] [,rerror=<ignore|report|stop>] [,secs=<integer>] [,serial=<serial>] [,size=<DiskSize>] [,snapshot=<1|0>] [,trans=<none|lba|auto>] [,werror=<enospc|ignore|report|stop>]
-
Use volume as IDE hard disk or CD-ROM (n is 0 to 3).
- -keyboard (da | de | de-ch | en-gb | en-us | es | fi | fr | fr-be | fr-ca | fr-ch | hu | is | it | ja | lt | mk | nl | no | pl | pt | pt-br | sl | sv | tr) (default=en-us)
-
Keybord layout for vnc server. Default is read from the /etc/pve/datacenter.conf configuration file.
- -kvm boolean (default=1)
-
Enable/disable KVM hardware virtualization.
- -localtime boolean
-
Set the real time clock to local time. This is enabled by default if ostype indicates a Microsoft OS.
- -lock (backup | migrate | rollback | snapshot)
-
Lock/unlock the VM.
- -machine (pc|pc(-i440fx)?-\d+\.\d+(\.pxe)?|q35|pc-q35-\d+\.\d+(\.pxe)?)
-
Specific the Qemu machine type.
- -memory integer (16 - N) (default=512)
-
Amount of RAM for the VM in MB. This is the maximum available memory when you use the balloon device.
- -migrate_downtime number (0 - N) (default=0.1)
-
Set maximum tolerated downtime (in seconds) for migrations.
- -migrate_speed integer (0 - N) (default=0)
-
Set maximum speed (in MB/s) for migrations. Value 0 is no limit.
- -name string
-
Set a name for the VM. Only used on the configuration web interface.
- -net[n] [model=]<model> [,bridge=<bridge>] [,firewall=<1|0>] [,link_down=<1|0>] [,macaddr=<XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX>] [,queues=<integer>] [,rate=<number>] [,tag=<integer>] [,trunks=<vlanid[;vlanid...]>] [,<model>=<macaddr>]
-
Specify network devices.
- -numa boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable NUMA.
- -numa[n] cpus=<id[-id];...> [,hostnodes=<id[-id];...>] [,memory=<number>] [,policy=<preferred|bind|interleave>]
-
NUMA topology.
- -onboot boolean (default=0)
-
Specifies whether a VM will be started during system bootup.
- -ostype (l24 | l26 | other | solaris | w2k | w2k3 | w2k8 | win7 | win8 | wvista | wxp)
-
Specify guest operating system.
- -parallel[n] /dev/parport\d+|/dev/usb/lp\d+
-
Map host parallel devices (n is 0 to 2).
- -pool string
-
Add the VM to the specified pool.
- -protection boolean (default=0)
-
Sets the protection flag of the VM. This will disable the remove VM and remove disk operations.
- -reboot boolean (default=1)
-
Allow reboot. If set to 0 the VM exit on reboot.
- -sata[n] [file=]<volume> [,aio=<native|threads>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,bps=<bps>] [,bps_rd=<bps>] [,bps_wr=<bps>] [,cache=<none|writethrough|writeback|unsafe|directsync>] [,cyls=<integer>] [,detect_zeroes=<1|0>] [,discard=<ignore|on>] [,format=<image format>] [,heads=<integer>] [,iops=<iops>] [,iops_max=<iops>] [,iops_rd=<iops>] [,iops_rd_max=<iops>] [,iops_wr=<iops>] [,iops_wr_max=<iops>] [,mbps=<mbps>] [,mbps_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr_max=<mbps>] [,media=<cdrom|disk>] [,rerror=<ignore|report|stop>] [,secs=<integer>] [,serial=<serial>] [,size=<DiskSize>] [,snapshot=<1|0>] [,trans=<none|lba|auto>] [,werror=<enospc|ignore|report|stop>]
-
Use volume as SATA hard disk or CD-ROM (n is 0 to 5).
- -scsi[n] [file=]<volume> [,aio=<native|threads>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,bps=<bps>] [,bps_rd=<bps>] [,bps_wr=<bps>] [,cache=<none|writethrough|writeback|unsafe|directsync>] [,cyls=<integer>] [,detect_zeroes=<1|0>] [,discard=<ignore|on>] [,format=<image format>] [,heads=<integer>] [,iops=<iops>] [,iops_max=<iops>] [,iops_rd=<iops>] [,iops_rd_max=<iops>] [,iops_wr=<iops>] [,iops_wr_max=<iops>] [,iothread=<1|0>] [,mbps=<mbps>] [,mbps_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr_max=<mbps>] [,media=<cdrom|disk>] [,queues=<integer>] [,secs=<integer>] [,serial=<serial>] [,size=<DiskSize>] [,snapshot=<1|0>] [,trans=<none|lba|auto>] [,werror=<enospc|ignore|report|stop>]
-
Use volume as SCSI hard disk or CD-ROM (n is 0 to 13).
- -scsihw (lsi | lsi53c810 | megasas | pvscsi | virtio-scsi-pci | virtio-scsi-single) (default=lsi)
-
SCSI controller model
- -serial[n] (/dev/.+|socket)
-
Create a serial device inside the VM (n is 0 to 3)
- -shares integer (0 - 50000) (default=1000)
-
Amount of memory shares for auto-ballooning. The larger the number is, the more memory this VM gets. Number is relative to weights of all other running VMs. Using zero disables auto-ballooning
- -smbios1 [family=<string>] [,manufacturer=<string>] [,product=<string>] [,serial=<string>] [,sku=<string>] [,uuid=<UUID>] [,version=<string>]
-
Specify SMBIOS type 1 fields.
- -smp integer (1 - N) (default=1)
-
The number of CPUs. Please use option -sockets instead.
- -sockets integer (1 - N) (default=1)
-
The number of CPU sockets.
- -startdate (now | YYYY-MM-DD | YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS) (default=now)
-
Set the initial date of the real time clock. Valid format for date are: now or 2006-06-17T16:01:21 or 2006-06-17.
- -startup `[[order=]\d+] [,up=\d+] [,down=\d+] `
-
Startup and shutdown behavior. Order is a non-negative number defining the general startup order. Shutdown in done with reverse ordering. Additionally you can set the up or down delay in seconds, which specifies a delay to wait before the next VM is started or stopped.
- -storage string
-
Default storage.
- -tablet boolean (default=1)
-
Enable/disable the USB tablet device.
- -tdf boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable time drift fix.
- -template boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable Template.
- -unique boolean
-
Assign a unique random ethernet address.
Requires option(s): archive - -unused[n] string
-
Reference to unused volumes. This is used internally, and should not be modified manually.
- -usb[n] [host=]<HOSTUSBDEVICE|spice> [,usb3=<1|0>]
-
Configure an USB device (n is 0 to 4).
- -vcpus integer (1 - N) (default=0)
-
Number of hotplugged vcpus.
- -vga (cirrus | qxl | qxl2 | qxl3 | qxl4 | serial0 | serial1 | serial2 | serial3 | std | vmware)
-
Select the VGA type.
- -virtio[n] [file=]<volume> [,aio=<native|threads>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,bps=<bps>] [,bps_rd=<bps>] [,bps_wr=<bps>] [,cache=<none|writethrough|writeback|unsafe|directsync>] [,cyls=<integer>] [,detect_zeroes=<1|0>] [,discard=<ignore|on>] [,format=<image format>] [,heads=<integer>] [,iops=<iops>] [,iops_max=<iops>] [,iops_rd=<iops>] [,iops_rd_max=<iops>] [,iops_wr=<iops>] [,iops_wr_max=<iops>] [,iothread=<1|0>] [,mbps=<mbps>] [,mbps_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr_max=<mbps>] [,media=<cdrom|disk>] [,rerror=<ignore|report|stop>] [,secs=<integer>] [,serial=<serial>] [,size=<DiskSize>] [,snapshot=<1|0>] [,trans=<none|lba|auto>] [,werror=<enospc|ignore|report|stop>]
-
Use volume as VIRTIO hard disk (n is 0 to 15).
- -watchdog [[model=]<i6300esb|ib700>] [,action=<reset|shutdown|poweroff|pause|debug|none>]
-
Create a virtual hardware watchdog device.
qm delsnapshot <vmid> <snapname> [OPTIONS]
Delete a VM snapshot.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <snapname> string
-
The name of the snapshot.
- -force boolean
-
For removal from config file, even if removing disk snapshots fails.
qm destroy <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Destroy the vm (also delete all used/owned volumes).
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -skiplock boolean
-
Ignore locks - only root is allowed to use this option.
qm help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
qm list [OPTIONS]
Virtual machine index (per node).
- -full boolean
-
Determine the full status of active VMs.
qm migrate <vmid> <target> [OPTIONS]
Migrate virtual machine. Creates a new migration task.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <target> string
-
Target node.
- -force boolean
-
Allow to migrate VMs which use local devices. Only root may use this option.
- -online boolean
-
Use online/live migration.
qm monitor <vmid>
Enter Qemu Monitor interface.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
qm move_disk <vmid> <disk> <storage> [OPTIONS]
Move volume to different storage.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <disk> (efidisk0 | ide0 | ide1 | ide2 | ide3 | sata0 | sata1 | sata2 | sata3 | sata4 | sata5 | scsi0 | scsi1 | scsi10 | scsi11 | scsi12 | scsi13 | scsi2 | scsi3 | scsi4 | scsi5 | scsi6 | scsi7 | scsi8 | scsi9 | virtio0 | virtio1 | virtio10 | virtio11 | virtio12 | virtio13 | virtio14 | virtio15 | virtio2 | virtio3 | virtio4 | virtio5 | virtio6 | virtio7 | virtio8 | virtio9)
-
The disk you want to move.
- <storage> string
-
Target storage.
- -delete boolean (default=0)
-
Delete the original disk after successful copy. By default the original disk is kept as unused disk.
- -digest string
-
Prevent changes if current configuration file has different SHA1 digest. This can be used to prevent concurrent modifications.
- -format (qcow2 | raw | vmdk)
-
Target Format.
qm mtunnel
Used by qmigrate - do not use manually.
qm pending <vmid>
Get virtual machine configuration, including pending changes.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
qm rescan [OPTIONS]
Rescan all storages and update disk sizes and unused disk images.
- -vmid integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
qm reset <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Reset virtual machine.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -skiplock boolean
-
Ignore locks - only root is allowed to use this option.
qm resize <vmid> <disk> <size> [OPTIONS]
Extend volume size.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <disk> (efidisk0 | ide0 | ide1 | ide2 | ide3 | sata0 | sata1 | sata2 | sata3 | sata4 | sata5 | scsi0 | scsi1 | scsi10 | scsi11 | scsi12 | scsi13 | scsi2 | scsi3 | scsi4 | scsi5 | scsi6 | scsi7 | scsi8 | scsi9 | virtio0 | virtio1 | virtio10 | virtio11 | virtio12 | virtio13 | virtio14 | virtio15 | virtio2 | virtio3 | virtio4 | virtio5 | virtio6 | virtio7 | virtio8 | virtio9)
-
The disk you want to resize.
- <size> \+?\d+(\.\d+)?[KMGT]?
-
The new size. With the + sign the value is added to the actual size of the volume and without it, the value is taken as an absolute one. Shrinking disk size is not supported.
- -digest string
-
Prevent changes if current configuration file has different SHA1 digest. This can be used to prevent concurrent modifications.
- -skiplock boolean
-
Ignore locks - only root is allowed to use this option.
qm resume <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Resume virtual machine.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -nocheck boolean
-
no description available
- -skiplock boolean
-
Ignore locks - only root is allowed to use this option.
qm rollback <vmid> <snapname>
Rollback VM state to specified snapshot.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <snapname> string
-
The name of the snapshot.
qm sendkey <vmid> <key> [OPTIONS]
Send key event to virtual machine.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <key> string
-
The key (qemu monitor encoding).
- -skiplock boolean
-
Ignore locks - only root is allowed to use this option.
qm set <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Set virtual machine options (synchrounous API) - You should consider using the POST method instead for any actions involving hotplug or storage allocation.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -acpi boolean (default=1)
-
Enable/disable ACPI.
- -agent boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable Qemu GuestAgent.
- -args string
-
Arbitrary arguments passed to kvm.
- -autostart boolean (default=0)
-
Automatic restart after crash (currently ignored).
- -balloon integer (0 - N)
-
Amount of target RAM for the VM in MB. Using zero disables the ballon driver.
- -bios (ovmf | seabios) (default=seabios)
-
Select BIOS implementation.
- -boot [acdn]{1,4} (default=cdn)
-
Boot on floppy (a), hard disk (c), CD-ROM (d), or network (n).
- -bootdisk (ide|sata|scsi|virtio)\d+
-
Enable booting from specified disk.
- -cdrom volume
-
This is an alias for option -ide2
- -cores integer (1 - N) (default=1)
-
The number of cores per socket.
- -cpu [cputype=]<cputype> [,hidden=<1|0>]
-
Emulated CPU type.
- -cpulimit number (0 - 128) (default=0)
-
Limit of CPU usage.
- -cpuunits integer (0 - 500000) (default=1000)
-
CPU weight for a VM.
- -delete string
-
A list of settings you want to delete.
- -description string
-
Description for the VM. Only used on the configuration web interface. This is saved as comment inside the configuration file.
- -digest string
-
Prevent changes if current configuration file has different SHA1 digest. This can be used to prevent concurrent modifications.
- -efidisk0 [file=]<volume> [,format=<image format>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
-
Configure a Disk for storing EFI vars
- -force boolean
-
Force physical removal. Without this, we simple remove the disk from the config file and create an additional configuration entry called unused[n], which contains the volume ID. Unlink of unused[n] always cause physical removal.
Requires option(s): delete - -freeze boolean
-
Freeze CPU at startup (use c monitor command to start execution).
- -hostpci[n] [host=]<HOSTPCIID[;HOSTPCIID2...]> [,pcie=<1|0>] [,rombar=<1|0>] [,x-vga=<1|0>]
-
Map host PCI devices into guest.
- -hotplug string (default=network,disk,usb)
-
Selectively enable hotplug features. This is a comma separated list of hotplug features: network, disk, cpu, memory and usb. Use 0 to disable hotplug completely. Value 1 is an alias for the default network,disk,usb.
- -hugepages (1024 | 2 | any)
-
Enable/disable hugepages memory.
- -ide[n] [file=]<volume> [,aio=<native|threads>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,bps=<bps>] [,bps_rd=<bps>] [,bps_wr=<bps>] [,cache=<none|writethrough|writeback|unsafe|directsync>] [,cyls=<integer>] [,detect_zeroes=<1|0>] [,discard=<ignore|on>] [,format=<image format>] [,heads=<integer>] [,iops=<iops>] [,iops_max=<iops>] [,iops_rd=<iops>] [,iops_rd_max=<iops>] [,iops_wr=<iops>] [,iops_wr_max=<iops>] [,mbps=<mbps>] [,mbps_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr_max=<mbps>] [,media=<cdrom|disk>] [,model=<model>] [,rerror=<ignore|report|stop>] [,secs=<integer>] [,serial=<serial>] [,size=<DiskSize>] [,snapshot=<1|0>] [,trans=<none|lba|auto>] [,werror=<enospc|ignore|report|stop>]
-
Use volume as IDE hard disk or CD-ROM (n is 0 to 3).
- -keyboard (da | de | de-ch | en-gb | en-us | es | fi | fr | fr-be | fr-ca | fr-ch | hu | is | it | ja | lt | mk | nl | no | pl | pt | pt-br | sl | sv | tr) (default=en-us)
-
Keybord layout for vnc server. Default is read from the /etc/pve/datacenter.conf configuration file.
- -kvm boolean (default=1)
-
Enable/disable KVM hardware virtualization.
- -localtime boolean
-
Set the real time clock to local time. This is enabled by default if ostype indicates a Microsoft OS.
- -lock (backup | migrate | rollback | snapshot)
-
Lock/unlock the VM.
- -machine (pc|pc(-i440fx)?-\d+\.\d+(\.pxe)?|q35|pc-q35-\d+\.\d+(\.pxe)?)
-
Specific the Qemu machine type.
- -memory integer (16 - N) (default=512)
-
Amount of RAM for the VM in MB. This is the maximum available memory when you use the balloon device.
- -migrate_downtime number (0 - N) (default=0.1)
-
Set maximum tolerated downtime (in seconds) for migrations.
- -migrate_speed integer (0 - N) (default=0)
-
Set maximum speed (in MB/s) for migrations. Value 0 is no limit.
- -name string
-
Set a name for the VM. Only used on the configuration web interface.
- -net[n] [model=]<model> [,bridge=<bridge>] [,firewall=<1|0>] [,link_down=<1|0>] [,macaddr=<XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX>] [,queues=<integer>] [,rate=<number>] [,tag=<integer>] [,trunks=<vlanid[;vlanid...]>] [,<model>=<macaddr>]
-
Specify network devices.
- -numa boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable NUMA.
- -numa[n] cpus=<id[-id];...> [,hostnodes=<id[-id];...>] [,memory=<number>] [,policy=<preferred|bind|interleave>]
-
NUMA topology.
- -onboot boolean (default=0)
-
Specifies whether a VM will be started during system bootup.
- -ostype (l24 | l26 | other | solaris | w2k | w2k3 | w2k8 | win7 | win8 | wvista | wxp)
-
Specify guest operating system.
- -parallel[n] /dev/parport\d+|/dev/usb/lp\d+
-
Map host parallel devices (n is 0 to 2).
- -protection boolean (default=0)
-
Sets the protection flag of the VM. This will disable the remove VM and remove disk operations.
- -reboot boolean (default=1)
-
Allow reboot. If set to 0 the VM exit on reboot.
- -revert string
-
Revert a pending change.
- -sata[n] [file=]<volume> [,aio=<native|threads>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,bps=<bps>] [,bps_rd=<bps>] [,bps_wr=<bps>] [,cache=<none|writethrough|writeback|unsafe|directsync>] [,cyls=<integer>] [,detect_zeroes=<1|0>] [,discard=<ignore|on>] [,format=<image format>] [,heads=<integer>] [,iops=<iops>] [,iops_max=<iops>] [,iops_rd=<iops>] [,iops_rd_max=<iops>] [,iops_wr=<iops>] [,iops_wr_max=<iops>] [,mbps=<mbps>] [,mbps_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr_max=<mbps>] [,media=<cdrom|disk>] [,rerror=<ignore|report|stop>] [,secs=<integer>] [,serial=<serial>] [,size=<DiskSize>] [,snapshot=<1|0>] [,trans=<none|lba|auto>] [,werror=<enospc|ignore|report|stop>]
-
Use volume as SATA hard disk or CD-ROM (n is 0 to 5).
- -scsi[n] [file=]<volume> [,aio=<native|threads>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,bps=<bps>] [,bps_rd=<bps>] [,bps_wr=<bps>] [,cache=<none|writethrough|writeback|unsafe|directsync>] [,cyls=<integer>] [,detect_zeroes=<1|0>] [,discard=<ignore|on>] [,format=<image format>] [,heads=<integer>] [,iops=<iops>] [,iops_max=<iops>] [,iops_rd=<iops>] [,iops_rd_max=<iops>] [,iops_wr=<iops>] [,iops_wr_max=<iops>] [,iothread=<1|0>] [,mbps=<mbps>] [,mbps_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr_max=<mbps>] [,media=<cdrom|disk>] [,queues=<integer>] [,secs=<integer>] [,serial=<serial>] [,size=<DiskSize>] [,snapshot=<1|0>] [,trans=<none|lba|auto>] [,werror=<enospc|ignore|report|stop>]
-
Use volume as SCSI hard disk or CD-ROM (n is 0 to 13).
- -scsihw (lsi | lsi53c810 | megasas | pvscsi | virtio-scsi-pci | virtio-scsi-single) (default=lsi)
-
SCSI controller model
- -serial[n] (/dev/.+|socket)
-
Create a serial device inside the VM (n is 0 to 3)
- -shares integer (0 - 50000) (default=1000)
-
Amount of memory shares for auto-ballooning. The larger the number is, the more memory this VM gets. Number is relative to weights of all other running VMs. Using zero disables auto-ballooning
- -skiplock boolean
-
Ignore locks - only root is allowed to use this option.
- -smbios1 [family=<string>] [,manufacturer=<string>] [,product=<string>] [,serial=<string>] [,sku=<string>] [,uuid=<UUID>] [,version=<string>]
-
Specify SMBIOS type 1 fields.
- -smp integer (1 - N) (default=1)
-
The number of CPUs. Please use option -sockets instead.
- -sockets integer (1 - N) (default=1)
-
The number of CPU sockets.
- -startdate (now | YYYY-MM-DD | YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS) (default=now)
-
Set the initial date of the real time clock. Valid format for date are: now or 2006-06-17T16:01:21 or 2006-06-17.
- -startup `[[order=]\d+] [,up=\d+] [,down=\d+] `
-
Startup and shutdown behavior. Order is a non-negative number defining the general startup order. Shutdown in done with reverse ordering. Additionally you can set the up or down delay in seconds, which specifies a delay to wait before the next VM is started or stopped.
- -tablet boolean (default=1)
-
Enable/disable the USB tablet device.
- -tdf boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable time drift fix.
- -template boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable Template.
- -unused[n] string
-
Reference to unused volumes. This is used internally, and should not be modified manually.
- -usb[n] [host=]<HOSTUSBDEVICE|spice> [,usb3=<1|0>]
-
Configure an USB device (n is 0 to 4).
- -vcpus integer (1 - N) (default=0)
-
Number of hotplugged vcpus.
- -vga (cirrus | qxl | qxl2 | qxl3 | qxl4 | serial0 | serial1 | serial2 | serial3 | std | vmware)
-
Select the VGA type.
- -virtio[n] [file=]<volume> [,aio=<native|threads>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,bps=<bps>] [,bps_rd=<bps>] [,bps_wr=<bps>] [,cache=<none|writethrough|writeback|unsafe|directsync>] [,cyls=<integer>] [,detect_zeroes=<1|0>] [,discard=<ignore|on>] [,format=<image format>] [,heads=<integer>] [,iops=<iops>] [,iops_max=<iops>] [,iops_rd=<iops>] [,iops_rd_max=<iops>] [,iops_wr=<iops>] [,iops_wr_max=<iops>] [,iothread=<1|0>] [,mbps=<mbps>] [,mbps_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd=<mbps>] [,mbps_rd_max=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr=<mbps>] [,mbps_wr_max=<mbps>] [,media=<cdrom|disk>] [,rerror=<ignore|report|stop>] [,secs=<integer>] [,serial=<serial>] [,size=<DiskSize>] [,snapshot=<1|0>] [,trans=<none|lba|auto>] [,werror=<enospc|ignore|report|stop>]
-
Use volume as VIRTIO hard disk (n is 0 to 15).
- -watchdog [[model=]<i6300esb|ib700>] [,action=<reset|shutdown|poweroff|pause|debug|none>]
-
Create a virtual hardware watchdog device.
qm showcmd <vmid>
Show command line which is used to start the VM (debug info).
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
qm shutdown <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Shutdown virtual machine. This is similar to pressing the power button on a physical machine.This will send an ACPI event for the guest OS, which should then proceed to a clean shutdown.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -forceStop boolean (default=0)
-
Make sure the VM stops.
- -keepActive boolean (default=0)
-
Do not decativate storage volumes.
- -skiplock boolean
-
Ignore locks - only root is allowed to use this option.
- -timeout integer (0 - N)
-
Wait maximal timeout seconds.
qm snapshot <vmid> <snapname> [OPTIONS]
Snapshot a VM.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <snapname> string
-
The name of the snapshot.
- -description string
-
A textual description or comment.
- -vmstate boolean
-
Save the vmstate
qm start <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Start virtual machine.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -machine (pc|pc(-i440fx)?-\d+\.\d+(\.pxe)?|q35|pc-q35-\d+\.\d+(\.pxe)?)
-
Specific the Qemu machine type.
- -migratedfrom string
-
The cluster node name.
- -skiplock boolean
-
Ignore locks - only root is allowed to use this option.
- -stateuri string
-
Some command save/restore state from this location.
qm status <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Show VM status.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format
qm stop <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Stop virtual machine. The qemu process will exit immediately. Thisis akin to pulling the power plug of a running computer and may damage the VM data
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -keepActive boolean (default=0)
-
Do not decativate storage volumes.
- -migratedfrom string
-
The cluster node name.
- -skiplock boolean
-
Ignore locks - only root is allowed to use this option.
- -timeout integer (0 - N)
-
Wait maximal timeout seconds.
qm suspend <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Suspend virtual machine.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -skiplock boolean
-
Ignore locks - only root is allowed to use this option.
qm template <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Create a Template.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -disk (efidisk0 | ide0 | ide1 | ide2 | ide3 | sata0 | sata1 | sata2 | sata3 | sata4 | sata5 | scsi0 | scsi1 | scsi10 | scsi11 | scsi12 | scsi13 | scsi2 | scsi3 | scsi4 | scsi5 | scsi6 | scsi7 | scsi8 | scsi9 | virtio0 | virtio1 | virtio10 | virtio11 | virtio12 | virtio13 | virtio14 | virtio15 | virtio2 | virtio3 | virtio4 | virtio5 | virtio6 | virtio7 | virtio8 | virtio9)
-
If you want to convert only 1 disk to base image.
qm terminal <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Open a terminal using a serial device (The VM need to have a serial device configured, for example serial0: socket)
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -iface (serial0 | serial1 | serial2 | serial3)
-
Select the serial device. By default we simply use the first suitable device.
qm unlink <vmid> -idlist <string> [OPTIONS]
Unlink/delete disk images.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -force boolean
-
Force physical removal. Without this, we simple remove the disk from the config file and create an additional configuration entry called unused[n], which contains the volume ID. Unlink of unused[n] always cause physical removal.
- -idlist string
-
A list of disk IDs you want to delete.
qm unlock <vmid>
Unlock the VM.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
qm vncproxy <vmid>
Proxy VM VNC traffic to stdin/stdout
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
qm wait <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Wait until the VM is stopped.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -timeout integer (1 - N)
-
Timeout in seconds. Default is to wait forever.
17.6. qmrestore - Restore QemuServer vzdump Backups
qmrestore help
qmrestore <archive> <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Restore QemuServer vzdump backups.
- <archive> string
-
The backup file. You can pass - to read from standard input.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -force boolean
-
Allow to overwrite existing VM.
- -pool string
-
Add the VM to the specified pool.
- -storage string
-
Default storage.
- -unique boolean
-
Assign a unique random ethernet address.
17.7. pct - Proxmox Container Toolkit
pct <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pct clone <vmid> <newid> -experimental <boolean> [OPTIONS]
Create a container clone/copy
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <newid> integer (1 - N)
-
VMID for the clone.
- -description string
-
Description for the new CT.
- -experimental boolean (default=0)
-
The clone feature is experimental, set this flag if you know what you are doing.
- -full boolean (default=0)
-
Create a full copy of all disk. This is always done when you clone a normal CT. For CT templates, we try to create a linked clone by default.
- -hostname string
-
Set a hostname for the new CT.
- -pool string
-
Add the new CT to the specified pool.
- -snapname string
-
The name of the snapshot.
- -storage string
-
Target storage for full clone.
Requires option(s): full
pct config <vmid>
Get container configuration.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
pct console <vmid>
Launch a console for the specified container.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
pct create <vmid> <ostemplate> [OPTIONS]
Create or restore a container.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <ostemplate> string
-
The OS template or backup file.
- -arch (amd64 | i386) (default=amd64)
-
OS architecture type.
- -cmode (console | shell | tty) (default=tty)
-
Console mode. By default, the console command tries to open a connection to one of the available tty devices. By setting cmode to console it tries to attach to /dev/console instead. If you set cmode to shell, it simply invokes a shell inside the container (no login).
- -console boolean (default=1)
-
Attach a console device (/dev/console) to the container.
- -cpulimit number (0 - 128) (default=0)
-
Limit of CPU usage.
If the computer has 2 CPUs, it has a total of 2 CPU time. Value 0 indicates no CPU limit. - -cpuunits integer (0 - 500000) (default=1024)
-
CPU weight for a VM. Argument is used in the kernel fair scheduler. The larger the number is, the more CPU time this VM gets. Number is relative to the weights of all the other running VMs.
You can disable fair-scheduler configuration by setting this to 0. - -description string
-
Container description. Only used on the configuration web interface.
- -force boolean
-
Allow to overwrite existing container.
- -hostname string
-
Set a host name for the container.
- -ignore-unpack-errors boolean
-
Ignore errors when extracting the template.
- -lock (backup | migrate | rollback | snapshot)
-
Lock/unlock the VM.
- -memory integer (16 - N) (default=512)
-
Amount of RAM for the VM in MB.
- -mp[n] [volume=]<volume> ,mp=<Path> [,acl=<1|0>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,quota=<1|0>] [,ro=<1|0>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
-
Use volume as container mount point.
- -nameserver string
-
Sets DNS server IP address for a container. Create will automatically use the setting from the host if you neither set searchdomain nor nameserver.
- -net[n] name=<string> [,bridge=<bridge>] [,firewall=<1|0>] [,gw=<GatewayIPv4>] [,gw6=<GatewayIPv6>] [,hwaddr=<XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX>] [,ip=<IPv4Format/CIDR>] [,ip6=<IPv6Format/CIDR>] [,mtu=<integer>] [,rate=<mbps>] [,tag=<integer>] [,trunks=<vlanid[;vlanid...]>] [,type=<veth>]
-
Specifies network interfaces for the container.
- -onboot boolean (default=0)
-
Specifies whether a VM will be started during system bootup.
- -ostype (alpine | archlinux | centos | debian | fedora | gentoo | opensuse | ubuntu | unmanaged)
-
OS type. This is used to setup configuration inside the container, and corresponds to lxc setup scripts in /usr/share/lxc/config/<ostype>.common.conf. Value unmanaged can be used to skip and OS specific setup.
- -password
-
Sets root password inside container.
- -pool string
-
Add the VM to the specified pool.
- -protection boolean (default=0)
-
Sets the protection flag of the container. This will prevent the CT or CT’s disk remove/update operation.
- -restore boolean
-
Mark this as restore task.
- -rootfs [volume=]<volume> [,acl=<1|0>] [,quota=<1|0>] [,ro=<1|0>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
-
Use volume as container root.
- -searchdomain string
-
Sets DNS search domains for a container. Create will automatically use the setting from the host if you neither set searchdomain nor nameserver.
- -ssh-public-keys filepath
-
Setup public SSH keys (one key per line, OpenSSH format).
- -startup `[[order=]\d+] [,up=\d+] [,down=\d+] `
-
Startup and shutdown behavior. Order is a non-negative number defining the general startup order. Shutdown in done with reverse ordering. Additionally you can set the up or down delay in seconds, which specifies a delay to wait before the next VM is started or stopped.
- -storage string (default=local)
-
Default Storage.
- -swap integer (0 - N) (default=512)
-
Amount of SWAP for the VM in MB.
- -template boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable Template.
- -tty integer (0 - 6) (default=2)
-
Specify the number of tty available to the container
- -unprivileged boolean (default=0)
-
Makes the container run as unprivileged user. (Should not be modified manually.)
- -unused[n] string
-
Reference to unused volumes. This is used internally, and should not be modified manually.
pct delsnapshot <vmid> <snapname> [OPTIONS]
Delete a LXC snapshot.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <snapname> string
-
The name of the snapshot.
- -force boolean
-
For removal from config file, even if removing disk snapshots fails.
pct destroy <vmid>
Destroy the container (also delete all uses files).
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
pct df <vmid>
Get the container’s current disk usage.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
pct enter <vmid>
Launch a shell for the specified container.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
pct exec <vmid> [<extra-args>]
Launch a command inside the specified container.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <extra-args> array
-
Extra arguments as array
pct fsck <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Run a filesystem check (fsck) on a container volume.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -device (mp0 | mp1 | mp2 | mp3 | mp4 | mp5 | mp6 | mp7 | mp8 | mp9 | rootfs)
-
A volume on which to run the filesystem check
- -force boolean (default=0)
-
Force checking, even if the filesystem seems clean
pct help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pct list
LXC container index (per node).
pct listsnapshot <vmid>
List all snapshots.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
pct migrate <vmid> <target> [OPTIONS]
Migrate the container to another node. Creates a new migration task.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <target> string
-
Target node.
- -force boolean
-
Force migration despite local bind / device mounts. WARNING: identical bind / device mounts need to be available on the target node.
- -online boolean
-
Use online/live migration.
pct mount <vmid>
Mount the container’s filesystem on the host. This will hold a lock on the container and is meant for emergency maintenance only as it will prevent further operations on the container other than start and stop.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
pct pull <vmid> <path> <destination> [OPTIONS]
Copy a file from the container to the local system.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <path> string
-
Path to a file inside the container to pull.
- <destination> string
-
Destination
- -group string
-
Owner group name or id.
- -perms string
-
File permissions to use (octal by default, prefix with 0x for hexadecimal).
- -user string
-
Owner user name or id.
pct push <vmid> <file> <destination> [OPTIONS]
Copy a local file to the container.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <file> string
-
Path to a local file.
- <destination> string
-
Destination inside the container to write to.
- -group string
-
Owner group name or id. When using a name it must exist inside the container.
- -perms string
-
File permissions to use (octal by default, prefix with 0x for hexadecimal).
- -user string
-
Owner user name or id. When using a name it must exist inside the container.
pct resize <vmid> <disk> <size> [OPTIONS]
Resize a container mountpoint.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <disk> (mp0 | mp1 | mp2 | mp3 | mp4 | mp5 | mp6 | mp7 | mp8 | mp9 | rootfs)
-
The disk you want to resize.
- <size> \+?\d+(\.\d+)?[KMGT]?
-
The new size. With the + sign the value is added to the actual size of the volume and without it, the value is taken as an absolute one. Shrinking disk size is not supported.
- -digest string
-
Prevent changes if current configuration file has different SHA1 digest. This can be used to prevent concurrent modifications.
pct restore <vmid> <ostemplate> [OPTIONS]
Create or restore a container.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <ostemplate> string
-
The OS template or backup file.
- -arch (amd64 | i386) (default=amd64)
-
OS architecture type.
- -cmode (console | shell | tty) (default=tty)
-
Console mode. By default, the console command tries to open a connection to one of the available tty devices. By setting cmode to console it tries to attach to /dev/console instead. If you set cmode to shell, it simply invokes a shell inside the container (no login).
- -console boolean (default=1)
-
Attach a console device (/dev/console) to the container.
- -cpulimit number (0 - 128) (default=0)
-
Limit of CPU usage.
If the computer has 2 CPUs, it has a total of 2 CPU time. Value 0 indicates no CPU limit. - -cpuunits integer (0 - 500000) (default=1024)
-
CPU weight for a VM. Argument is used in the kernel fair scheduler. The larger the number is, the more CPU time this VM gets. Number is relative to the weights of all the other running VMs.
You can disable fair-scheduler configuration by setting this to 0. - -description string
-
Container description. Only used on the configuration web interface.
- -force boolean
-
Allow to overwrite existing container.
- -hostname string
-
Set a host name for the container.
- -ignore-unpack-errors boolean
-
Ignore errors when extracting the template.
- -lock (backup | migrate | rollback | snapshot)
-
Lock/unlock the VM.
- -memory integer (16 - N) (default=512)
-
Amount of RAM for the VM in MB.
- -mp[n] [volume=]<volume> ,mp=<Path> [,acl=<1|0>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,quota=<1|0>] [,ro=<1|0>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
-
Use volume as container mount point.
- -nameserver string
-
Sets DNS server IP address for a container. Create will automatically use the setting from the host if you neither set searchdomain nor nameserver.
- -net[n] name=<string> [,bridge=<bridge>] [,firewall=<1|0>] [,gw=<GatewayIPv4>] [,gw6=<GatewayIPv6>] [,hwaddr=<XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX>] [,ip=<IPv4Format/CIDR>] [,ip6=<IPv6Format/CIDR>] [,mtu=<integer>] [,rate=<mbps>] [,tag=<integer>] [,trunks=<vlanid[;vlanid...]>] [,type=<veth>]
-
Specifies network interfaces for the container.
- -onboot boolean (default=0)
-
Specifies whether a VM will be started during system bootup.
- -ostype (alpine | archlinux | centos | debian | fedora | gentoo | opensuse | ubuntu | unmanaged)
-
OS type. This is used to setup configuration inside the container, and corresponds to lxc setup scripts in /usr/share/lxc/config/<ostype>.common.conf. Value unmanaged can be used to skip and OS specific setup.
- -password
-
Sets root password inside container.
- -pool string
-
Add the VM to the specified pool.
- -protection boolean (default=0)
-
Sets the protection flag of the container. This will prevent the CT or CT’s disk remove/update operation.
- -rootfs [volume=]<volume> [,acl=<1|0>] [,quota=<1|0>] [,ro=<1|0>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
-
Use volume as container root.
- -searchdomain string
-
Sets DNS search domains for a container. Create will automatically use the setting from the host if you neither set searchdomain nor nameserver.
- -ssh-public-keys filepath
-
Setup public SSH keys (one key per line, OpenSSH format).
- -startup `[[order=]\d+] [,up=\d+] [,down=\d+] `
-
Startup and shutdown behavior. Order is a non-negative number defining the general startup order. Shutdown in done with reverse ordering. Additionally you can set the up or down delay in seconds, which specifies a delay to wait before the next VM is started or stopped.
- -storage string (default=local)
-
Default Storage.
- -swap integer (0 - N) (default=512)
-
Amount of SWAP for the VM in MB.
- -template boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable Template.
- -tty integer (0 - 6) (default=2)
-
Specify the number of tty available to the container
- -unprivileged boolean (default=0)
-
Makes the container run as unprivileged user. (Should not be modified manually.)
- -unused[n] string
-
Reference to unused volumes. This is used internally, and should not be modified manually.
pct resume <vmid>
Resume the container.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
pct rollback <vmid> <snapname>
Rollback LXC state to specified snapshot.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <snapname> string
-
The name of the snapshot.
pct set <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Set container options.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -arch (amd64 | i386) (default=amd64)
-
OS architecture type.
- -cmode (console | shell | tty) (default=tty)
-
Console mode. By default, the console command tries to open a connection to one of the available tty devices. By setting cmode to console it tries to attach to /dev/console instead. If you set cmode to shell, it simply invokes a shell inside the container (no login).
- -console boolean (default=1)
-
Attach a console device (/dev/console) to the container.
- -cpulimit number (0 - 128) (default=0)
-
Limit of CPU usage.
If the computer has 2 CPUs, it has a total of 2 CPU time. Value 0 indicates no CPU limit. - -cpuunits integer (0 - 500000) (default=1024)
-
CPU weight for a VM. Argument is used in the kernel fair scheduler. The larger the number is, the more CPU time this VM gets. Number is relative to the weights of all the other running VMs.
You can disable fair-scheduler configuration by setting this to 0. - -delete string
-
A list of settings you want to delete.
- -description string
-
Container description. Only used on the configuration web interface.
- -digest string
-
Prevent changes if current configuration file has different SHA1 digest. This can be used to prevent concurrent modifications.
- -hostname string
-
Set a host name for the container.
- -lock (backup | migrate | rollback | snapshot)
-
Lock/unlock the VM.
- -memory integer (16 - N) (default=512)
-
Amount of RAM for the VM in MB.
- -mp[n] [volume=]<volume> ,mp=<Path> [,acl=<1|0>] [,backup=<1|0>] [,quota=<1|0>] [,ro=<1|0>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
-
Use volume as container mount point.
- -nameserver string
-
Sets DNS server IP address for a container. Create will automatically use the setting from the host if you neither set searchdomain nor nameserver.
- -net[n] name=<string> [,bridge=<bridge>] [,firewall=<1|0>] [,gw=<GatewayIPv4>] [,gw6=<GatewayIPv6>] [,hwaddr=<XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX>] [,ip=<IPv4Format/CIDR>] [,ip6=<IPv6Format/CIDR>] [,mtu=<integer>] [,rate=<mbps>] [,tag=<integer>] [,trunks=<vlanid[;vlanid...]>] [,type=<veth>]
-
Specifies network interfaces for the container.
- -onboot boolean (default=0)
-
Specifies whether a VM will be started during system bootup.
- -ostype (alpine | archlinux | centos | debian | fedora | gentoo | opensuse | ubuntu | unmanaged)
-
OS type. This is used to setup configuration inside the container, and corresponds to lxc setup scripts in /usr/share/lxc/config/<ostype>.common.conf. Value unmanaged can be used to skip and OS specific setup.
- -protection boolean (default=0)
-
Sets the protection flag of the container. This will prevent the CT or CT’s disk remove/update operation.
- -rootfs [volume=]<volume> [,acl=<1|0>] [,quota=<1|0>] [,ro=<1|0>] [,size=<DiskSize>]
-
Use volume as container root.
- -searchdomain string
-
Sets DNS search domains for a container. Create will automatically use the setting from the host if you neither set searchdomain nor nameserver.
- -startup `[[order=]\d+] [,up=\d+] [,down=\d+] `
-
Startup and shutdown behavior. Order is a non-negative number defining the general startup order. Shutdown in done with reverse ordering. Additionally you can set the up or down delay in seconds, which specifies a delay to wait before the next VM is started or stopped.
- -swap integer (0 - N) (default=512)
-
Amount of SWAP for the VM in MB.
- -template boolean (default=0)
-
Enable/disable Template.
- -tty integer (0 - 6) (default=2)
-
Specify the number of tty available to the container
- -unprivileged boolean (default=0)
-
Makes the container run as unprivileged user. (Should not be modified manually.)
- -unused[n] string
-
Reference to unused volumes. This is used internally, and should not be modified manually.
pct shutdown <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Shutdown the container. This will trigger a clean shutdown of the container, see lxc-stop(1) for details.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -forceStop boolean (default=0)
-
Make sure the Container stops.
- -timeout integer (0 - N) (default=60)
-
Wait maximal timeout seconds.
pct snapshot <vmid> <snapname> [OPTIONS]
Snapshot a container.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- <snapname> string
-
The name of the snapshot.
- -description string
-
A textual description or comment.
pct start <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Start the container.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -skiplock boolean
-
Ignore locks - only root is allowed to use this option.
pct status <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Show CT status.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format
pct stop <vmid> [OPTIONS]
Stop the container. This will abruptly stop all processes running in the container.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -skiplock boolean
-
Ignore locks - only root is allowed to use this option.
pct suspend <vmid>
Suspend the container.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
pct template <vmid> -experimental <boolean> [OPTIONS]
Create a Template.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
- -experimental boolean (default=0)
-
The template feature is experimental, set this flag if you know what you are doing.
pct unlock <vmid>
Unlock the VM.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
pct unmount <vmid>
Unmount the container’s filesystem.
- <vmid> integer (1 - N)
-
The (unique) ID of the VM.
17.8. pveam - Proxmox VE Appliance Manager
pveam <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pveam available [OPTIONS]
List available templates.
- -section (system | turnkeylinux)
-
Restrict list to specified section.
pveam download <storage> <template>
Download appliance templates.
- <storage> string
-
The storage where the template will be stored
- <template> string
-
The template wich will downloaded
pveam help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pveam list <storage>
Get list of all templates on storage
- <storage> string
-
Only list templates on specified storage
pveam remove <template_path>
Remove a template.
- <template_path> string
-
The template to remove.
pveam update
Update Container Template Database.
17.9. pvecm - Proxmox VE Cluster Manager
pvecm <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pvecm add <hostname> [OPTIONS]
Adds the current node to an existing cluster.
- <hostname> string
-
Hostname (or IP) of an existing cluster member.
- -force boolean
-
Do not throw error if node already exists.
- -nodeid integer (1 - N)
-
Node id for this node.
- -ring0_addr string
-
Hostname (or IP) of the corosync ring0 address of this node. Defaults to nodes hostname.
- -ring1_addr string
-
Hostname (or IP) of the corosync ring1 address, this needs an valid configured ring 1 interface in the cluster.
- -votes integer (0 - N)
-
Number of votes for this node
pvecm addnode <node> [OPTIONS]
Adds a node to the cluster configuration.
- <node> string
-
The cluster node name.
- -force boolean
-
Do not throw error if node already exists.
- -nodeid integer (1 - N)
-
Node id for this node.
- -ring0_addr string
-
Hostname (or IP) of the corosync ring0 address of this node. Defaults to nodes hostname.
- -ring1_addr string
-
Hostname (or IP) of the corosync ring1 address, this needs an valid bindnet1_addr.
- -votes integer (0 - N)
-
Number of votes for this node
pvecm create <clustername> [OPTIONS]
Generate new cluster configuration.
- <clustername> string
-
The name of the cluster.
- -bindnet0_addr string
-
This specifies the network address the corosync ring 0 executive should bind to and defaults to the local IP address of the node.
- -bindnet1_addr string
-
This specifies the network address the corosync ring 1 executive should bind to and is optional.
- -nodeid integer (1 - N)
-
Node id for this node.
- -ring0_addr string
-
Hostname (or IP) of the corosync ring0 address of this node. Defaults to the hostname of the node.
- -ring1_addr string
-
Hostname (or IP) of the corosync ring1 address, this needs an valid bindnet1_addr.
- -rrp_mode (active | none | passive) (default=none)
-
This specifies the mode of redundant ring, which may be none, active or passive. Using multiple interfaces only allows active or passive.
- -votes integer (1 - N)
-
Number of votes for this node.
pvecm delnode <node>
Removes a node to the cluster configuration.
- <node> string
-
Hostname or IP of the corosync ring0 address of this node.
pvecm expected <expected>
Tells corosync a new value of expected votes.
- <expected> integer (1 - N)
-
Expected votes
pvecm help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pvecm keygen <filename>
Generate new cryptographic key for corosync.
- <filename> string
-
Output file name
pvecm nodes
Displays the local view of the cluster nodes.
pvecm status
Displays the local view of the cluster status.
pvecm updatecerts [OPTIONS]
Update node certificates (and generate all needed files/directories).
- -force boolean
-
Force generation of new SSL certifate.
- -silent boolean
-
Ignore errors (i.e. when cluster has no quorum).
17.10. pveum - Proxmox VE User Manager
pveum <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pveum acldel <path> -roles <string> [OPTIONS]
Update Access Control List (add or remove permissions).
- <path> string
-
Access control path
- -groups string
-
List of groups.
- -propagate boolean (default=1)
-
Allow to propagate (inherit) permissions.
- -roles string
-
List of roles.
- -users string
-
List of users.
pveum aclmod <path> -roles <string> [OPTIONS]
Update Access Control List (add or remove permissions).
- <path> string
-
Access control path
- -groups string
-
List of groups.
- -propagate boolean (default=1)
-
Allow to propagate (inherit) permissions.
- -roles string
-
List of roles.
- -users string
-
List of users.
pveum groupadd <groupid> [OPTIONS]
Create new group.
- <groupid> string
-
no description available
- -comment string
-
no description available
pveum groupdel <groupid>
Delete group.
- <groupid> string
-
no description available
pveum groupmod <groupid> [OPTIONS]
Update group data.
- <groupid> string
-
no description available
- -comment string
-
no description available
pveum help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pveum passwd <userid>
Change user password.
- <userid> string
-
User ID
pveum roleadd <roleid> [OPTIONS]
Create new role.
- <roleid> string
-
no description available
- -privs string
-
no description available
pveum roledel <roleid>
Delete role.
- <roleid> string
-
no description available
pveum rolemod <roleid> -privs <string> [OPTIONS]
Create new role.
- <roleid> string
-
no description available
- -append boolean
-
no description available
Requires option(s): privs - -privs string
-
no description available
pveum ticket <username> [OPTIONS]
Create or verify authentication ticket.
- <username> string
-
User name
- -otp string
-
One-time password for Two-factor authentication.
- -path string
-
Verify ticket, and check if user have access privs on path
Requires option(s): privs - -privs string
-
Verify ticket, and check if user have access privs on path
Requires option(s): path - -realm string
-
You can optionally pass the realm using this parameter. Normally the realm is simply added to the username <username>@<relam>.
pveum useradd <userid> [OPTIONS]
Create new user.
- <userid> string
-
User ID
- -comment string
-
no description available
- -email string
-
no description available
- -enable boolean (default=1)
-
Enable the account (default). You can set this to 0 to disable the accout
- -expire integer (0 - N)
-
Account expiration date (seconds since epoch). 0 means no expiration date.
- -firstname string
-
no description available
- -groups string
-
no description available
- -keys string
-
Keys for two factor auth (yubico).
- -lastname string
-
no description available
- -password
-
Initial password.
pveum userdel <userid>
Delete user.
- <userid> string
-
User ID
pveum usermod <userid> [OPTIONS]
Update user configuration.
- <userid> string
-
User ID
- -append boolean
-
no description available
Requires option(s): groups - -comment string
-
no description available
- -email string
-
no description available
- -enable boolean
-
Enable/disable the account.
- -expire integer (0 - N)
-
Account expiration date (seconds since epoch). 0 means no expiration date.
- -firstname string
-
no description available
- -groups string
-
no description available
- -keys string
-
Keys for two factor auth (yubico).
- -lastname string
-
no description available
17.11. vzdump - Backup Utility for VMs and Containers
vzdump help
vzdump {<vmid>} [OPTIONS]
Create backup.
- <vmid> string
-
The ID of the guest system you want to backup.
- -all boolean (default=0)
-
Backup all known guest systems on this host.
- -bwlimit integer (0 - N) (default=0)
-
Limit I/O bandwidth (KBytes per second).
- -compress (0 | 1 | gzip | lzo) (default=0)
-
Compress dump file.
- -dumpdir string
-
Store resulting files to specified directory.
- -exclude string
-
Exclude specified guest systems (assumes --all)
- -exclude-path string
-
Exclude certain files/directories (shell globs).
- -ionice integer (0 - 8) (default=7)
-
Set CFQ ionice priority.
- -lockwait integer (0 - N) (default=180)
-
Maximal time to wait for the global lock (minutes).
- -mailnotification (always | failure) (default=always)
-
Specify when to send an email
- -mailto string
-
Comma-separated list of email addresses that should receive email notifications.
- -maxfiles integer (1 - N) (default=1)
-
Maximal number of backup files per guest system.
- -mode (snapshot | stop | suspend) (default=snapshot)
-
Backup mode.
- -node string
-
Only run if executed on this node.
- -pigz integer (default=0)
-
Use pigz instead of gzip when N>0. N=1 uses half of cores, N>1 uses N as thread count.
- -quiet boolean (default=0)
-
Be quiet.
- -remove boolean (default=1)
-
Remove old backup files if there are more than maxfiles backup files.
- -script string
-
Use specified hook script.
- -size integer (500 - N) (default=1024)
-
Unused, will be removed in a future release.
- -stdexcludes boolean (default=1)
-
Exclude temporary files and logs.
- -stdout boolean
-
Write tar to stdout, not to a file.
- -stop boolean (default=0)
-
Stop runnig backup jobs on this host.
- -stopwait integer (0 - N) (default=10)
-
Maximal time to wait until a guest system is stopped (minutes).
- -storage string
-
Store resulting file to this storage.
- -tmpdir string
-
Store temporary files to specified directory.
17.12. ha-manager - Proxmox VE HA Manager
ha-manager <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
ha-manager add <sid> [OPTIONS]
Create a new HA resource.
- <sid> <type>:<name>
-
HA resource ID. This consists of a resource type followed by a resource specific name, separated with colon (example: vm:100 / ct:100). For virtual machines and containers, you can simply use the VM or CT id as a shortcut (example: 100).
- -comment string
-
Description.
- -group string
-
The HA group identifier.
- -max_relocate integer (0 - N) (default=1)
-
Maximal number of service relocate tries when a service failes to start.
- -max_restart integer (0 - N) (default=1)
-
Maximal number of tries to restart the service on a node after its start failed.
- -state (disabled | enabled) (default=enabled)
-
Resource state.
- -type (ct | vm)
-
Resource type.
ha-manager config [OPTIONS]
List HA resources.
- -type (ct | vm)
-
Only list resources of specific type
ha-manager disable <sid>
Disable a HA resource.
- <sid> <type>:<name>
-
HA resource ID. This consists of a resource type followed by a resource specific name, separated with colon (example: vm:100 / ct:100). For virtual machines and containers, you can simply use the VM or CT id as a shortcut (example: 100).
ha-manager enable <sid>
Enable a HA resource.
- <sid> <type>:<name>
-
HA resource ID. This consists of a resource type followed by a resource specific name, separated with colon (example: vm:100 / ct:100). For virtual machines and containers, you can simply use the VM or CT id as a shortcut (example: 100).
ha-manager groupadd <group> -nodes <string> [OPTIONS]
Create a new HA group.
- <group> string
-
The HA group identifier.
- -comment string
-
Description.
- -nodes <node>[:<pri>]{,<node>[:<pri>]}*
-
List of cluster node names with optional priority. We use priority 0 as default. The CRM tries to run services on the node with highest priority (also see option nofailback).
- -nofailback boolean (default=0)
-
The CRM tries to run services on the node with the highest priority. If a node with higher priority comes online, the CRM migrates the service to that node. Enabling nofailback prevents that behavior.
- -restricted boolean (default=0)
-
Services on unrestricted groups may run on any cluster members if all group members are offline. But they will migrate back as soon as a group member comes online. One can implement a preferred node behavior using an unrestricted group with one member.
- -type (group)
-
Group type.
ha-manager groupconfig
Get HA groups.
ha-manager groupremove <group>
Delete ha group configuration.
- <group> string
-
The HA group identifier.
ha-manager groupset <group> [OPTIONS]
Update ha group configuration.
- <group> string
-
The HA group identifier.
- -comment string
-
Description.
- -delete string
-
A list of settings you want to delete.
- -digest string
-
Prevent changes if current configuration file has different SHA1 digest. This can be used to prevent concurrent modifications.
- -nodes <node>[:<pri>]{,<node>[:<pri>]}*
-
List of cluster node names with optional priority. We use priority 0 as default. The CRM tries to run services on the node with highest priority (also see option nofailback).
- -nofailback boolean (default=0)
-
The CRM tries to run services on the node with the highest priority. If a node with higher priority comes online, the CRM migrates the service to that node. Enabling nofailback prevents that behavior.
- -restricted boolean (default=0)
-
Services on unrestricted groups may run on any cluster members if all group members are offline. But they will migrate back as soon as a group member comes online. One can implement a preferred node behavior using an unrestricted group with one member.
ha-manager help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
ha-manager migrate <sid> <node>
Request resource migration (online) to another node.
- <sid> <type>:<name>
-
HA resource ID. This consists of a resource type followed by a resource specific name, separated with colon (example: vm:100 / ct:100). For virtual machines and containers, you can simply use the VM or CT id as a shortcut (example: 100).
- <node> string
-
The cluster node name.
ha-manager relocate <sid> <node>
Request resource relocatzion to another node. This stops the service on the old node, and restarts it on the target node.
- <sid> <type>:<name>
-
HA resource ID. This consists of a resource type followed by a resource specific name, separated with colon (example: vm:100 / ct:100). For virtual machines and containers, you can simply use the VM or CT id as a shortcut (example: 100).
- <node> string
-
The cluster node name.
ha-manager remove <sid>
Delete resource configuration.
- <sid> <type>:<name>
-
HA resource ID. This consists of a resource type followed by a resource specific name, separated with colon (example: vm:100 / ct:100). For virtual machines and containers, you can simply use the VM or CT id as a shortcut (example: 100).
ha-manager set <sid> [OPTIONS]
Update resource configuration.
- <sid> <type>:<name>
-
HA resource ID. This consists of a resource type followed by a resource specific name, separated with colon (example: vm:100 / ct:100). For virtual machines and containers, you can simply use the VM or CT id as a shortcut (example: 100).
- -comment string
-
Description.
- -delete string
-
A list of settings you want to delete.
- -digest string
-
Prevent changes if current configuration file has different SHA1 digest. This can be used to prevent concurrent modifications.
- -group string
-
The HA group identifier.
- -max_relocate integer (0 - N) (default=1)
-
Maximal number of service relocate tries when a service failes to start.
- -max_restart integer (0 - N) (default=1)
-
Maximal number of tries to restart the service on a node after its start failed.
- -state (disabled | enabled) (default=enabled)
-
Resource state.
ha-manager status [OPTIONS]
Display HA manger status.
- -verbose boolean (default=0)
-
Verbose output. Include complete CRM and LRM status (JSON).
18. Appendix B: Service Daemons
18.1. pve-firewall - Proxmox VE Firewall Daemon
pve-firewall <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pve-firewall compile
Compile and print firewall rules. This is useful for testing.
pve-firewall help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pve-firewall localnet
Print information about local network.
pve-firewall restart
Restart the Proxmox VE firewall service.
pve-firewall simulate [OPTIONS]
Simulate firewall rules. This does not simulate kernel routing table. Instead, this simply assumes that routing from source zone to destination zone is possible.
- -dest string
-
Destination IP address.
- -dport integer
-
Destination port.
- -from (host|outside|vm\d+|ct\d+|vmbr\d+/\S+) (default=outside)
-
Source zone.
- -protocol (tcp|udp) (default=tcp)
-
Protocol.
- -source string
-
Source IP address.
- -sport integer
-
Source port.
- -to (host|outside|vm\d+|ct\d+|vmbr\d+/\S+) (default=host)
-
Destination zone.
- -verbose boolean (default=0)
-
Verbose output.
pve-firewall start [OPTIONS]
Start the Proxmox VE firewall service.
- -debug boolean (default=0)
-
Debug mode - stay in foreground
pve-firewall status
Get firewall status.
pve-firewall stop
Stop firewall. This removes all Proxmox VE related iptable rules. The host is unprotected afterwards.
18.2. pvedaemon - Proxmox VE API Daemon
pvedaemon <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pvedaemon help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pvedaemon restart
Restart the daemon (or start if not running).
pvedaemon start [OPTIONS]
Start the daemon.
- -debug boolean (default=0)
-
Debug mode - stay in foreground
pvedaemon status
Get daemon status.
pvedaemon stop
Stop the daemon.
18.3. pveproxy - Proxmox VE API Proxy Daemon
pveproxy <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pveproxy help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pveproxy restart
Restart the daemon (or start if not running).
pveproxy start [OPTIONS]
Start the daemon.
- -debug boolean (default=0)
-
Debug mode - stay in foreground
pveproxy status
Get daemon status.
pveproxy stop
Stop the daemon.
18.4. pvestatd - Proxmox VE Status Daemon
pvestatd <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pvestatd help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pvestatd restart
Restart the daemon (or start if not running).
pvestatd start [OPTIONS]
Start the daemon.
- -debug boolean (default=0)
-
Debug mode - stay in foreground
pvestatd status
Get daemon status.
pvestatd stop
Stop the daemon.
18.5. spiceproxy - SPICE Proxy Service
spiceproxy <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
spiceproxy help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
spiceproxy restart
Restart the daemon (or start if not running).
spiceproxy start [OPTIONS]
Start the daemon.
- -debug boolean (default=0)
-
Debug mode - stay in foreground
spiceproxy status
Get daemon status.
spiceproxy stop
Stop the daemon.
18.6. pmxcfs - Proxmox Cluster File System
pmxcfs [OPTIONS]
Help Options:
- -h, --help
-
Show help options
Application Options:
- -d, --debug
-
Turn on debug messages
- -f, --foreground
-
Do not daemonize server
- -l, --local
-
Force local mode (ignore corosync.conf, force quorum)
This service is usually started and managed using systemd toolset. The service is called pve-cluster.
systemctl start pve-cluster
systemctl stop pve-cluster
systemctl status pve-cluster
18.7. pve-ha-crm - Cluster Resource Manager Daemon
pve-ha-crm <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pve-ha-crm help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pve-ha-crm start [OPTIONS]
Start the daemon.
- -debug boolean (default=0)
-
Debug mode - stay in foreground
pve-ha-crm status
Get daemon status.
pve-ha-crm stop
Stop the daemon.
18.8. pve-ha-lrm - Local Resource Manager Daemon
pve-ha-lrm <COMMAND> [ARGS] [OPTIONS]
pve-ha-lrm help [<cmd>] [OPTIONS]
Get help about specified command.
- <cmd> string
-
Command name
- -verbose boolean
-
Verbose output format.
pve-ha-lrm start [OPTIONS]
Start the daemon.
- -debug boolean (default=0)
-
Debug mode - stay in foreground
pve-ha-lrm status
Get daemon status.
pve-ha-lrm stop
Stop the daemon.
19. Appendix C: Configuration Files
19.1. Datacenter Configuration
The file /etc/pve/datacenter.cfg is a configuration file for Proxmox VE. It contains cluster wide default values used by all nodes.
19.1.1. File Format
The file uses a simple colon separated key/value format. Each line has the following format:
OPTION: value
Blank lines in the file are ignored, and lines starting with a # character are treated as comments and are also ignored.
19.1.2. Options
- console: (applet | html5 | vv)
-
Select the default Console viewer. You can either use the builtin java applet (VNC), an external virt-viewer comtatible application (SPICE), or an HTML5 based viewer (noVNC).
- email_from: string
-
Specify email address to send notification from (default is root@$hostname)
- fencing: (both | hardware | watchdog) (default=watchdog)
-
Set the fencing mode of the HA cluster. Hardware mode needs a valid configuration of fence devices in /etc/pve/ha/fence.cfg. With both all two modes are used.
hardware and both are EXPERIMENTAL & WIP - http_proxy: http://.*
-
Specify external http proxy which is used for downloads (example: http://username:password@host:port/)
- keyboard: (da | de | de-ch | en-gb | en-us | es | fi | fr | fr-be | fr-ca | fr-ch | hu | is | it | ja | lt | mk | nl | no | pl | pt | pt-br | sl | sv | tr)
-
Default keybord layout for vnc server.
- language: (de | en)
-
Default GUI language.
- mac_prefix: (?^i:[a-f0-9]{2}(?::[a-f0-9]{2}){0,2}:?)
-
Prefix for autogenerated MAC addresses.
- max_workers: integer (1 - N)
-
Defines how many workers (per node) are maximal started on actions like stopall VMs or task from the ha-manager.
- migration_unsecure: boolean
-
Migration is secure using SSH tunnel by default. For secure private networks you can disable it to speed up migration.
20. Appendix D: Firewall Macro Definitions
Amanda
|
Amanda Backup |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
10080 |
|
PARAM |
tcp |
10080 |
Auth
|
Auth (identd) traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
113 |
BGP
|
Border Gateway Protocol traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
179 |
BitTorrent
|
BitTorrent traffic for BitTorrent 3.1 and earlier |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
6881:6889 |
|
PARAM |
udp |
6881 |
BitTorrent32
|
BitTorrent traffic for BitTorrent 3.2 and later |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
6881:6999 |
|
PARAM |
udp |
6881 |
CVS
|
Concurrent Versions System pserver traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
2401 |
Ceph
|
Ceph Storage Cluster traffic (Ceph Monitors, OSD & MDS Deamons) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
6789 |
|
PARAM |
tcp |
6800:7300 |
Citrix
|
Citrix/ICA traffic (ICA, ICA Browser, CGP) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
1494 |
|
PARAM |
udp |
1604 |
|
PARAM |
tcp |
2598 |
DAAP
|
Digital Audio Access Protocol traffic (iTunes, Rythmbox daemons) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
3689 |
|
PARAM |
udp |
3689 |
DCC
|
Distributed Checksum Clearinghouse spam filtering mechanism |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
6277 |
DHCPfwd
|
Forwarded DHCP traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
67:68 |
67:68 |
DHCPv6
|
DHCPv6 traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
546:547 |
546:547 |
DNS
|
Domain Name System traffic (upd and tcp) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
53 |
|
PARAM |
tcp |
53 |
Distcc
|
Distributed Compiler service |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
3632 |
FTP
|
File Transfer Protocol |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
21 |
Finger
|
Finger protocol (RFC 742) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
79 |
GNUnet
|
GNUnet secure peer-to-peer networking traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
2086 |
|
PARAM |
udp |
2086 |
|
PARAM |
tcp |
1080 |
|
PARAM |
udp |
1080 |
GRE
|
Generic Routing Encapsulation tunneling protocol |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
47 |
Git
|
Git distributed revision control traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
9418 |
HKP
|
OpenPGP HTTP keyserver protocol traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
11371 |
HTTP
|
Hypertext Transfer Protocol (WWW) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
80 |
HTTPS
|
Hypertext Transfer Protocol (WWW) over SSL |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
443 |
ICPV2
|
Internet Cache Protocol V2 (Squid) traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
3130 |
ICQ
|
AOL Instant Messenger traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
5190 |
IMAP
|
Internet Message Access Protocol |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
143 |
IMAPS
|
Internet Message Access Protocol over SSL |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
993 |
IPIP
|
IPIP capsulation traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
94 |
IPsec
|
IPsec traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
500 |
500 |
PARAM |
50 |
IPsecah
|
IPsec authentication (AH) traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
500 |
500 |
PARAM |
51 |
IPsecnat
|
IPsec traffic and Nat-Traversal |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
500 |
|
PARAM |
udp |
4500 |
|
PARAM |
50 |
IRC
|
Internet Relay Chat traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
6667 |
Jetdirect
|
HP Jetdirect printing |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
9100 |
L2TP
|
Layer 2 Tunneling Protocol traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
1701 |
LDAP
|
Lightweight Directory Access Protocol traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
389 |
LDAPS
|
Secure Lightweight Directory Access Protocol traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
636 |
MDNS
|
Multicast DNS |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
5353 |
MSNP
|
Microsoft Notification Protocol |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
1863 |
MSSQL
|
Microsoft SQL Server |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
1433 |
Mail
|
Mail traffic (SMTP, SMTPS, Submission) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
25 |
|
PARAM |
tcp |
465 |
|
PARAM |
tcp |
587 |
Munin
|
Munin networked resource monitoring traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
4949 |
MySQL
|
MySQL server |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
3306 |
NNTP
|
NNTP traffic (Usenet). |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
119 |
NNTPS
|
Encrypted NNTP traffic (Usenet) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
563 |
NTP
|
Network Time Protocol (ntpd) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
123 |
NeighborDiscovery
|
IPv6 neighbor solicitation, neighbor and router advertisement |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
icmpv6 |
router-solicitation |
|
PARAM |
icmpv6 |
router-advertisement |
|
PARAM |
icmpv6 |
neighbor-solicitation |
|
PARAM |
icmpv6 |
neighbor-advertisement |
OSPF
|
OSPF multicast traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
89 |
OpenVPN
|
OpenVPN traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
1194 |
PCA
|
Symantec PCAnywere (tm) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
5632 |
|
PARAM |
tcp |
5631 |
POP3
|
POP3 traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
110 |
POP3S
|
Encrypted POP3 traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
995 |
PPtP
|
Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
47 |
||
PARAM |
tcp |
1723 |
Ping
|
ICMP echo request |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
icmp |
echo-request |
PostgreSQL
|
PostgreSQL server |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
5432 |
Printer
|
Line Printer protocol printing |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
515 |
RDP
|
Microsoft Remote Desktop Protocol traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
3389 |
RIP
|
Routing Information Protocol (bidirectional) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
520 |
RNDC
|
BIND remote management protocol |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
953 |
Razor
|
Razor Antispam System |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
ACCEPT |
tcp |
2703 |
Rdate
|
Remote time retrieval (rdate) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
37 |
Rsync
|
Rsync server |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
873 |
SANE
|
SANE network scanning |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
6566 |
SMB
|
Microsoft SMB traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
135,445 |
|
PARAM |
udp |
137:139 |
|
PARAM |
udp |
1024:65535 |
137 |
PARAM |
tcp |
135,139,445 |
SMBswat
|
Samba Web Administration Tool |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
901 |
SMTP
|
Simple Mail Transfer Protocol |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
25 |
SMTPS
|
Encrypted Simple Mail Transfer Protocol |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
465 |
SNMP
|
Simple Network Management Protocol |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
161:162 |
|
PARAM |
tcp |
161 |
SPAMD
|
Spam Assassin SPAMD traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
783 |
SSH
|
Secure shell traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
22 |
SVN
|
Subversion server (svnserve) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
3690 |
SixXS
|
SixXS IPv6 Deployment and Tunnel Broker |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
3874 |
|
PARAM |
udp |
3740 |
|
PARAM |
41 |
||
PARAM |
udp |
5072,8374 |
Squid
|
Squid web proxy traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
3128 |
Submission
|
Mail message submission traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
587 |
Syslog
|
Syslog protocol (RFC 5424) traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
514 |
|
PARAM |
tcp |
514 |
TFTP
|
Trivial File Transfer Protocol traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
69 |
Telnet
|
Telnet traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
23 |
Telnets
|
Telnet over SSL |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
992 |
Time
|
RFC 868 Time protocol |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
37 |
Trcrt
|
Traceroute (for up to 30 hops) traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
udp |
33434:33524 |
|
PARAM |
icmp |
echo-request |
VNC
|
VNC traffic for VNC display’s 0 - 99 |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
5900:5999 |
VNCL
|
VNC traffic from Vncservers to Vncviewers in listen mode |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
5500 |
Web
|
WWW traffic (HTTP and HTTPS) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
80 |
|
PARAM |
tcp |
443 |
Webcache
|
Web Cache/Proxy traffic (port 8080) |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
8080 |
Webmin
|
Webmin traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
10000 |
Whois
|
Whois (nicname, RFC 3912) traffic |
Action | proto | dport | sport |
---|---|---|---|
PARAM |
tcp |
43 |
21. Appendix E: GNU Free Documentation License
Version 1.3, 3 November 2008
Copyright © 2000, 2001, 2002, 2007, 2008 Free Software Foundation, Inc. http://fsf.org/
Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
The purpose of this License is to make a manual, textbook, or other functional and useful document "free" in the sense of freedom: to assure everyone the effective freedom to copy and redistribute it, with or without modifying it, either commercially or noncommercially. Secondarily, this License preserves for the author and publisher a way to get credit for their work, while not being considered responsible for modifications made by others.
This License is a kind of "copyleft", which means that derivative works of the document must themselves be free in the same sense. It complements the GNU General Public License, which is a copyleft license designed for free software.
We have designed this License in order to use it for manuals for free software, because free software needs free documentation: a free program should come with manuals providing the same freedoms that the software does. But this License is not limited to software manuals; it can be used for any textual work, regardless of subject matter or whether it is published as a printed book. We recommend this License principally for works whose purpose is instruction or reference.
This License applies to any manual or other work, in any medium, that contains a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it can be distributed under the terms of this License. Such a notice grants a world-wide, royalty-free license, unlimited in duration, to use that work under the conditions stated herein. The "Document", below, refers to any such manual or work. Any member of the public is a licensee, and is addressed as "you". You accept the license if you copy, modify or distribute the work in a way requiring permission under copyright law.
A "Modified Version" of the Document means any work containing the Document or a portion of it, either copied verbatim, or with modifications and/or translated into another language.
A "Secondary Section" is a named appendix or a front-matter section of the Document that deals exclusively with the relationship of the publishers or authors of the Document to the Document’s overall subject (or to related matters) and contains nothing that could fall directly within that overall subject. (Thus, if the Document is in part a textbook of mathematics, a Secondary Section may not explain any mathematics.) The relationship could be a matter of historical connection with the subject or with related matters, or of legal, commercial, philosophical, ethical or political position regarding them.
The "Invariant Sections" are certain Secondary Sections whose titles are designated, as being those of Invariant Sections, in the notice that says that the Document is released under this License. If a section does not fit the above definition of Secondary then it is not allowed to be designated as Invariant. The Document may contain zero Invariant Sections. If the Document does not identify any Invariant Sections then there are none.
The "Cover Texts" are certain short passages of text that are listed, as Front-Cover Texts or Back-Cover Texts, in the notice that says that the Document is released under this License. A Front-Cover Text may be at most 5 words, and a Back-Cover Text may be at most 25 words.
A "Transparent" copy of the Document means a machine-readable copy, represented in a format whose specification is available to the general public, that is suitable for revising the document straightforwardly with generic text editors or (for images composed of pixels) generic paint programs or (for drawings) some widely available drawing editor, and that is suitable for input to text formatters or for automatic translation to a variety of formats suitable for input to text formatters. A copy made in an otherwise Transparent file format whose markup, or absence of markup, has been arranged to thwart or discourage subsequent modification by readers is not Transparent. An image format is not Transparent if used for any substantial amount of text. A copy that is not "Transparent" is called "Opaque".
Examples of suitable formats for Transparent copies include plain ASCII without markup, Texinfo input format, LaTeX input format, SGML or XML using a publicly available DTD, and standard-conforming simple HTML, PostScript or PDF designed for human modification. Examples of transparent image formats include PNG, XCF and JPG. Opaque formats include proprietary formats that can be read and edited only by proprietary word processors, SGML or XML for which the DTD and/or processing tools are not generally available, and the machine-generated HTML, PostScript or PDF produced by some word processors for output purposes only.
The "Title Page" means, for a printed book, the title page itself, plus such following pages as are needed to hold, legibly, the material this License requires to appear in the title page. For works in formats which do not have any title page as such, "Title Page" means the text near the most prominent appearance of the work’s title, preceding the beginning of the body of the text.
The "publisher" means any person or entity that distributes copies of the Document to the public.
A section "Entitled XYZ" means a named subunit of the Document whose title either is precisely XYZ or contains XYZ in parentheses following text that translates XYZ in another language. (Here XYZ stands for a specific section name mentioned below, such as "Acknowledgements", "Dedications", "Endorsements", or "History".) To "Preserve the Title" of such a section when you modify the Document means that it remains a section "Entitled XYZ" according to this definition.
The Document may include Warranty Disclaimers next to the notice which states that this License applies to the Document. These Warranty Disclaimers are considered to be included by reference in this License, but only as regards disclaiming warranties: any other implication that these Warranty Disclaimers may have is void and has no effect on the meaning of this License.
You may copy and distribute the Document in any medium, either commercially or noncommercially, provided that this License, the copyright notices, and the license notice saying this License applies to the Document are reproduced in all copies, and that you add no other conditions whatsoever to those of this License. You may not use technical measures to obstruct or control the reading or further copying of the copies you make or distribute. However, you may accept compensation in exchange for copies. If you distribute a large enough number of copies you must also follow the conditions in section 3.
You may also lend copies, under the same conditions stated above, and you may publicly display copies.
If you publish printed copies (or copies in media that commonly have printed covers) of the Document, numbering more than 100, and the Document’s license notice requires Cover Texts, you must enclose the copies in covers that carry, clearly and legibly, all these Cover Texts: Front-Cover Texts on the front cover, and Back-Cover Texts on the back cover. Both covers must also clearly and legibly identify you as the publisher of these copies. The front cover must present the full title with all words of the title equally prominent and visible. You may add other material on the covers in addition. Copying with changes limited to the covers, as long as they preserve the title of the Document and satisfy these conditions, can be treated as verbatim copying in other respects.
If the required texts for either cover are too voluminous to fit legibly, you should put the first ones listed (as many as fit reasonably) on the actual cover, and continue the rest onto adjacent pages.
If you publish or distribute Opaque copies of the Document numbering more than 100, you must either include a machine-readable Transparent copy along with each Opaque copy, or state in or with each Opaque copy a computer-network location from which the general network-using public has access to download using public-standard network protocols a complete Transparent copy of the Document, free of added material. If you use the latter option, you must take reasonably prudent steps, when you begin distribution of Opaque copies in quantity, to ensure that this Transparent copy will remain thus accessible at the stated location until at least one year after the last time you distribute an Opaque copy (directly or through your agents or retailers) of that edition to the public.
It is requested, but not required, that you contact the authors of the Document well before redistributing any large number of copies, to give them a chance to provide you with an updated version of the Document.
You may copy and distribute a Modified Version of the Document under the conditions of sections 2 and 3 above, provided that you release the Modified Version under precisely this License, with the Modified Version filling the role of the Document, thus licensing distribution and modification of the Modified Version to whoever possesses a copy of it. In addition, you must do these things in the Modified Version:
-
Use in the Title Page (and on the covers, if any) a title distinct from that of the Document, and from those of previous versions (which should, if there were any, be listed in the History section of the Document). You may use the same title as a previous version if the original publisher of that version gives permission.
-
List on the Title Page, as authors, one or more persons or entities responsible for authorship of the modifications in the Modified Version, together with at least five of the principal authors of the Document (all of its principal authors, if it has fewer than five), unless they release you from this requirement.
-
State on the Title page the name of the publisher of the Modified Version, as the publisher.
-
Preserve all the copyright notices of the Document.
-
Add an appropriate copyright notice for your modifications adjacent to the other copyright notices.
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Include, immediately after the copyright notices, a license notice giving the public permission to use the Modified Version under the terms of this License, in the form shown in the Addendum below.
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Preserve in that license notice the full lists of Invariant Sections and required Cover Texts given in the Document’s license notice.
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Include an unaltered copy of this License.
-
Preserve the section Entitled "History", Preserve its Title, and add to it an item stating at least the title, year, new authors, and publisher of the Modified Version as given on the Title Page. If there is no section Entitled "History" in the Document, create one stating the title, year, authors, and publisher of the Document as given on its Title Page, then add an item describing the Modified Version as stated in the previous sentence.
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Preserve the network location, if any, given in the Document for public access to a Transparent copy of the Document, and likewise the network locations given in the Document for previous versions it was based on. These may be placed in the "History" section. You may omit a network location for a work that was published at least four years before the Document itself, or if the original publisher of the version it refers to gives permission.
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For any section Entitled "Acknowledgements" or "Dedications", Preserve the Title of the section, and preserve in the section all the substance and tone of each of the contributor acknowledgements and/or dedications given therein.
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Preserve all the Invariant Sections of the Document, unaltered in their text and in their titles. Section numbers or the equivalent are not considered part of the section titles.
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Delete any section Entitled "Endorsements". Such a section may not be included in the Modified Version.
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Do not retitle any existing section to be Entitled "Endorsements" or to conflict in title with any Invariant Section.
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Preserve any Warranty Disclaimers.
If the Modified Version includes new front-matter sections or appendices that qualify as Secondary Sections and contain no material copied from the Document, you may at your option designate some or all of these sections as invariant. To do this, add their titles to the list of Invariant Sections in the Modified Version’s license notice. These titles must be distinct from any other section titles.
You may add a section Entitled "Endorsements", provided it contains nothing but endorsements of your Modified Version by various parties—for example, statements of peer review or that the text has been approved by an organization as the authoritative definition of a standard.
You may add a passage of up to five words as a Front-Cover Text, and a passage of up to 25 words as a Back-Cover Text, to the end of the list of Cover Texts in the Modified Version. Only one passage of Front-Cover Text and one of Back-Cover Text may be added by (or through arrangements made by) any one entity. If the Document already includes a cover text for the same cover, previously added by you or by arrangement made by the same entity you are acting on behalf of, you may not add another; but you may replace the old one, on explicit permission from the previous publisher that added the old one.
The author(s) and publisher(s) of the Document do not by this License give permission to use their names for publicity for or to assert or imply endorsement of any Modified Version.
You may combine the Document with other documents released under this License, under the terms defined in section 4 above for modified versions, provided that you include in the combination all of the Invariant Sections of all of the original documents, unmodified, and list them all as Invariant Sections of your combined work in its license notice, and that you preserve all their Warranty Disclaimers.
The combined work need only contain one copy of this License, and multiple identical Invariant Sections may be replaced with a single copy. If there are multiple Invariant Sections with the same name but different contents, make the title of each such section unique by adding at the end of it, in parentheses, the name of the original author or publisher of that section if known, or else a unique number. Make the same adjustment to the section titles in the list of Invariant Sections in the license notice of the combined work.
In the combination, you must combine any sections Entitled "History" in the various original documents, forming one section Entitled "History"; likewise combine any sections Entitled "Acknowledgements", and any sections Entitled "Dedications". You must delete all sections Entitled "Endorsements".
You may make a collection consisting of the Document and other documents released under this License, and replace the individual copies of this License in the various documents with a single copy that is included in the collection, provided that you follow the rules of this License for verbatim copying of each of the documents in all other respects.
You may extract a single document from such a collection, and distribute it individually under this License, provided you insert a copy of this License into the extracted document, and follow this License in all other respects regarding verbatim copying of that document.
A compilation of the Document or its derivatives with other separate and independent documents or works, in or on a volume of a storage or distribution medium, is called an "aggregate" if the copyright resulting from the compilation is not used to limit the legal rights of the compilation’s users beyond what the individual works permit. When the Document is included in an aggregate, this License does not apply to the other works in the aggregate which are not themselves derivative works of the Document.
If the Cover Text requirement of section 3 is applicable to these copies of the Document, then if the Document is less than one half of the entire aggregate, the Document’s Cover Texts may be placed on covers that bracket the Document within the aggregate, or the electronic equivalent of covers if the Document is in electronic form. Otherwise they must appear on printed covers that bracket the whole aggregate.
Translation is considered a kind of modification, so you may distribute translations of the Document under the terms of section 4. Replacing Invariant Sections with translations requires special permission from their copyright holders, but you may include translations of some or all Invariant Sections in addition to the original versions of these Invariant Sections. You may include a translation of this License, and all the license notices in the Document, and any Warranty Disclaimers, provided that you also include the original English version of this License and the original versions of those notices and disclaimers. In case of a disagreement between the translation and the original version of this License or a notice or disclaimer, the original version will prevail.
If a section in the Document is Entitled "Acknowledgements", "Dedications", or "History", the requirement (section 4) to Preserve its Title (section 1) will typically require changing the actual title.
You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Document except as expressly provided under this License. Any attempt otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute it is void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License.
However, if you cease all violation of this License, then your license from a particular copyright holder is reinstated (a) provisionally, unless and until the copyright holder explicitly and finally terminates your license, and (b) permanently, if the copyright holder fails to notify you of the violation by some reasonable means prior to 60 days after the cessation.
Moreover, your license from a particular copyright holder is reinstated permanently if the copyright holder notifies you of the violation by some reasonable means, this is the first time you have received notice of violation of this License (for any work) from that copyright holder, and you cure the violation prior to 30 days after your receipt of the notice.
Termination of your rights under this section does not terminate the licenses of parties who have received copies or rights from you under this License. If your rights have been terminated and not permanently reinstated, receipt of a copy of some or all of the same material does not give you any rights to use it.
The Free Software Foundation may publish new, revised versions of the GNU Free Documentation License from time to time. Such new versions will be similar in spirit to the present version, but may differ in detail to address new problems or concerns. See http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/.
Each version of the License is given a distinguishing version number. If the Document specifies that a particular numbered version of this License "or any later version" applies to it, you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of that specified version or of any later version that has been published (not as a draft) by the Free Software Foundation. If the Document does not specify a version number of this License, you may choose any version ever published (not as a draft) by the Free Software Foundation. If the Document specifies that a proxy can decide which future versions of this License can be used, that proxy’s public statement of acceptance of a version permanently authorizes you to choose that version for the Document.
"Massive Multiauthor Collaboration Site" (or "MMC Site") means any World Wide Web server that publishes copyrightable works and also provides prominent facilities for anybody to edit those works. A public wiki that anybody can edit is an example of such a server. A "Massive Multiauthor Collaboration" (or "MMC") contained in the site means any set of copyrightable works thus published on the MMC site.
"CC-BY-SA" means the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license published by Creative Commons Corporation, a not-for-profit corporation with a principal place of business in San Francisco, California, as well as future copyleft versions of that license published by that same organization.
"Incorporate" means to publish or republish a Document, in whole or in part, as part of another Document.
An MMC is "eligible for relicensing" if it is licensed under this License, and if all works that were first published under this License somewhere other than this MMC, and subsequently incorporated in whole or in part into the MMC, (1) had no cover texts or invariant sections, and (2) were thus incorporated prior to November 1, 2008.
The operator of an MMC Site may republish an MMC contained in the site under CC-BY-SA on the same site at any time before August 1, 2009, provided the MMC is eligible for relicensing.