Configuring the storage backend for Glance API server

You can modify the Glance API server configuration file to specify the datastore backend that is used to store images.

About this task

IBM® Cloud Manager with OpenStack provides the Glance vSphere datastore backend function. When you want to deploy a VMware virtual machine disk file (VMDK) image, you can configure Glance to support the datastore backend. This configuration reduces the time that it takes for virtual machine deployment.

To configure the Glance vSphere datastore backend, complete the following instructions.

Procedure

  1. Edit the /etc/glance/glance-api.conf file, as follows: 
    [DEFAULT]
vmware_server_username = VCENTER_USERNAME
vmware_server_password = VCENTER_PASSWORD
vmware_datacenter_path = DATACENTER_NAME
vmware_datastore_name = DATASTORE_NAME
vmware_store_image_dir = /openstack_glance
show_image_direct_url = True 

[glance_store]
default_store = vsphere
stores = file, vmware_datastore, glance.store.vmware_datastore.Store
  2. Restart the glance-api service to enable the change.
  3. Verify the Glance vSphere datastore backend is enabled.
    1. After you complete the configuration, create an image.
    2. Deploy a virtual machine with the image you created in step 3a.
    3. If the deployment in step 3a is successful, a folder that is named "X.X.X.X_folder" displays in the datastore that is specified in vCenter. The IP address is the IP address for the compute node in use. There is also a sub folder under X.X.X.X_folder, named using the image UUID in step 3a and the virtual disk file is in this sub folder.
    4. The virtual machine folder displays in the specified datastore (configured in nova.conf), which is named with the corresponding instance UUID in OpenStack.

What to do next

Note:
  • This function applies for VMDK image deployment only. Template images are not supported.
  • If you use Glance vSphere datastore backend function, "show_image_direct_url = True" is required in the glance-api.conf configuration file.
  • The cookbook for the VMware driver supports this function.