High-availability for DHCP
This section describes how to use the agent management (alias agent)
and scheduler (alias agent_scheduler) extensions for DHCP agents
scalability and HA.
Note
Use the openstack extension list
command to check if these
extensions are enabled. Check agent
and
agent_scheduler
are included in the output.
$ openstack extension list --network -c Name -c Alias
+-------------------------------------------------------------+---------------------------+
| Name | Alias |
+-------------------------------------------------------------+---------------------------+
| Default Subnetpools | default-subnetpools |
| Network IP Availability | network-ip-availability |
| Network Availability Zone | network_availability_zone |
| Auto Allocated Topology Services | auto-allocated-topology |
| Neutron L3 Configurable external gateway mode | ext-gw-mode |
| Port Binding | binding |
| Neutron Metering | metering |
| agent | agent |
| Subnet Allocation | subnet_allocation |
| L3 Agent Scheduler | l3_agent_scheduler |
| Neutron external network | external-net |
| Neutron Service Flavors | flavors |
| Network MTU | net-mtu |
| Availability Zone | availability_zone |
| Quota management support | quotas |
| HA Router extension | l3-ha |
| Provider Network | provider |
| Multi Provider Network | multi-provider |
| Address scope | address-scope |
| Neutron Extra Route | extraroute |
| Subnet service types | subnet-service-types |
| Resource timestamps | standard-attr-timestamp |
| Neutron Service Type Management | service-type |
| Router Flavor Extension | l3-flavors |
| Neutron Extra DHCP opts | extra_dhcp_opt |
| Resource revision numbers | standard-attr-revisions |
| Pagination support | pagination |
| Sorting support | sorting |
| security-group | security-group |
| DHCP Agent Scheduler | dhcp_agent_scheduler |
| Router Availability Zone | router_availability_zone |
| RBAC Policies | rbac-policies |
| standard-attr-description | standard-attr-description |
| Neutron L3 Router | router |
| Allowed Address Pairs | allowed-address-pairs |
| project_id field enabled | project-id |
| Distributed Virtual Router | dvr |
+-------------------------------------------------------------+---------------------------+
Demo setup
There will be three hosts in the setup.
Host | Description |
---|---|
OpenStack controller host – controlnode | Runs the Networking, Identity, and Compute services that are required to deploy VMs. The node must have at least one network interface that is connected to the Management Network. Note that nova-network should not be running because it is replacedby Neutron. |
HostA | Runs nova-compute , the Neutron L2 agent and DHCPagent |
HostB | Same as HostA |
Configuration
controlnode: neutron server
-
Neutron configuration file
/etc/neutron/neutron.conf
:[DEFAULT] core_plugin = linuxbridge rabbit_host = controlnode host = controlnode agent_down_time = 5 dhcp_agents_per_network = 1
Note
In the above configuration, we use
dhcp_agents_per_network = 1
for this demonstration. In
usual deployments, we suggest setting
dhcp_agents_per_network
to more than one to match the
number of DHCP agents in your deployment. Seeconf-dhcp-agents-per-network
. -
Update the plug-in configuration file
/etc/neutron/plugins/linuxbridge/linuxbridge_conf.ini
:[vlans] tenant_network_type = vlan network_vlan_ranges = physnet1:1000:2999 [database] connection = mysql+pymysql://root:[email protected]:3306/neutron_linux_bridge retry_interval = 2 [linux_bridge] physical_interface_mappings = physnet1:eth0
HostA and HostB: L2 agent
-
Neutron configuration file
/etc/neutron/neutron.conf
: -
Update the plug-in configuration file
/etc/neutron/plugins/linuxbridge/linuxbridge_conf.ini
:[vlans] tenant_network_type = vlan network_vlan_ranges = physnet1:1000:2999 [database] connection = mysql://root:[email protected]:3306/neutron_linux_bridge retry_interval = 2 [linux_bridge] physical_interface_mappings = physnet1:eth0
-
Update the nova configuration file
/etc/nova/nova.conf
:
HostA and HostB: DHCP agent
-
Update the DHCP configuration file
/etc/neutron/dhcp_agent.ini
:
Prerequisites for
demonstration
Admin role is required to use the agent management and scheduler
extensions. Ensure you run the following commands under a project with
an admin role.
To experiment, you need VMs and a neutron network:
$ openstack server list
+--------------------------------------+-----------+--------+----------------+--------+----------+
| ID | Name | Status | Networks | Image | Flavor |
+--------------------------------------+-----------+--------+----------------+--------+----------+
| c394fcd0-0baa-43ae-a793-201815c3e8ce | myserver1 | ACTIVE | net1=192.0.2.3 | cirros | m1.tiny |
| 2d604e05-9a6c-4ddb-9082-8a1fbdcc797d | myserver2 | ACTIVE | net1=192.0.2.4 | ubuntu | m1.small |
| c7c0481c-3db8-4d7a-a948-60ce8211d585 | myserver3 | ACTIVE | net1=192.0.2.5 | centos | m1.small |
+--------------------------------------+-----------+--------+----------------+--------+----------+
$ openstack network list
+--------------------------------------+------+--------------------------------------+
| ID | Name | Subnets |
+--------------------------------------+------+--------------------------------------+
| ad88e059-e7fa-4cf7-8857-6731a2a3a554 | net1 | 8086db87-3a7a-4cad-88c9-7bab9bc69258 |
+--------------------------------------+------+--------------------------------------+
Managing agents in
neutron deployment
-
List all agents:
$ openstack network agent list +--------------------------------------+--------------------+-------+-------------------+-------+-------+---------------------------+ | ID | Agent Type | Host | Availability Zone | Alive | State | Binary | +--------------------------------------+--------------------+-------+-------------------+-------+-------+---------------------------+ | 22467163-01ea-4231-ba45-3bd316f425e6 | Linux bridge agent | HostA | None | True | UP | neutron-linuxbridge-agent | | 2444c54d-0d28-460c-ab0f-cd1e6b5d3c7b | DHCP agent | HostA | None | True | UP | neutron-dhcp-agent | | 3066d20c-9f8f-440c-ae7c-a40ffb4256b6 | Linux bridge agent | HostB | nova | True | UP | neutron-linuxbridge-agent | | 55569f4e-6f31-41a6-be9d-526efce1f7fe | DHCP agent | HostB | nova | True | UP | neutron-dhcp-agent | +--------------------------------------+--------------------+-------+-------------------+-------+-------+---------------------------+
Every agent that supports these extensions will register itself with
the neutron server when it starts up.The output shows information for four agents. The
alive
field showsTrue
if the agent reported its state within the
period defined by theagent_down_time
option in the
neutron.conf
file. Otherwise thealive
is
False
. -
List DHCP agents that host a specified network:
$ openstack network agent list --network net1 +--------------------------------------+---------------+----------------+-------+ | ID | Host | Admin State Up | Alive | +--------------------------------------+---------------+----------------+-------+ | 22467163-01ea-4231-ba45-3bd316f425e6 | HostA | UP | True | +--------------------------------------+---------------+----------------+-------+
-
List the networks hosted by a given DHCP agent:
This command is to show which networks a given dhcp agent is
managing.$ openstack network list --agent 22467163-01ea-4231-ba45-3bd316f425e6 +--------------------------------+------------------------+---------------------------------+ | ID | Name | Subnets | +--------------------------------+------------------------+---------------------------------+ | ad88e059-e7fa- | net1 | 8086db87-3a7a-4cad- | | 4cf7-8857-6731a2a3a554 | | 88c9-7bab9bc69258 | +--------------------------------+------------------------+---------------------------------+
-
Show agent details.
The
openstack network agent show
command shows details
for a specified agent:$ openstack network agent show 2444c54d-0d28-460c-ab0f-cd1e6b5d3c7b +---------------------+--------------------------------------------------+ | Field | Value | +---------------------+--------------------------------------------------+ | admin_state_up | UP | | agent_type | DHCP agent | | alive | True | | availability_zone | nova | | binary | neutron-dhcp-agent | | configurations | dhcp_driver='neutron.agent.linux.dhcp.Dnsmasq', | | | dhcp_lease_duration='86400', | | | log_agent_heartbeats='False', networks='1', | | | notifies_port_ready='True', ports='3', | | | subnets='1' | | created_at | 2016-12-14 00:25:54 | | description | None | | last_heartbeat_at | 2016-12-14 06:53:24 | | host | HostA | | id | 2444c54d-0d28-460c-ab0f-cd1e6b5d3c7b | | started_at | 2016-12-14 00:25:54 | | topic | dhcp_agent | +---------------------+--------------------------------------------------+
In this output,
last_heartbeat_at
is the time on the
neutron server. You do not need to synchronize all agents to this time
for this extension to run correctly.configurations
describes the static configuration for the agent or run time data. This
agent is a DHCP agent and it hosts one network, one subnet, and three
ports.Different types of agents show different details. The following
output shows information for a Linux bridge agent:$ openstack network agent show 22467163-01ea-4231-ba45-3bd316f425e6 +---------------------+--------------------------------------+ | Field | Value | +---------------------+--------------------------------------+ | admin_state_up | UP | | agent_type | Linux bridge agent | | alive | True | | availability_zone | nova | | binary | neutron-linuxbridge-agent | | configurations | { | | | "physnet1": "eth0", | | | "devices": "4" | | | } | | created_at | 2016-12-14 00:26:54 | | description | None | | last_heartbeat_at | 2016-12-14 06:53:24 | | host | HostA | | id | 22467163-01ea-4231-ba45-3bd316f425e6 | | started_at | 2016-12-14T06:48:39.000000 | | topic | N/A | +---------------------+--------------------------------------+
The output shows
bridge-mapping
and the number of
virtual network devices on this L2 agent.
Managing
assignment of networks to DHCP agent
A single network can be assigned to more than one DHCP agents and one
DHCP agent can host more than one network. You can add a network to a
DHCP agent and remove one from it.
-
Default scheduling.
When you create a network with one port, the network will be
scheduled to an active DHCP agent. If many active DHCP agents are
running, select one randomly. You can design more sophisticated
scheduling algorithms in the same way as nova-schedule later on.$ openstack network create net2 $ openstack subnet create --network net2 --subnet-range 198.51.100.0/24 subnet2 $ openstack port create port2 --network net2 $ openstack network agent list --network net2 +--------------------------------------+---------------+----------------+-------+ | ID | Host | Admin State Up | Alive | +--------------------------------------+---------------+----------------+-------+ | 2444c54d-0d28-460c-ab0f-cd1e6b5d3c7b | HostA | UP | True | +--------------------------------------+---------------+----------------+-------+
It is allocated to DHCP agent on HostA. If you want to validate the
behavior through thednsmasq
command, you must create a subnet for the
network because the DHCP agent starts the dnsmasq service only if there
is a DHCP. -
Assign a network to a given DHCP agent.
To add another DHCP agent to host the network, run this command:
$ openstack network agent add network --dhcp \ 55569f4e-6f31-41a6-be9d-526efce1f7fe net2 $ openstack network agent list --network net2 +--------------------------------------+-------+----------------+--------+ | ID | Host | Admin State Up | Alive | +--------------------------------------+-------+----------------+--------+ | 2444c54d-0d28-460c-ab0f-cd1e6b5d3c7b | HostA | UP | True | | 55569f4e-6f31-41a6-be9d-526efce1f7fe | HostB | UP | True | +--------------------------------------+-------+----------------+--------+
Both DHCP agents host the
net2
network. -
Remove a network from a specified DHCP agent.
This command is the sibling command for the previous one. Remove
net2
from the DHCP agent for HostA:$ openstack network agent remove network --dhcp \ 2444c54d-0d28-460c-ab0f-cd1e6b5d3c7b net2 $ openstack network agent list --network net2 +--------------------------------------+-------+----------------+-------+ | ID | Host | Admin State Up | Alive | +--------------------------------------+-------+----------------+-------+ | 55569f4e-6f31-41a6-be9d-526efce1f7fe | HostB | UP | True | +--------------------------------------+-------+----------------+-------+
You can see that only the DHCP agent for HostB is hosting the
net2
network.
HA of DHCP agents
Boot a VM on net2
. Let both DHCP agents host
net2
. Fail the agents in turn to see if the VM can still
get the desired IP.
-
Boot a VM on
net2
:$ openstack network list +--------------------------------------+------+--------------------------------------+ | ID | Name | Subnets | +--------------------------------------+------+--------------------------------------+ | ad88e059-e7fa-4cf7-8857-6731a2a3a554 | net1 | 8086db87-3a7a-4cad-88c9-7bab9bc69258 | | 9b96b14f-71b8-4918-90aa-c5d705606b1a | net2 | 6979b71a-0ae8-448c-aa87-65f68eedcaaa | +--------------------------------------+------+--------------------------------------+ $ openstack server create --image tty --flavor 1 myserver4 \ --nic net-id=9b96b14f-71b8-4918-90aa-c5d705606b1a ... $ openstack server list +--------------------------------------+-----------+--------+-------------------+---------+----------+ | ID | Name | Status | Networks | Image | Flavor | +--------------------------------------+-----------+--------+-------------------+---------+----------+ | c394fcd0-0baa-43ae-a793-201815c3e8ce | myserver1 | ACTIVE | net1=192.0.2.3 | cirros | m1.tiny | | 2d604e05-9a6c-4ddb-9082-8a1fbdcc797d | myserver2 | ACTIVE | net1=192.0.2.4 | ubuntu | m1.small | | c7c0481c-3db8-4d7a-a948-60ce8211d585 | myserver3 | ACTIVE | net1=192.0.2.5 | centos | m1.small | | f62f4731-5591-46b1-9d74-f0c901de567f | myserver4 | ACTIVE | net2=198.51.100.2 | cirros1 | m1.tiny | +--------------------------------------+-----------+--------+-------------------+---------+----------+
-
Make sure both DHCP agents hosting
net2
:Use the previous commands to assign the network to agents.
$ openstack network agent list --network net2 +--------------------------------------+-------+----------------+-------+ | ID | Host | Admin State Up | Alive | +--------------------------------------+-------+----------------+-------+ | 2444c54d-0d28-460c-ab0f-cd1e6b5d3c7b | HostA | UP | True | | 55569f4e-6f31-41a6-be9d-526efce1f7fe | HostB | UP | True | +--------------------------------------+-------+----------------+-------+
To test the HA of DHCP agent:
- Log in to the
myserver4
VM, and run
udhcpc
,dhclient
or other DHCP client. - Stop the DHCP agent on HostA. Besides stopping the
neutron-dhcp-agent
binary, you must stop the
dnsmasq
processes. - Run a DHCP client in VM to see if it can get the wanted IP.
- Stop the DHCP agent on HostB too.
- Run
udhcpc
in the VM; it cannot get the wanted IP. - Start DHCP agent on HostB. The VM gets the wanted IP again.
No HA for
metadata service on isolated networks
All Neutron backends using the DHCP agent can also provide metadata
service in isolated networks (i.e. networks without a router). In
this case the DHCP agent manages the metadata service (see config option
enable_isolated_metadata).
Note however that the metadata service is only redundant for IPv4,
and not IPv6, even when the DHCP service is configured to be highly
available (config option dhcp_agents_per_network
> 1). This is because the DHCP agent will insert a route to the well
known metadata IPv4 address (169.254.169.254) via its own IP address, so it
will be reachable as long as the DHCP service is available at that IP
address. This also means that recovery after a failure is tied to the
renewal of the DHCP lease, since that route will only change if the DHCP
server for a VM changes.
With IPv6, the well known metadata IPv6 address (fe80::a9fe:a9fe) is used, but directly
configured in the DHCP agent network namespace. Due to the enforcement
of duplicate address detection (DAD), this address can only be
configured in at most one DHCP network namespaces at any time. See RFC 4862
for details on the DAD process.
For this reason, even when you have multiple DHCP agents, an
arbitrary one (where the metadata IPv6 address is not in dadfailed state) will serve all metadata
requests over IPv6. When that metadata service instance becomes
unreachable there is no failover and the service will become
unreachable.
Disabling and removing an
agent
An administrator might want to disable an agent if a system hardware
or software upgrade is planned. Some agents that support scheduling also
support disabling and enabling agents, such as L3 and DHCP agents. After
the agent is disabled, the scheduler does not schedule new resources to
the agent.
After the agent is disabled, you can safely remove the agent. Even
after disabling the agent, resources on the agent are kept assigned.
Ensure you remove the resources on the agent before you delete the
agent.
Disable the DHCP agent on HostA before you stop it:
$ openstack network agent set 2444c54d-0d28-460c-ab0f-cd1e6b5d3c7b --disable
$ openstack network agent list
+--------------------------------------+--------------------+-------+-------------------+-------+-------+---------------------------+
| ID | Agent Type | Host | Availability Zone | Alive | State | Binary |
+--------------------------------------+--------------------+-------+-------------------+-------+-------+---------------------------+
| 22467163-01ea-4231-ba45-3bd316f425e6 | Linux bridge agent | HostA | None | True | UP | neutron-linuxbridge-agent |
| 2444c54d-0d28-460c-ab0f-cd1e6b5d3c7b | DHCP agent | HostA | None | True | DOWN | neutron-dhcp-agent |
| 3066d20c-9f8f-440c-ae7c-a40ffb4256b6 | Linux bridge agent | HostB | nova | True | UP | neutron-linuxbridge-agent |
| 55569f4e-6f31-41a6-be9d-526efce1f7fe | DHCP agent | HostB | nova | True | UP | neutron-dhcp-agent |
+--------------------------------------+--------------------+-------+-------------------+-------+-------+---------------------------+
After you stop the DHCP agent on HostA, you can delete it by the
following command:
$ openstack network agent delete 2444c54d-0d28-460c-ab0f-cd1e6b5d3c7b
$ openstack network agent list
+--------------------------------------+--------------------+-------+-------------------+-------+-------+---------------------------+
| ID | Agent Type | Host | Availability Zone | Alive | State | Binary |
+--------------------------------------+--------------------+-------+-------------------+-------+-------+---------------------------+
| 22467163-01ea-4231-ba45-3bd316f425e6 | Linux bridge agent | HostA | None | True | UP | neutron-linuxbridge-agent |
| 3066d20c-9f8f-440c-ae7c-a40ffb4256b6 | Linux bridge agent | HostB | nova | True | UP | neutron-linuxbridge-agent |
| 55569f4e-6f31-41a6-be9d-526efce1f7fe | DHCP agent | HostB | nova | True | UP | neutron-dhcp-agent |
+--------------------------------------+--------------------+-------+-------------------+-------+-------+---------------------------+
After deletion, if you restart the DHCP agent, it appears on the
agent list again.
Enabling DHCP high availability by
default
You can control the default number of DHCP agents assigned to a
network by setting the following configuration option in the file
/etc/neutron/neutron.conf
.