1. Introduction

Provisioning is a process that starts with a bare physical or virtual machine and ends with a fully configured, ready-to-use operating system. Using Red Hat Satellite, you can define and automate fine-grained provisioning for a large number of hosts.

There are many provisioning methods. For example, you can use Satellite Server’s integrated Capsule or an external Capsule Server to provision bare metal hosts using both PXE based and non-PXE based methods. You can also provision cloud instances from specific providers through their APIs. These provisioning methods are part of the Red Hat Satellite 6 application life cycle to create, manage, and update hosts.

1.1. Provisioning Types Overview

Red Hat Satellite 6 has different methods for provisioning hosts:

Bare Metal Provisioning

Satellite provisions bare metal hosts primarily through PXE boot and MAC address identification. You can create host entries and specify the MAC address of the physical host to provision. You can also boot blank hosts to use Satellite’s discovery service, which creates a pool of ready-to-provision hosts. You can also boot and provision hosts through PXE-less methods.

Cloud Providers

Satellite connects to private and public cloud providers to provision instances of hosts from images that are stored with the Cloud environment. This also includes selecting which hardware profile or flavor to use.

Virtualization Infrastructure

Satellite connects to virtualization infrastructure services such as Red Hat Virtualization and VMware to provision virtual machines from virtual image templates or using the same PXE-based boot methods as bare metal providers.

1.2. Provisioning Workflow Overview

The provisioning process follows a basic workflow:

  1. You create a host. Satellite requests an unused IP address from the DHCP Capsule Server that is associated with the subnet. Satellite loads this IP address into the IP address field in the Create Host window. When you complete all the options for the new host, submit the new host request.

  2. The DHCP Capsule Server that is associated with the subnet reserves an entry for the host.

  3. Satellite configures the DNS records:

    • A forward DNS record is created on the Capsule Server that is associated with the domain.

    • A reverse DNS record is created on the DNS Capsule Server that is associated with the subnet.

  4. A PXELinux menu is created for the host in the TFTP Capsule Server that is associated with the subnet.

  5. The new host requests a DHCP lease from the DHCP server.

  6. The DHCP server responds to the lease request and returns TFTP next-server and filename options.

  7. The host requests the bootloader and menu from the TFTP server.

  8. The PXELinux menu and OS installer for the host is returned over TFTP.

  9. The installer requests the provisioning template or script from Satellite.

  10. Satellite renders the template and returns the resulting kickstart file to the host.

  11. The host enters a build process that installs the operating system, registers the host to Satellite, and installs management tools such as katello-agent and puppet.

  12. The installer notifies Satellite of a successful build in the postinstall script.

  13. The PXELinux menu reverts to a local boot template.

  14. The host starts its operating system. If you configured the host to use any Puppet classes, the host configures itself using the modules stored on Satellite.

This workflow differs depending on custom options. For example:

Discovery

If you use the Discovery service, Satellite automatically detects the MAC address of the new host and restarts the host after you submit a request. Note that TCP port 8443 must be reachable by the Capsule to which the host is attached for Satellite to restart the host.

PXE-less Provisioning

After you submit a new host request, you must boot the specific host with a boot disk that you download from Satellite.

Compute Resources

The compute resource creates the virtual machine for the host and returns the MAC address to Satellite. If you use image-based provisioning, the host does not follow the standard PXE boot and operating system installation: the compute resource creates a copy of the image for the new host to use.

2. Configuring Provisioning Contexts

Before you provision hosts using Satellite, you must understand the placement strategy for hosts in Satellite. This is known as the provisioning context.

2.1. Provisioning Context Overview

A provisioning context is the combination of an organization and location that you specify for Satellite components. The organization and location that a component belongs to sets the ownership and access for that component.

Organizations divide Red Hat Satellite 6 components into logical groups based on ownership, purpose, content, security level, and other divisions. You can create and manage multiple organizations through Red Hat Satellite 6 and assign components to each individual organization. This ensures the Satellite Server provisions hosts within a certain organization and only uses components that are assigned to that organization. For more information about organizations, see Managing Organizations in the Content Management Guide.

Locations function similar to organizations. The difference is that locations are based on physical or geographical setting. Users can nest locations in a hierarchy.

For more information about locations, see Managing Locations in the Content Management Guide.

2.2. Setting the Provisioning Context

When you set a context, you define which organization and location to use for provisioning hosts.

The organization and location menus are located in the menu bar, on the upper left of the Satellite web UI. If you have not selected an organization and location to use, the menu displays: Any Organization and Any Location.

Procedure

  • To set the provisioning context, click the Any Organization and Any Location buttons and select the organization and location to use.

Each user can set their default provisioning context in their account settings. Click the user name in the upper right of the Satellite web UI and select My account to edit your user account settings.

For CLI Users

While using the CLI, include either --organization or --organization-label and --location or --location-id as an option. For example:

# hammer host list --organization "Default_Organization" --location "Default_Location"

This command outputs hosts allocated for the Default_Organization and Default_Location.

3. Configuring Provisioning Resources

Red Hat Satellite 6 contains provisioning resources that you must setup and configure to create a host. These include:

Domain

You must assign every host that is managed by Satellite to a domain. Using the domain, Satellite can manage A, AAAA and PTR records. If there is no record integration, you still must create and associate at least one domain. Domains are included in the naming conventions Satellite hosts, for example, a host test123 in the example.com domain has the host name test123.example.com.

Subnet

You must assign every host managed by Satellite to a subnet. Using subnets, Satellite can then manage IPv4 reservations. If there are no reservation integrations, you still must create and associate at least one subnet. You can manage IP addresses with one of the following options:

  • Manual - when the IPAM is set to None

  • DHCP - the managed DHCP server requests a free IP from its pool

  • Database - serial or random IP address book that is kept in the Satellite database

Provisioning template

While you can create static provisioning templates, for example Kickstart templates, Satellite has many provisioning templates in ERB (Embedded Ruby) syntax that you can use to modularize parameters in each host or host group. For example, the timezone setting in a kickstart template can differ depending on the given host parameter. Depending on a provisioning workflow, you can set various combinations.

Partition table

A Partition table is a type of template used only for rendering the disk volume definition part of kickstart. A Partition table uses the same ERB syntax as provisioning templates. You can use a Partition table to define multiple disk layouts and select them for each host or host group depending on the system purpose.

Installation media

Installation media represents a parametrized URL to a remote repository with OS packages, for example yum or apt. You can use this parameter to install third-party content. Red Hat content is delivered through repository syncing feature instead.

Subscriptions and Repositories

To consume Red Hat content, you must upload subscriptions to Red Hat Satellite. You must create a Product for the subscription. You must enable and synchronize one or more installation repositories in the initial lifecycle environment Library. Optionally, content can be filtered and promoted to other Lifecycle Environments or Content Views.

3.1. Creating Operating Systems

An operating system is a collection of resources that define how Satellite Server installs a base operating system on a host. Operating system entries combine previously defined resources, such as installation media, partition tables, provisioning templates, and others.

Importing operating systems from Red Hat’s CDN creates new entries on the Hosts > Operating Systems page.

You can also add custom operating systems using the following procedure:

Procedure

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Operating systems and click New Operating system.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name to represent the operating system entry.

  3. In the Major field, enter the number that corresponds to the major version of the operating system.

  4. In the Minor field, enter the number that corresponds to the minor version of the operating system.

  5. In the Description field, enter a description of the operating system.

  6. From the Family list, select the operating system’s family.

  7. From the Root Password Hash list, select the encoding method for the root password.

  8. From the Architectures list, select the architectures that the operating system uses.

  9. Click the Partition table tab and select the possible partition tables that apply to this operating system.

  10. Optional: if you use non-Red Hat content, click the Installation media tab and select the installation media that apply to this operating system. For more information, see Using Third Party Installation Media.

  11. Click the Templates tab and select a PXELinux template, a Provisioning template, and a Finish template for your operating system to use. You can select other templates, for example an iPXE template, if you plan to use iPXE for provisioning.

  12. Click Submit to save your provisioning template.

For CLI Users

Create the operating system using the hammer os create command:

# hammer os create --name "MyOS" \
--description "My_custom_operating_system" \
--major 7 --minor 3 --family "Redhat" --architectures "x86_64" \
--partition-tables "My_Partition" --media "Red_Hat" \
--provisioning-templates "My_Provisioning_Template"

3.2. Creating Architectures

An architecture in Satellite represents a logical grouping of hosts and operating systems. Architectures are created by Satellite automatically when hosts check in with Puppet. Basic i386 and x86_64 architectures are already preset in Satellite 6.

Use this procedure to create an architecture in Satellite.

Supported Architectures

Intel x86_64 architecture is supported only for provisioning using PXE, Discovery, and boot disk. For more information, see Red Hat Knowledgebase solution Architectures Supported for Satellite 6 Provisioning.

Procedure

To create an architecture, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Architectures, and in the Architectures window, click Create Architecture.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the architecture.

  3. From the Operating Systems list, select an operating system. If none are available, you can create and assign them under Hosts > Operating Systems.

  4. Click Submit.

For CLI Users

Enter the hammer architecture create command to create an architecture. Specify its name and operating systems that include this architecture:

# hammer architecture create --name "Architecture_Name" \
--operatingsystems "os"

3.3. Creating Hardware Models

Use this procedure to create a hardware model in Satellite so that you can specify what hardware model a host uses.

Procedure

To create a hardware model, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Hardware Models, and in the Hardware Models window, click Create Model.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the hardware model.

  3. Optionally, in the Hardware Model and Vendor Class fields, you can enter corresponding information for your system.

  4. In the Info field, enter a description of the hardware model.

  5. Click Submit to save your hardware model.

For CLI Users

Create a hardware model using the hammer model create command. The only required parameter is --name. Optionally, enter the hardware model with the --hardware-model option, a vendor class with the --vendor-class option, and a description with the --info option:

# hammer model create --name "model_name" --info "description" \
--hardware-model "hardware_model" --vendor-class "vendor_class"

3.4. Using a Synced Kickstart Repository for a Host’s Operating System

Satellite contains a set of synchronized kickstart repositories that you use to install the provisioned host’s operating system. For more information about adding repositories, see Selecting Red Hat Repositories to Synchronize in the Content Management Guide.

To set up a kickstart repository, complete the following steps:

  1. Add the synchronized kickstart repository that you want to use to the existing Content View or create a new Content View and add the kickstart repository.

    For Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8, ensure that you add both Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 for x86_64 - AppStream Kickstart x86_64 8 and Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 for x86_64 - BaseOS Kickstart x86_64 8 repositories.

  2. Publish a new version of the Content View where the kickstart repository is added and promote it to a required lifecycle environment. For more information, see Managing Content Views in the Content Management Guide.

  3. When you create a host, in the Operating System tab, for Media Selection, select the Synced Content check box.

To View the Kickstart Tree

To view the kickstart tree enter the following command:

# hammer medium list --organization "your_organization"

3.5. Creating Partition Tables

A partition table is a set of directives that defines the way Satellite Server configures the disks available on a new host. Red Hat Satellite 6 contains a set of default partition tables to use, including a Kickstart default. You can also edit partition table entries to configure the preferred partitioning scheme, or create a partition table entry and add it to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux operating system entry.

Procedure

To create partition tables, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Partition Tables and, in the Partition Tables window, click Create Partition Table.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name to represent the partition table.

  3. Select the Default check box if you want to set the template to automatically associate with new organizations or locations.

  4. Select the Snippet check box if you want to identify the template as a reusable snippet for other partition tables.

  5. From the Operating System Family list, select the distribution or family of the partitioning layout. For example, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, CentOS, and Fedora are in the Red Hat family.

  6. In the Template editor field, enter the layout for the disk partition. For example:

    zerombr
clearpart --all --initlabel
autopart

    You can also use the Template file browser to upload a template file.

    The format of the layout must match that for the intended operating system. For example, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.2 requires a layout that matches a kickstart file.

  7. In the Audit Comment field, add a summary of changes to the partition layout.

  8. Click the Organizations and Locations tabs to add any other provisioning contexts that you want to associate with the partition table. Satellite adds the partition table to the current provisioning context.

  9. Click Submit to save your partition table.

For CLI Users

Before you create a partition table with the CLI, create a plain text file that contains the partition layout. This example uses the ~/my-partition file. Create the installation medium using the hammer partition-table create command:

# hammer partition-table create --name "My Partition" --snippet false \
--os-family Redhat --file ~/my-partition --organizations "My_Organization" \
--locations "My_Location"

3.6. Creating Provisioning Templates

A provisioning template defines the way Satellite Server installs an operating system on a host.

3.6.1. Types of Provisioning Templates

There are various types of provisioning templates, including:

Provision

The main template for the provisioning process. For example, a kickstart template. For more information about kickstart template syntax, see the Kickstart Syntax Reference in the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Installation Guide.

PXELinux, PXEGrub, PXEGrub2

PXE-based templates that deploy to the template Capsule associated with a subnet to ensure that the host uses the installer with the correct kernel options. For BIOS provisioning, select PXELinux template. For UEFI provisioning, select PXEGrub2.

Finish

Post-configuration scripts to use when the main provisioning process completes. This is completed as an SSH task. You can use Finishing templates only for imaged-based provisioning in virtual environments. Do not confuse an image with a foreman discovery ISO, which is sometimes called a Foreman discovery image. An image in this context is an install image in a virtualized environment for easy deployment.

When a finish script successfully exits with the return code 0, Red Hat Satellite treats the code as a success and the host exits the build mode. Note that there are a few finish scripts with a build mode that uses a call back HTTP call. These scripts are not used for image-based provisioning, but for post configuration of operating-system installations such as Debian, Ubuntu, and BSD.

Bootdisk

Templates for PXE-less boot methods.

Kernel Execution (kexec)

Kernel execution templates for PXE-less boot methods.

Note

Kernel Execution is a Technology Preview feature. Technology Preview features are not fully supported under Red Hat Subscription Service Level Agreements (SLAs), may not be functionally complete, and are not intended for production use. However, these features provide early access to upcoming product innovations, enabling customers to test functionality and provide feedback during the development process.

user_data

Post-configuration scripts for providers that accept user data, such as cloud-init scripts. This template does not require Satellite to be able to reach the host. However, the host must be able to reach Satellite.

Script

An arbitrary script not used by default but useful for custom tasks.

ZTP

Zero Touch Provisioning templates.

POAP

PowerOn Auto Provisioning templates.

iPXE

Templates for iPXE or gPXE environments to use instead of PXELinux.

3.6.2. Template Syntax and Management

Red Hat Satellite includes many template examples. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Provisioning templates to view them. You can create a template or clone a template and edit the clone. For help with templates, navigate to Hosts > Provisioning templates > Create Template > Help.

Templates accept the Embedded Ruby (ERB) syntax. For more information, see Template Writing Reference in Managing Hosts.

You can download provisioning templates. Before you can download the template, you must create a debug certificate. For more information, see Creating an Organization Debug Certificate in the Content Management Guide.

You can synchronize templates between Satellite Server and a Git repository or a local directory. For more information, see Appendix F. Synchronizing Templates with Git in the Content Management guide.

Change logs and history

To view the history of changes applied to a template, navigate to Hosts > Provisioning templates, select one of the templates, and click History. Click Revert to override the editor content with the previous version. It is possible to revert to an earlier change as well. Click Show Diff to see information about a specific change:

  1. Template Diff tab displays changes in the body of a provisioning template.

  2. Details tab displays changes in the template description.

  3. History tab displays the user who made a change to the template and date of the change.

3.6.3. Procedure

To create a template, complete the following step:

  • In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Provisioning Templates and, in the Provisioning Templates window, click Create Template.

The Help tab provides information about the template syntax. It details the available functions, variables, and methods that can be called on different types of objects within the template.

Alternatively, to clone a template and add your updates to the clone, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Provisioning Templates and search for the template that you want to use.

  2. On the template that you want to use, click Clone to duplicate it.

  3. In the Name field, enter a name for the provisioning template.

  4. Select the Default check box to set the template to associate automatically with new organizations or locations.

  5. In the Template editor field, enter the body of the provisioning template. You can also use the Template file browser to upload a template file.

  6. In the Audit Comment field, enter a summary of changes to the provisioning template for auditing purposes.

  7. Click the Type tab and if your template is a snippet, select the Snippet check box. A snippet is not a standalone provisioning template, but a part of a provisioning template that can be inserted into other provisioning templates.

  8. From the Type list, select the type of the template. For example, Provisioning template.

  9. Click the Association tab and from the Applicable Operating Systems list, select the names of the operating systems that you want to associate with the provisioning template.

  10. Optionally, click Add combination and select a host group from the Host Group list or an environment from the Environment list to associate provisioning template with the host groups and environments.

  11. Click the Organizations and Locations tabs to add any additional contexts to the template.

  12. Click Submit to save your provisioning template.

For CLI Users

Before you create a template with the CLI, create a plain text file that contains the template. This example uses the ~/my-template file. Create the installation medium using the hammer template create command and specify the type with the --type option:

# hammer template create --name "My Provisioning Template" \
--file ~/my-template --type provision --organizations "My_Organization" \
--locations "My_Location"

3.7. Creating Compute Profiles

Compute profiles are used in conjunction with compute resources, such as virtualization infrastructure and cloud providers. Compute profiles allow users to predefine hardware such as CPUs, memory, and storage. A default installation of Red Hat Satellite 6 contains three predefined profiles:

  • 1-Small

  • 2-Medium

  • 3-Large

Procedure

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Profiles, and in the Compute Profiles window, click Create Compute Profile.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the profile and click Submit.

For CLI Users

The compute profile CLI commands are not yet implemented in Red Hat Satellite 6.4.

3.8. Setting a Default Encrypted Root Password for Hosts

If you do not want to set a plain text default root password for the hosts that you provision, you can use a default encrypted password.

To set a default encrypted password for your hosts, complete the following steps:

  1. Generate an encrypted password. You can use the following command to generate a password:

    # python -c 'import crypt,getpass;pw=getpass.getpass(); print(crypt.crypt(pw)) if (pw==getpass.getpass("Confirm: ")) else exit()'

  2. Copy the password for later use.

  3. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Administer > Settings.

  4. On the Settings page, select the Provisioning tab.

  5. In the Name column, navigate to Root password, and click Click to edit.

  6. Paste the encrypted password that you generate, and click Save.

3.9. Using Third Party Installation Media

Installation media are sources of files for third parties that Satellite Server uses to install a third-party base operating system on a machine. Installation media must be in the format of an operating system installation tree, and must be accessible to the machine hosting the installer through an HTTP URL. You can view installation media by navigating to Hosts > Installation Media menu.

For other installation media, for example, a locally mounted ISO image, you can add your own custom media paths using the following procedure.

Procedure

To create installation media, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Installation Media and click Create Medium.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name to represent the installation media entry.

  3. In the Path enter the URL or NFS share that contains the installation tree. You can use following variables in the path to represent multiple different system architectures and versions:

    • $arch - The system architecture.

    • $version - The operating system version.

    • $major - The operating system major version.

    • $minor - The operating system minor version.

      Example HTTP path:

      http://download.example.com/centos/$version/Server/$arch/os/

      Example NFS path:

      nfs://download.example.com:/centos/$version/Server/$arch/os/

      Synchronized content on Capsule Servers always uses an HTTP path. Capsule Server managed content does not support NFS paths.

  4. From the Operating system family list, select the distribution or family of the installation medium. For example, CentOS, and Fedora are in the Red Hat family.

  5. Click the Organizations and Locations tabs, to change the provisioning context. Satellite Server adds the installation medium to the set provisioning context.

  6. Click Submit to save your installation medium.

For CLI Users

Create the installation medium using the hammer medium create command:

# hammer medium create --name "CustomOS" --os-family "Redhat" \
--path 'http://download.example.com/centos/$version/Server/$arch/os/' \
--organizations "My_Organization" --locations "My_Location"

3.10. Using noVNC to Access Virtual Machines

You can use your browser to access the VNC console of VMs created by Satellite.

Satellite supports using noVNC on the following virtualization platforms:

  • VMware

  • Libvirt

  • Red Hat Virtualization

Use the following procedure to configure your virtualization platform and browser to enable the use of the noVNC console.

Prerequisites

  • You must have a virtual machine created by Satellite.

  • For existing virtual machines, ensure that the Display type in the Compute Resource settings is VNC.

  • You must import the Katello root CA certificate into your Satellite Server. Adding a security exception in the browser is not enough for using noVNC. For more information, see the Installing the Katello Root CA Certificate section in the Administering Red Hat Satellite guide.

Procedure

  1. On the VM host system, configure the firewall to allow VNC service on ports 5900 to 5930:

    • On Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6:

      # iptables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 5900:5930 -j ACCEPT
# service iptables save

    • On Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7:

      # firewall-cmd --add-port=5900-5930/tcp
# firewall-cmd --add-port=5900-5930/tcp --permanent

  2. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources and select the name of a compute resource.

  3. In the Virtual Machines tab, select the name of a VM host. Ensure the machine is powered on and then select Console.

4. Configuring Networking

Each provisioning type requires some network configuration. Use this chapter to configure network services in Satellite Server’s integrated Capsule.

New hosts must have access to your Capsule Server. A Capsule Server can be either Satellite Server’s integrated Capsule or an external Capsule Server. You might want to provision hosts from an external Capsule Server when the hosts are on isolated networks and cannot connect to the Satellite Server directly, or when the content is synchronized with the Capsule Server. Provisioning using the external Capsule Server can save on network bandwidth.

Configuring the Capsule Server has two basic requirements:

  1. Configuring network services. This includes:

    • Content delivery services

    • Network services (DHCP, DNS, and TFTP)

    • Puppet configuration

  2. Defining network resource data in Satellite Server to help configure network interfaces on new hosts.

The following instructions have similar applications to configuring standalone Capsule Servers managing a specific network. To configure Satellite to use external DHCP, DNS, and TFTP services, see Configuring External Services in Installing Satellite Server from a Connected Network.

DHCP Ranges

You can define the same DHCP range in Satellite Server for both Discovered and Provisioned systems, but use a separate range for each service within the same subnet.

4.1. Prerequisites for Image Based Provisioning

Post-Boot Configuration Method

Images that use the finish post-boot configuration scripts require a managed DHCP server, such as Satellite’s integrated Capsule or an external Capsule. The host must be created with a subnet associated with a DHCP Capsule, and the IP address of the host must be a valid IP address from the DHCP range.

It is possible to use an external DHCP service, but IP addresses must be entered manually. The SSH credentials corresponding to the configuration in the image must be configured in Satellite to enable the post-boot configuration to be made.

Check following items when troubleshooting a virtual machine booted from an image that depends on post-configuration scripts:

  • The host has a subnet assigned in Satellite Server.

  • The subnet has a DHCP Capsule assigned in Satellite Server.

  • The host has a valid IP address assigned in Satellite Server.

  • The IP address acquired by the virtual machine using DHCP matches the address configured in Satellite Server.

  • The virtual machine created from an image responds to SSH requests.

  • The virtual machine created from an image authorizes the user and password, over SSH, which is associated with the image being deployed.

  • Satellite Server has access to the virtual machine via SSH keys. This is required for the virtual machine to receive post-configuration scripts from Satellite Server.

Pre-Boot Initialization Configuration Method

Images that use the cloud-init scripts require a DHCP server to avoid having to include the IP address in the image. A managed DHCP Capsule is preferred. The image must have the cloud-init service configured to start when the system boots and fetch a script or configuration data to use in completing the configuration.

Check the following items when troubleshooting a virtual machine booted from an image that depends on initialization scripts included in the image:

  • There is a DHCP server on the subnet.

  • The virtual machine has the cloud-init service installed and enabled.

For information about the differing levels of support for finish and cloud-init scripts in virtual-machine images, see the Red Hat Knowledgebase Solution What are the supported compute resources for the finish and cloud-init scripts on the Red Hat Customer Portal.

4.2. Configuring Network Services

Some provisioning methods use Capsule Server services. For example, a network might require the Capsule Server to act as a DHCP server. A network can also use PXE boot services to install the operating system on new hosts. This requires configuring the Capsule Server to use the main PXE boot services: DHCP, DNS, and TFTP.

Use the satellite-installer script with the options to configure these services on the Satellite Server.

To configure these services on an external Capsule Server, run satellite-installer --scenario capsule.

Satellite Server uses eth0 for external communication, such as connecting to Red Hat’s CDN.

Procedure

To configure network services on Satellite’s integrated Capsule, complete the following steps:

  1. Enter the satellite-installer command to configure the required network services:

    # satellite-installer --foreman-proxy-dhcp true \
--foreman-proxy-dhcp-managed true \
--foreman-proxy-dhcp-gateway "192.168.140.1" \
--foreman-proxy-dhcp-interface "eth1" \
--foreman-proxy-dhcp-nameservers "192.168.140.2" \
--foreman-proxy-dhcp-range "192.168.140.10 192.168.140.110" \
--foreman-proxy-dhcp-server "192.168.140.2" \
--foreman-proxy-dns true \
--foreman-proxy-dns-managed true \
--foreman-proxy-dns-forwarders "8.8.8.8; 8.8.4.4" \
--foreman-proxy-dns-interface "eth1" \
--foreman-proxy-dns-reverse "140.168.192.in-addr.arpa" \
--foreman-proxy-dns-server "192.168.140.2" \
--foreman-proxy-dns-zone "example.com" \
--foreman-proxy-tftp true \
--foreman-proxy-tftp-managed true

  2. Find the Capsule Server that you configure:

    # hammer proxy list

  3. Refresh features of the Capsule Server to view the changes:

    # hammer proxy refresh-features --name "satellite.example.com"

  4. Verify the services configured on the Capsule Server:

    # hammer proxy info --name "satellite.example.com"

4.2.1. DHCP, DNS, and TFTP Options for Network Configuration

DHCP Options
--foreman-proxy-dhcp

Enables the DHCP service. You can set this option to true or false.

--foreman-proxy-dhcp-managed

Enables Foreman to manage the DHCP service. You can set this option to true or false.

--foreman-proxy-dhcp-gateway

The DHCP pool gateway. Set this to the address of the external gateway for hosts on your private network.

--foreman-proxy-dhcp-interface

Sets the interface for the DHCP service to listen for requests. Set this to eth1.

--foreman-proxy-dhcp-nameservers

Sets the addresses of the nameservers provided to clients through DHCP. Set this to the address for Satellite Server on eth1.

--foreman-proxy-dhcp-range

A space-separated DHCP pool range for Discovered and Unmanaged services.

--foreman-proxy-dhcp-server

Sets the address of the DHCP server to manage.

DNS Options
--foreman-proxy-dns

Enables DNS service. You can set this option to true or false.

--foreman-proxy-dns-managed

Enables Foreman to manage the DNS service. You can set this option to true or false.

--foreman-proxy-dns-forwarders

Sets the DNS forwarders. Set this to your DNS servers.

--foreman-proxy-dns-interface

Sets the interface to listen for DNS requests. Set this to eth1.

--foreman-proxy-dns-reverse

The DNS reverse zone name.

--foreman-proxy-dns-server

Sets the address of the DNS server to manage.

--foreman-proxy-dns-zone

Sets the DNS zone name.

TFTP Options
--foreman-proxy-tftp

Enables TFTP service. You can set this option to true or false.

--foreman-proxy-tftp-managed

Enables Foreman to manage the TFTP service. You can set this option to true or false.

--foreman-proxy-tftp-servername

Sets the TFTP server to use. Ensure that you use Capsule’s IP address.

Run satellite-installer --help to view more options related to DHCP, DNS, TFTP, and other Satellite Capsule services

4.2.2. Using TFTP Services through NAT

You can use Satellite TFTP services through NAT. To do this, on all NAT routers or firewalls, you must enable a TFTP service on UDP port 69 and enable the TFTP state tracking feature. For more information, see the documentation for your NAT device.

For a NAT running on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7:

Use the following command to allow TFTP service on UDP port 69, load the kernel TFTP state tracking module, and make the changes persistent:

# firewall-cmd --add-service=tftp && firewall-cmd --runtime-to-permanent
For a NAT running on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6:

  1. Configure the firewall to allow TFTP service UDP on port 69.

    # iptables -A OUTPUT -i eth0 -p udp --sport 69 -m state \
--state ESTABLISHED -j ACCEPT
# service iptables save

  2. Load the ip_conntrack_tftp kernel TFTP state module. In the /etc/sysconfig/iptables-config file, locate IPTABLES_MODULES and add ip_conntrack_tftp as follows:

    IPTABLES_MODULES="ip_conntrack_tftp"

4.3. Adding a Domain to Satellite Server

Satellite Server defines domain names for each host on the network. Satellite Server must have information about the domain and the Capsule Server responsible for domain name assignment.

Checking for Existing Domains

Satellite Server might already have the relevant domain created as part of Satellite Server installation. Switch the context to Any Organization and Any Location then check the domain list to see if it exists.

DNS Server Configuration Considerations

During the DNS record creation, Satellite performs conflict DNS lookups to verify that the host name is not in active use. This check runs against one of the following DNS servers:

  • The system-wide resolver if Adminster > Settings > Query local nameservers is set to true.

  • The nameservers that are defined in the subnet associated with the host.

  • The authoritative NS-Records that are queried from the SOA from the domain name associated with the host.

If you experience timeouts during DNS conflict resolution, check the following settings:

  • The subnet nameservers must be reachable from Satellite Server.

  • The domain name must have a Start of Authority (SOA) record available from Satellite Server.

  • The system resolver in the `/etc/resolv.conf`file must have a valid and working configuration.

Procedure

To add a domain to Satellite, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Domains and click Create Domain.

  2. In the DNS Domain field, enter the full DNS domain name.

  3. In the Fullname field, enter the plain text name of the domain.

  4. Click the Parameters tab and configure any domain level parameters to apply to hosts attached to this domain. For example, user defined Boolean or string parameters to use in templates.

  5. Click Add Parameter and fill in the Name and Value fields.

  6. Click the Locations tab, and add the location where the domain resides.

  7. Click the Organizations tab, and add the organization that the domain belongs to.

  8. Click Submit to save the changes.

For CLI Users

Use the hammer domain create command to create a domain:

# hammer domain create --name "domain_name.com" \
--description "My example domain" --dns-id 1 \
--locations "My_Location" --organizations "My_Organization"

In this example, the --dns-id option uses 1, which is the ID of Satellite Server’s integrated Capsule.

4.4. Adding a Subnet to Satellite Server

You must add information for each of your subnets to Satellite Server because Satellite configures interfaces for new hosts. To configure interfaces, Satellite Server must have all the information about the network that connects these interfaces.

Procedure

To add a subnet to Satellite Server, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Subnets, and in the Subnets window, click Create Subnet.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the subnet.

  3. In the Description field, enter a description for the subnet.

  4. In the Network address field, enter the network address for the subnet.

  5. In the Network prefix field, enter the network prefix for the subnet.

  6. In the Network mask field, enter the network mask for the subnet.

  7. In the Gateway address field, enter the external gateway for the subnet.

  8. In the Primary DNS server field, enter a primary DNS for the subnet.

  9. In the Secondary DNS server, enter a secondary DNS for the subnet.

  10. From the IPAM list, select the method that you want to use for IP address management (IPAM):

    • DHCP - The subnet contains a DHCP server.

    • Internal DB - The subnet does not contain a DHCP server but Satellite can manage the IP address assignment and record IP addresses in its internal database.

    • None - No IP address management.

  11. Enter the information for the IPAM method that you select.

  12. Click the Remote Execution tab and select the capsule that controls the remote execution.

  13. Click the Domains tab and select the domains that apply to this subnet.

  14. Click the Capsules tab and select the capsule that applies to each service in the subnet, including DHCP, TFTP, and reverse DNS services.

  15. Click the Parameters tab and configure any subnet level parameters to apply to hosts attached to this subnet. For example, user defined Boolean or string parameters to use in templates.

  16. Click the Locations tab and select the locations that use this capsule.

  17. Click the Organizations tab and select the organizations that use this capsule.

  18. Click Submit to save the subnet information.

For CLI Users

Create the subnet with the following command:

# hammer subnet create --name "My_Network" \
--description "your_description" \
--network "192.168.140.0" --mask "255.255.255.0" \
--gateway "192.168.140.1" --dns-primary "192.168.140.2" \
--dns-secondary "8.8.8.8" --ipam "DHCP" \
--from "192.168.140.111" --to "192.168.140.250" --boot-mode "DHCP" \
--domains "example.com" --dhcp-id 1 --dns-id 1 --tftp-id 1 \
--locations "My_Location" --organizations "My_Organization"
Note
 In this example, the --dhcp-id, --dns-id, and --tftp-id options use 1, which is the ID of the integrated Capsule in Satellite Server.

4.5. Configuring iPXE to Reduce Provisioning Times

You can configure PXELinux to chainboot iPXE and boot using the HTTP protocol, which is faster and more reliable on high latency networks than TFTP.

There are three methods of using iPXE with Red Hat Satellite 6.4:

  1. Chainbooting virtual machines using hypervisors that use iPXE as primary firmware

  2. Using PXELinux through TFTP to chainload iPXE directly on bare metal hosts

  3. Using PXELinux through UNDI, which uses HTTP to transfer the kernel and the initial RAM disk on bare metal hosts

Prerequisites

Before you begin, ensure that the following conditions are met:

  • A host exists on Red Hat Satellite to use

  • The MAC address of the provisioning interface matches the host configuration

  • The provisioning interface of the host has a valid DHCP reservation

  • The NIC is capable of PXE booting. For more information, see http://ipxe.org/appnote/hardware_drivers

  • The NIC is compatible with iPXE

4.5.1. Chainbooting virtual machines

Most virtualization hypervisors use iPXE as primary firmware for PXE booting. Because of this, you can chainboot without TFTP and PXELinux.

Chainbooting virtual machine workflow

Using virtualization hypervisors removes the need for TFTP and PXELinux. It has the following workflow:

  1. Virtual machine starts

  2. iPXE retrieves the network credentials using DHCP

  3. iPXE retrieves the HTTP address using DHCP

  4. iPXE chainloads the iPXE template from the template Capsule

  5. iPXE loads the kernel and initial RAM disk of the installer

Ensure that the hypervisor that you want to use supports iPXE. The following virtualization hypervisors support iPXE:

  • libvirt

  • oVirt

  • RHEV

Configuring Red Hat Satellite Server to use iPXE

You can use the default template to configure iPXE booting for hosts. If you want to change the default values in the template, clone the template and edit the clone.

Procedure

To configure Satellite to use iPXE, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Provisioning Templates, enter Kickstart default iPXE and click Search.

  2. Optional: If you want to change the template, click Clone, enter a unique name, and click Submit.

  3. Click the name of the template you want to use.

  4. If you clone the template, you can make changes you require on the Template tab.

  5. Click the Association tab, and select the operating systems that your host uses.

  6. Click the Locations tab, and add the location where the host resides.

  7. Click the Organizations tab, and add the organization that the host belongs to.

  8. Click Submit to save the changes.

  9. Navigate to Hosts > Operating systems and select the operating system of your host.

  10. Click the Templates tab.

  11. From the iPXE Template list, select the template you want to use.

  12. Click Submit to save the changes.

  13. Navigate to Hosts > All Hosts.

  14. In the Hosts page, select the host that you want to use.

  15. Select the Templates tab.

  16. From the iPXE template list, select Review and verify that the Kickstart default iPXE template is the correct template.

  17. To prevent an endless loop of chainbooting iPXE firmware, edit the /etc/dhcp/dhcpd.conf file to match the following example. If you use an isolated network, use a Capsule Server URL with TCP port 8000, instead of Satellite Server’s URL.

    1. Locate the following lines in the Bootfile Handoff section of the /etc/dhcp/dhcpd.conf file:

      } else {
  filename "pxelinux.0";
}

    2. Add the following extra elsif statement before the else statement:

      elsif exists user-class and option user-class = "iPXE" {
  filename "http://satellite.example.com/unattended/iPXE";
}

    3. Verify that the 'if' section matches the following example:

      if option architecture = 00:06 {
  filename "grub2/shim.efi";
} elsif option architecture = 00:07 {
  filename "grub2/shim.efi";
} elsif option architecture = 00:09 {
  filename "grub2/shim.efi";
} elsif exists user-class and option user-class = "iPXE" {
  filename "http://satellite.example.com/unattended/iPXE";
} else {
  filename "pxelinux.0";
}
      Note
      		 Use http://satellite.example.com/unattended/iPXE when Capsule HTTP endpoint is disabled (installer option --foreman-proxy-http false). Template Capsule plugin has default value 8000 when enabled and can be changed with --foreman-proxy-http-port installer option, in that case use http://capsule.example.com:8000. You must update the /etc/dhcp/dhcpd.conf file after every upgrade. The content of the /etc/dhcp/dhcpd.conf file is case sensitive.

4.5.2. Chainbooting iPXE directly

Use this procedure to set up iPXE to use a built-in driver for network communication or UNDI interface. There are separate procedures to configure Satellite Server and Capsule to use iPXE.

You can use this procedure only with bare metal hosts.

Chainbooting iPXE directly or with UNDI workflow

  1. Host powers on

  2. PXE driver retrieves the network credentials using DHCP

  3. PXE driver retrieves the PXELinux firmware pxelinux.0 using TFTP

  4. PXELinux searches for the configuration file on the TFTP server

  5. PXELinux chainloads iPXE ipxe.lkrn or undionly-ipxe.0

  6. iPXE retrieves the network credentials using DHCP again

  7. iPXE retrieves HTTP address using DHCP

  8. iPXE chainloads the iPXE template from the template Capsule

  9. iPXE loads the kernel and initial RAM disk of the installer

Configuring Red Hat Satellite Server to use iPXE

You can use the default template to configure iPXE booting for hosts. If you want to change the default values in the template, clone the template and edit the clone.

Procedure

To configure Satellite to use iPXE with the UNDI workflow, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Provisioning Templates, enter PXELinux chain iPXE or, for UNDI, enter PXELinux chain iPXE UNDI, and click Search.

  2. Optional: If you want to change the template, click Clone, enter a unique name, and click Submit.

  3. Click the name of the template you want to use.

  4. If you clone the template, you can make changes you require on the Template tab.

  5. Click the Association tab, and select the operating systems that your host uses.

  6. Click the Locations tab, and add the location where the host resides.

  7. Click the Organizations tab, and add the organization that the host belongs to.

  8. Click Submit to save the changes.

  9. In the Provisioning Templates page, enter Kickstart default iPXE into the search field and click Search.

  10. Optional: If you want to change the template, click Clone, enter a unique name, and click Submit.

  11. Click the name of the template you want to use.

  12. If you clone the template, you can make changes you require on the Template tab.

  13. Click the Association tab, and associate the template with the operating system that your host uses.

  14. Click the Locations tab, and add the location where the host resides.

  15. Click the Organizations tab, and add the organization that the host belongs to.

  16. Click Submit to save the changes.

  17. Navigate to Hosts > Operating systems and select the operating system of your host.

  18. Click the Templates tab.

  19. From the PXELinux template list, select the template you want to use.

  20. From the iPXE template list, select the template you want to use.

  21. Click Submit to save the changes.

  22. Navigate to Hosts > All Hosts, and select the host you want to use.

  23. Select the Templates tab, and from the PXELinux template list, select Review and verify the template is the correct template.

  24. From the iPXE template list, select Review and verify the template is the correct template. If there is no PXELinux entry, or you cannot find the new template, navigate to Hosts > All Hosts, and on your host, click Edit. Click the Operating system tab and click the Provisioning Template Resolve button to refresh the list of templates.

  25. To prevent an endless loop of chainbooting iPXE firmware, edit the /etc/dhcp/dhcpd.conf file to match the following example. If you use an isolated network, use a Capsule Server URL with TCP port 8000, instead of Satellite Server’s URL.

    1. Locate the following lines in the Bootfile Handoff section of the /etc/dhcp/dhcpd.conf file:

      } else {
  filename "pxelinux.0";
}

    2. Add the following extra elsif statement before the else statement:

      elsif exists user-class and option user-class = "iPXE" {
  filename "http://satellite.example.com/unattended/iPXE";
}

    3. Verify that the 'if' section matches the following example:

      if option architecture = 00:06 {
  filename "grub2/shim.efi";
} elsif option architecture = 00:07 {
  filename "grub2/shim.efi";
} elsif option architecture = 00:09 {
  filename "grub2/shim.efi";
} elsif exists user-class and option user-class = "iPXE" {
  filename "http://satellite.example.com/unattended/iPXE";
} else {
  filename "pxelinux.0";
}
      Note
      		 For http://satellite.example.com/unattended/iPXE, you can also use a Red Hat Satellite Capsule http://capsule.example.com:8000/unattended/iPXE. You must update the /etc/dhcp/dhcpd.conf file after every upgrade. The content of the /etc/dhcp/dhcpd.conf file is case sensitive.
Configuring Red Hat Satellite Capsule to use iPXE

You can use this procedure to configure Capsules to use iPXE.

You must perform this procedure on all Capsules.

Procedure

To configure the Capsule to chainboot iPXE, complete the following steps:

  1. Install the ipxe-bootimgs RPM package:

    # yum install ipxe-bootimgs

  2. Copy the iPXE firmware to the TFTP server’s root directory. Do not use symbolic links because TFTP runs in the chroot environment.

    • For chainbooting directly, enter the following command:

      # cp /usr/share/ipxe/ipxe.lkrn /var/lib/tftpboot/

    • For UNDI, enter the following command:

      # cp /usr/share/ipxe/undionly.kpxe /var/lib/tftpboot/undionly-ipxe.0

  3. Correct the file contexts:

    # restorecon -RvF /var/lib/tftpboot/

5. Using Infoblox as DHCP and DNS Providers

You can use Capsule Server to connect to your Infoblox application to create and manage DHCP and DNS records, and to reserve IP addresses.

The supported Infoblox version is NIOS 8.0 or higher and Satellite 6.4 or higher.

5.1. Limitations

All DHCP and DNS records can be managed only in a single Network or DNS view, After you install the Infoblox modules on Capsule and set up the view using the satellite-installer command, you cannot edit the view.

Capsule Server communicates with a single Infoblox node using the standard HTTPS web API. If you want to configure clustering and High Availability, make the configurations in Infoblox.

Hosting PXE-related files using Infoblox’s TFTP functionality is not supported. You must use Capsule as a TFTP server for PXE provisioning. For more information, see Configuring Networking.

5.2. Prerequisites

You must have Infoblox account credentials to manage DHCP and DNS entries in Satellite.

Ensure that you have Infoblox administration roles with the names: DHCP Admin and DNS Admin.

The administration roles must have permissions or belong to an admin group that permits the accounts to perform tasks through the Infoblox API.

5.3. Installing the Infoblox CA Certificate on Capsule Server

You must install Infoblox HTTPS CA certificate on the base system for all Capsules that you want to integrate with Infoblox applications.

You can download the certificate from the Infoblox web UI, or you can use the following OpenSSL commands to download the certificate:

# update-ca-trust enable
# openssl s_client -showcerts -connect Infoblox_hostname:443 </dev/null | \
openssl x509 -text >/etc/pki/ca-trust/source/anchors/infoblox.crt
# update-ca-trust extract

  • The Infoblox_hostname entry must match the host name for the Infoblox application in the X509 certificate.

To test the CA certificate, use a CURL query:

# curl -u admin:infoblox https://Infoblox_hostname/wapi/v2.0/network

Example positive response:

[
    {
        "_ref": "network/ZG5zLm5ldHdvcmskMTkyLjE2OC4yMDIuMC8yNC8w:Infoblox_hostname/24/default",
        "network": "192.168.202.0/24",
        "network_view": "default"
    }
]

Use the following Red Hat Knowledgebase article to install the certificate: How to install a CA certificate on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 / 7.

5.4. Installing the DHCP Infoblox module

Use this procedure to install the DHCP Infoblox module on Capsule. Note that you cannot manage records in separate views.

You can also install DHCP and DNS Infoblox modules simultaneously by combining this procedure and Installing the DNS Infoblox Module

DHCP Infoblox Record Type Considerations

Use only the --foreman-proxy-plugin-dhcp-infoblox-record-type fixedaddress option to configure the DHCP and DNS modules.

Configuring both DHCP and DNS Infoblox modules with the host record type setting causes DNS conflicts and is not supported. If you install the Infoblox module on Capsule Server with the --foreman-proxy-plugin-dhcp-infoblox-record-type option set to host, you must unset both DNS Capsule and Reverse DNS Capsule options because Infoblox does the DNS management itself. You cannot use the host option without creating conflicts and, for example, being unable to rename hosts in Satellite.

Procedure

To install the Infoblox module for DHCP, complete the following steps:

  1. On Capsule, enter the following command:

    # satellite-installer --enable-foreman-proxy-plugin-dhcp-infoblox \
--foreman-proxy-dhcp true \
--foreman-proxy-dhcp-managed false \
--foreman-proxy-dhcp-provider infoblox \
--foreman-proxy-plugin-dhcp-infoblox-record-type fixedaddress \
--foreman-proxy-dhcp-server Infoblox_hostname \
--foreman-proxy-plugin-dhcp-infoblox-username admin \
--foreman-proxy-plugin-dhcp-infoblox-password infoblox \
--foreman-proxy-plugin-dhcp-infoblox-network-view default \
--foreman-proxy-plugin-dhcp-infoblox-dns-view default

  2. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Capsules and select the Capsule with the Infoblox DHCP module and click Refresh.

  3. Ensure that the dhcp features are listed.

  4. For all domains managed through Infoblox, ensure that the DNS Capsule is set for that domain. To verify, in the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Domains, and inspect the settings of each domain.

  5. For all subnets managed through Infoblox, ensure that DHCP Capsule and Reverse DNS Capsule is set. To verify, in the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Subnets, and inspect the settings of each subnet.

5.5. Installing the DNS Infoblox Module

Use this procedure to install the DNS Infoblox module on Capsule. You can also install DHCP and DNS Infoblox modules simultaneously by combining this procedure and Installing the DHCP Infoblox module.

DNS records are managed only in the default DNS view, it’s not possible to specify which DNS view to use.

To install the DNS Infoblox module, complete the following steps:

  1. On Capsule, enter the following command:

    # satellite-installer --enable-foreman-proxy-plugin-dns-infoblox \
--foreman-proxy-dns true \
--foreman-proxy-dns-managed false \
--foreman-proxy-dns-provider infoblox \
--foreman-proxy-plugin-dns-infoblox-dns-server Infoblox_hostname \
--foreman-proxy-plugin-dns-infoblox-username admin \
--foreman-proxy-plugin-dns-infoblox-password infoblox

  2. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Capsules and select the Capsule with the Infoblox DNS module and click Refresh.

  3. Ensure that the dns features are listed.

6. Provisioning Bare Metal Hosts

There are four main ways to provision bare metal instances with Red Hat Satellite 6.4:

Unattended Provisioning

New hosts are identified by a MAC address and Satellite Server provisions the host using a PXE boot process.

Unattended Provisioning with Discovery

New hosts use PXE boot to load the Satellite Discovery service. This service identifies hardware information about the host and lists it as an available host to provision.

PXE-less Provisioning

New hosts are provisioned with a boot disk or PXE-less discovery image that Satellite Server generates.

PXE-less Provisioning with Discovery

New hosts use an ISO boot disk that loads the Satellite Discovery service. This service identifies hardware information about the host and lists it as an available host to provision.

BIOS and UEFI Support

With Red Hat Satellite, you can perform both BIOS and UEFI based PXELinux provisioning.

Both BIOS and UEFI interfaces work as interpreters between the computer’s operating system and firmware, initializing the hardware components and starting the operating system at boot time.

While BIOS reads the first section of the hard drive that contains the next address to initialize, UEFI stores all the information about initialization and startup in an .efi file instead of the firmware. UEFI systems are newer and becoming more common.

To perform PXELinux provisioning with UEFI you must use a Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 7 or higher that has Intel x86_64. In Satellite, PXELinux provisioning with UEFI is supported only on bare-metal systems. Because of a GRUB-related limitation, you cannot use UEFI to provision with a full host image. UEFI is not supported for virtual machines. UEFI SecureBoot is also not supported.

In Satellite provisioning, the PXE loader which is a DHCP file name that defines which file to load through TFTP during PXE provisioning. For BIOS system, the file is pxelinux.0. For UEFI systems, the file is grub2/grubx64.efi.

For BIOS provisioning, you must associate a PXELinux template with the operating system.

For UEFI provisioning you must associate a PXEGrub2 template with the operating system.

If you associate both PXELinux and PXEGrub2 templates, Satellite 6 can deploy configuration files for both on a TFTP server, so that you can switch between PXE loaders easily.

6.1. Prerequisites for Bare Metal Provisioning

The requirements for bare metal provisioning include:

  • Synchronized content repositories for the version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux that you want to use. For more information, see Synchronizing Red Hat Repositories in the Content Management Guide.

  • A Capsule Server managing the network for bare metal hosts. For unattended provisioning and discovery-based provisioning, Satellite Server requires PXE server settings. For more information, see Configuring Networking.

  • An activation key for host registration. For more information, see Creating An Activation Key in the Content Management guide.

  • A blank bare metal host.

For information about the security token for unattended and PXE-less provisioning, see Configuring the Security Token Validity Duration.

6.2. Configuring the Security Token Validity Duration

When performing unattended and PXE-less provisioning, as a security measure, Satellite automatically generates a unique token and adds this token to the URL of the ISO image that downloads during the Kickstart provisioning process.

By default, the token is valid for 360 minutes. When you provision a host, ensure that you reboot the host within this time frame. If the token expires, it is deleted and you might receive a 404 error.

To adjust the token’s duration of validity, in the Satellite web UI, navigate to Administer > Settings, and click the Provisioning tab. Find the Token duration option, and click the edit icon and edit the duration, or enter 0 to disable token generation.

6.3. Creating Hosts with Unattended Provisioning

Unattended provisioning is the simplest form of host provisioning. You enter the host details on Satellite Server and boot your host. Satellite Server automatically manages the PXE configuration, organizes networking services, and provides the operating system and configuration for the host.

This method of provisioning hosts uses minimal interaction during the process.

Procedure

To create a host with unattended provisioning, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Create Host.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the host.

  3. Click the Organization and Location tabs and change the context to match your requirements.

  4. From the Host Group list, select a host group that you want to use to populate the form.

  5. Click the Interface tab, and on the host’s interface, click Edit.

  6. Verify that the fields are populated with values. Note in particular:

    • The Name from the Host tab becomes the DNS name.

    • Satellite Server automatically assigns an IP address for the new host.

  7. In the MAC address field, enter a MAC address for the host. This ensures the identification of the host during the PXE boot process.

  8. Ensure that Satellite Server automatically selects the Managed, Primary, and Provision options for the first interface on the host. If not, select them.

  9. Click the Operating System tab, and verify that all fields contain values. Confirm each aspect of the operating system.

  10. Click Resolve in Provisioning template to check the new host can identify the right provisioning templates to use.

  11. Optional: If you want to use VLAN tagging, you must add the VLAN ID to the PXELinux or PXEGrub2 template. To the APPEND line, add vlanid=example_vlanid.

    For more information about associating provisioning templates, see Creating Provisioning Templates.

  12. Click the Parameters tab, and ensure that a parameter exists that provides an activation key. If not, add an activation key.

  13. Click Submit to save the host details.

This creates the host entry and the relevant provisioning settings. This also includes creating the necessary directories and files for PXE booting the bare metal host. If you start the physical host and set its boot mode to PXE, the host detects the DHCP service of Satellite Server’s integrated Capsule and starts installing the operating system from its Kickstart tree. When the installation completes, the host also registers to Satellite Server using the activation key and installs the necessary configuration and management tools from the Red Hat Satellite Tools repository.

For CLI Users

Create the host with the hammer host create command.

# hammer host create --name "My_Unattended_Host" --organization "My_Organization" \
--location "My_Location" --hostgroup "My_Host_Group" --mac "aa:aa:aa:aa:aa:aa" \
--build true --enabled true --managed true

Ensure the network interface options are set using the hammer host interface update command.

# hammer host interface update --host "test1" --managed true \
--primary true --provision true

6.4. Configuring Red Hat Satellite's Discovery Service

Red Hat Satellite provides a method to automatically detect hosts on a network that are not in your Satellite inventory. These hosts boot the discovery image that performs hardware detection and relays this information back to Satellite Server. This method creates a list of ready-to-provision hosts in Satellite Server without needing to enter the MAC address of each host.

The Discovery service is enabled by default on Satellite Server. However, the default setting of the global templates is to boot from the local hard drive. To use discovery you must change the default entry in the template to discovery.

PXE mode

To use Satellite Server to provide the Discovery image, install the foreman-discovery-image and rubygem-smart_proxy_discovery packages:

# yum install foreman-discovery-image rubygem-smart_proxy_discovery

The foreman-discovery-image package installs the Discovery ISO to the /usr/share/foreman-discovery-image/ directory and also creates a PXE boot image from this ISO using the livecd-iso-to-pxeboot tool. The tool saves this PXE boot image in the /var/lib/tftpboot/boot directory. The rubygem-smart_proxy_discovery package configures a Capsule Server, such as Satellite Server’s integrated Capsule, to act as a proxy for the Discovery service.

When the installation completes, you can view the new menu option by navigating to Hosts > Discovered Hosts.

6.4.1. Enabling Discovery service on a Capsule Server

Complete the following procedure to enable the Discovery service on a Capsule Server.

  1. Enter the following commands on the Capsule Server:

    # yum install foreman-discovery-image rubygem-smart_proxy_discovery
    # foreman-maintain service restart

  2. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Capsule.

  3. Click the Capsule Server and select Refresh from the Actions list. Locate Discovery in the list of features to confirm the Discovery service is now running.

Subnets

All subnets with discoverable hosts require an appropriate Capsule Server selected to provide the Discovery service.

To check this, navigate to Infrastructure > Capsules and verify if the Capsule Server that you want to use lists the Discovery feature. If not, click Refresh features.

In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Subnets, select a subnet, click the Capsules tab, and select the Discovery Proxy that you want to use. Perform this for each appropriate subnet.

6.4.2. Provisioning Template PXELinux Discovery Snippet

For BIOS provisioning, the PXELinux global default template in the Hosts > Provisioning Templates window contains the snippet pxelinux_discovery. The snippet has the following lines:

LABEL discovery
  MENU LABEL Foreman Discovery Image
  KERNEL boot/fdi-image/vmlinuz0
  APPEND initrd=boot/fdi-image/initrd0.img rootflags=loop root=live:/fdi.iso rootfstype=auto ro rd.live.image acpi=force rd.luks=0 rd.md=0 rd.dm=0 rd.lvm=0 rd.bootif=0 rd.neednet=0 nomodeset proxy.url=<%= foreman_server_url %> proxy.type=foreman
  IPAPPEND 2

The KERNEL and APPEND options boot the Discovery image and ramdisk. The APPEND option contains a proxy.url parameter, with the foreman_server_url macro as its argument. This macro resolves to the full URL of Satellite Server.

For UEFI provisioning, the PXEgrub2 global default template in the Hosts > Provisioning Templates window contains the snippet pxegrub2_discovery:

menuentry 'Foreman Discovery Image' --id discovery {
  linuxefi boot/fdi-image/vmlinuz0 rootflags=loop root=live:/fdi.iso rootfstype=auto ro rd.live.image acpi=force rd.luks=0 rd.md=0 rd.dm=0 rd.lvm=0 rd.bootif=0 rd.neednet=0 nomodeset proxy.url=<%= foreman_server_url %> proxy.type=foreman BOOTIF=01-$mac
  initrdefi boot/fdi-image/initrd0.img
}

To use a Capsule to proxy the discovery steps, edit /var/lib/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/default or /var/lib/tftpboot/grub2/grub.cfg and change the URL to the FQDN of the Capsule Server you want to use.

The global template is available on Satellite Server and all Capsules that have the TFTP feature enabled.

6.4.3. Changing Templates and Snippets

To use a template, in the Satellite web UI, navigate to Administer > Settings and click the Provisioning tab and set the templates that you want to use.

Templates and snippets are locked to prevent changes. If you want to edit a template or snippet, clone it, save it with a unique name, and then edit the clone.

When you change the template or a snippet it includes, the changes must be propagated to Satellite Server’s default PXE template. Navigate to Hosts > Provisioning Templates and click Build PXE Default. This refreshes the default PXE template on Satellite Server.

The proxy.url argument

During the Satellite installation process, if you use the default option --enable-foreman-plugin-discovery, you can edit the proxy.url argument in the template to set the URL of Capsule Server that provides the discovery service. You can change the proxy.url argument to the IP address or FQDN of another provisioning Capsule that you want to use, but ensure that you append the port number, for example, 9090. If you use an alternative port number with the --foreman-proxy-ssl-port option during Satellite installation, you must add that port number. You can also edit the proxy.url argument to use a Satellite IP address or FQDN so that the discovered hosts communicate directly with Satellite Server.

The proxy.type argument

If you use a Capsule Server FQDN for the proxy.url argument, ensure that you set the proxy.type argument to proxy. If you use a Satellite FQDN, update the proxy.type argument to foreman.

proxy.url=https://capsule.example.com:9090 proxy.type=proxy
Rendering the Capsule's Host Name

Satellite 6 deploys the same template to all TFTP Capsules and there is no variable or macro available to render the Capsule’s host name. The hard-coded proxy.url does not not work with two or more TFTP Capsules. As a workaround, every time you click Build PXE Defaults, edit the configuration file in the TFTP directory using SSH.

Setting Discovery Service as Default

For both BIOS and UEFI, to set the Discovery service as the default service that boots for hosts that are not present in your current Satellite inventory, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Administer > Settings and click the Provisioning tab.

  2. For the Default PXE global template entry, in the Value column, enter discovery.

Tagged VLAN Provisioning

If you want to use tagged VLAN provisioning, and you want the discovery service to send a discovery request, add the following information to the KERNEL option in the discovery template:

fdi.vlan.primary=example_VLAN_ID
Testing

Test the Discovery service and boot a blank bare metal host on the 192.168.140.0/24 network. A boot menu has two options:

  • local, which boots from the hard disk

  • discovery, which boots to the Discovery service

Select discovery to boot the Discovery image. After a few minutes, the Discovery image completes booting and a status screen is displayed.

In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Discovered hosts and view the newly discovered host. The discovered hosts automatically define their host name based on their MAC address. For example, Satellite sets a discovered host with a MAC address of ab:cd:ef:12:34:56 to have macabcdef123456 as the host name. You can change this host name when provisioning the host.

6.4.4. Automatic Contexts for Discovered Hosts

Satellite Server assigns organization and location to discovered hosts according to the following sequence of rules:

  1. If a discovered host uses a subnet defined in Satellite, the host uses the first organization and location associated with the subnet.

  2. If the discovery_organization or discovery_location fact values are set, the discovered host uses these fact values as an organization and location. To set these fact values, navigate to Administer > Settings > Discovered, and add these facts to the Default organization and Default location fields. Ensure that the discovered host’s subnet also belongs to the organization and location set by the fact, otherwise Satellite refuses to set it for security reasons.

  3. If none of the previous conditions exists, Satellite assigns the first Organization and Location ordered by name.

You can change the organization or location using the bulk actions menu of the Discovered hosts page. Select the discovered hosts to modify and select Assign Organization or Assign Location from the Select Action menu.

Note that the foreman_organization and foreman_location facts are no longer valid values for assigning context for discovered hosts. You still can use these facts to configure the host for Puppet runs. To do this, navigate to Administer > Settings > Puppet section and add the foreman_organization and foreman_location facts to the Default organization and Default location fields.

6.5. Creating Hosts from Discovered Hosts

Provisioning discovered hosts follows a provisioning process that is similar to PXE provisioning. The main difference is that instead of manually entering the host’s MAC address, you can select the host to provision from the list of discovered hosts.

Procedure

To create a host from a discovered host, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Discovered host. Select the host you want to use and click Provision to the right of the list.

  2. Select from one of the two following options:

    • To provision a host from a host group, select a host group, organization, and location, and then click Create Host.

    • To provision a host with further customization, click Customize Host and enter the additional details you want to specify for the new host.

  3. Verify that the fields are populated with values. Note in particular:

    • The Name from the Host tab becomes the DNS name.

    • Satellite Server automatically assigns an IP address for the new host.

    • Satellite Server automatically populates the MAC address from the Discovery results.

  4. Ensure that Satellite Server automatically selects the Managed, Primary, and Provision options for the first interface on the host. If not, select them.

  5. Click the Operating System tab, and verify that all fields contain values. Confirm each aspect of the operating system.

  6. Click Resolve in Provisioning template to check the new host can identify the right provisioning templates to use.

    For more information about associating provisioning templates, see Creating Provisioning Templates.

  7. Click Submit to save the host details.

When the host provisioning is complete, the discovered host becomes a content host. To view the host, navigate to Hosts > Content Hosts.

For CLI Users

  1. Identify the discovered host to use for provisioning:

    # hammer discovery list

  2. Select a host and provision it using a host group. Set a new host name with the --new-name option:

    # hammer discovery provision --name "host_name" \
--new-name "new_host_name" --organization "My_Organization" \
--location "My_Location" --hostgroup "My_Host_Group" --build true \
--enabled true --managed true

    This removes the host from the discovered host listing and creates a host entry with the provisioning settings. The Discovery image automatically resets the host so that it can boot to PXE. The host detects the DHCP service on Satellite Server’s integrated Capsule and starts installing the operating system from its Kickstart tree. When the installation completes, the host also registers to Satellite Server using an activation key and installs the necessary configuration and management tools from the Red Hat Satellite Tools repository.

6.6. Creating Discovery Rules

As a method of automating the provisioning process for discovered hosts, Red Hat Satellite 6 provides a feature to create discovery rules. These rules define how discovered hosts automatically provision themselves, based on the assigned host group. For example, you can automatically provision hosts with a high CPU count as hypervisors. Likewise, you can provision hosts with large hard disks as storage servers.

NIC Considerations

Auto provisioning does not currently allow configuring NICs; all systems are being provisioned with the NIC configuration that was detected during discovery. However, you can set the NIC in an Anaconda kickstart, scriptlet, or using configuration management later on.

Procedure

To create a rule, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Configure > Discovery rules. Select Create Rule and enter the following details:

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the rule.

  3. In the Search field, enter the rules to determine whether to provision a host. This field provides suggestions for values you enter and allows operators for multiple rules. For example: cpu_count > 8.

  4. From the Host Group list, select the host group to use as a template for this host.

  5. In the Hostname field, enter the pattern to determine host names for multiple hosts. This uses the same ERB syntax that provisioning templates use. The host name can use the @host attribute for host-specific values and the rand function for a random number.

    • myhost-<%= rand(99999) %>

    • abc-<%= @host.facts['bios_vendor'] + '-' + rand(99999).to_s %>

    • xyz-<%= @host.hostgroup.name %>

    • srv-<%= @host.discovery_rule.name %>

    • server-<%= @host.ip.gsub('.','-') + '-' + @host.hostgroup.subnet.name %>

      Because the rand() function returns an integer that cannot be concatenated with a string, use the to_s function to change the integer to a string. When creating host name patterns, ensure the resulting host names are unique, do not start with numbers, and do not contain underscores or dots. A good approach is to use unique information provided by Facter, such as the MAC address, BIOS, or serial ID.

  6. In the Hosts limit field, enter the maximum hosts you can provision with the rule. Enter 0 for unlimited.

  7. In the Priority field, enter a number to set the precedence the rule has over other rules. Rules with lower values have a higher priority.

  8. From the Enabled list, select whether you want to enable the rule.

  9. To set a different provisioning context for the rule, click the Organizations and Locations tabs and select the contexts you want to use.

  10. Click Submit to save your rule.

  11. Navigate to Hosts > Discovered Host and select one of the following two options:

    • From the Discovered hosts list on the right, select Auto-Provision to automatically provisions a single host.

    • On the upper right of the window, click Auto-Provision All to automatically provisions all hosts.

For CLI Users

Create the rule with the hammer discovery_rule create command:

# hammer discovery_rule create --name "Hypervisor" \
--search "cpu_count  > 8" --hostgroup "My_Host_Group" \
--hostname "hypervisor-<%= rand(99999) %>" \
--hosts-limit 5 --priority 5 --enabled true

Automatically provision a host with the hammer discovery auto-provision command:

# hammer discovery auto-provision --name "macabcdef123456"

6.7. Creating Hosts with PXE-less Provisioning

Some hardware does not provide a PXE boot interface. Red Hat Satellite 6 provides a PXE-less discovery service that operates without PXE-based services, such as DHCP and TFTP. In Satellite, you can provision a host without PXE boot. This is also known as PXE-less provisioning and involves generating a boot ISO that hosts can use. Using this ISO, the host can connect to Satellite Server, boot the installation media, and install the operating system.

Boot ISO Types

There are four types of boot ISOs:

Host image - A boot ISO for the specific host. This image contains only the boot files that are necessary to access the installation media on Satellite Server. The user defines the subnet data in Satellite and the image is created with static networking.

Full host image - A boot ISO that contains the kernel and initial RAM disk image for the specific host. This image is useful if the host fails to chainload correctly. The provisioning template still downloads from Satellite Server.

Generic image - A boot ISO that is not associated with a specific host. The ISO sends the host’s MAC address to Satellite Server, which matches it against the host entry. The image does not store IP address details, and requires access to a DHCP server on the network to bootstrap. This image is also available from the /bootdisk/disks/generic URL on your Satellite Server, for example, https://satellite.example.com/bootdisk/disks/generic.

Subnet image - A boot ISO that is similar to the generic image but is configured with the address of a Capsule Server. This image is generic to all hosts with a provisioning NIC on the same subnet.

Procedure

To create a host with PXE-less provisioning, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Create Host.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name that you want to become the provisioned system’s host name.

  3. Click the Organization and Location tabs and change the context to match your requirements.

  4. From the Host Group list, select a host group that you want to use to populate the form.

  5. Click the Interface tab, and on the host’s interface, click Edit.

  6. Verify that the fields are populated with values. Note in particular:

    • The Name from the Host tab becomes the DNS name.

    • Satellite Server automatically assigns an IP address for the new host.

  7. In the MAC address field, enter a MAC address for the host.

  8. Ensure that Satellite Server automatically selects the Managed, Primary, and Provision options for the first interface on the host. If not, select them.

  9. Click the Operating System tab, and verify that all fields contain values. Confirm each aspect of the operating system.

  10. Click Resolve in Provisioning template to check the new host can identify the right provisioning templates to use.

    For more information about associating provisioning templates, see Creating Provisioning Templates.

  11. Click the Parameters tab, and ensure that a parameter exists that provides an activation key. If not, add an activation key.

  12. Click Submit to save the host details.

This creates a host entry and the host details page appears.

The options on the upper-right of the window are the Boot disk menu. From this menu, one of the following images is available for download: Host image, Full host image, Generic image, and Subnet image.

Note
 The Full host image is based on SYSLINUX and works with most hardware. When using a Host image, Generic image, or Subnet image, see http://ipxe.org/appnote/hardware_drivers for a list of hardware drivers expected to work with an iPXE-based boot disk.
For CLI Users

Create the host with the hammer host create command.

# hammer host create --name "My_Bare_Metal" --organization "My_Organization" \
--location "My_Location" --hostgroup "My_Host_Group" --mac "aa:aa:aa:aa:aa:aa" \
--build true --enabled true --managed true

Ensure that your network interface options are set using the hammer host interface update command.

# hammer host interface update --host "test3" --managed true \
--primary true --provision true

Download the boot disk from Satellite Server with the hammer bootdisk host command:

  • For Host image:

    # hammer bootdisk host --host test3.example.com

  • For Full host image:

    # hammer bootdisk host --host test3.example.com --full true

  • For Generic image:

    # hammer bootdisk generic

  • For Subnet image:

    # hammer bootdisk subnet --subnet subnetName

This creates a boot ISO for your host to use.

Write the ISO to a USB storage device using the dd utility or livecd-tools if required.

When you start the physical host and boot from the ISO or the USB storage device, the host connects to Satellite Server and starts installing operating system from its kickstart tree.

When the installation completes, the host also registers to Satellite Server using the activation key and installs the necessary configuration and management tools from the Red Hat Satellite Tools repository.

6.8. Implementing PXE-less Discovery

Red Hat Satellite 6 provides a PXE-less Discovery service that operates without the need for PXE-based services (DHCP and TFTP). You accomplish this using Satellite Server’s Discovery image.

PXEless mode

If you have not yet installed the Discovery service or image, follow the "Installation" section in Configuring Red Hat Satellite's Discovery Service.

The ISO for the Discovery service resides at /usr/share/foreman-discovery-image/ and is installed using the foreman-discovery-image package.

Attended Use

This ISO acts as bootable media. Copy this media to either a CD, DVD, or a USB stick. For example, to copy to a USB stick at /dev/sdb:

# dd bs=4M \
if=/usr/share/foreman-discovery-image/foreman-discovery-image-3.4.4-5.iso \
of=/dev/sdb

Insert the Discovery boot media into a bare metal host, start the host, and boot from the media. The Discovery Image displays an option for either Manual network setup or Discovery with DHCP:

  • If selecting Manual network setup, the Discovery image requests a set of network options. This includes the primary network interface that connects to Satellite Server. This Discovery image also asks for network interface configuration options, such as an IPv4 Address, IPv4 Gateway, and an IPv4 DNS server.

    After entering these details, select Next.

  • If selecting Discovery with DHCP, the Discovery image requests only the primary network interface that connects to Satellite Server. It attempts to automatically configure the network interface using a DHCP server, such as one that a Capsule Server provides.

After the primary interface configuration, the Discovery image requests the Server URL, which is the URL of Satellite Server or Capsule Server offering the Discovery service. For example, to use the integrated Capsule on Satellite Server, use the following URL:

https://satellite.example.com:9090

Set the Connection type to Proxy, then select Next.

The Discovery image also provides a set of fields to input Custom facts for the Facter tool to relay back to Satellite Server. These are entered in a name-value format. Provide any custom facts you require and select Confirm to continue.

The Satellite reports a successful communication with Satellite Server’s Discovery service. Navigate to Hosts > Discovered Hosts and view the newly discovered host.

For more information about provisioning discovered hosts, see Creating Hosts from Discovered Hosts.

Unattended Use and Customization

It is possible to create a customized Discovery ISO, which automates the process of configuring the image after booting. The Discovery image uses a Linux kernel for the operating system, which means you pass kernel parameters to the configure the image’s operating system. These kernel parameters include:

proxy.url

The URL of the Capsule Server providing the Discovery service.

proxy.type

The proxy type. This is usually set to proxy to connect to Capsule Server. This parameter also supports a legacy foreman option, where communication goes directly to Satellite Server instead of a Capsule Server.

fdi.pxmac

The MAC address of the primary interface in the format of AA:BB:CC:DD:EE:FF. This is the interface you aim to use for communicating with Capsule Server. In automated mode, the first NIC (using network identifiers in alphabetical order) with a link is used. In semi-automated mode, a screen appears and requests you to select the correct interface.

fdi.pxip, fdi.pxgw, fdi.pxdns

Manually configures IP address (fdi.pxip), the gateway (fdi.pxgw), and the DNS (fdi.pxdns) for the primary network interface. If your omit these parameters, the image uses DHCP to configure the network interface.

fdi.pxfactname1, fdi.pxfactname2 …​ fdi.pxfactnameN

Allows you to specify custom fact names.

fdi.pxfactvalue1, fdi.pxfactvalue2 …​ fdi.pxfactvalueN

The values for each custom fact. Each value corresponds to a fact name. For example, fdi.pxfactvalue1 sets the value for the fact named with fdi.pxfactname1.

fdi.pxauto

To set automatic or semi-automatic mode. If set to 0, the image uses semi-automatic mode, which allows you to confirm your choices through a set of dialog options. If set to 1, the image uses automatic mode and proceeds without any confirmation.

Satellite Server also provides a tool (discovery-remaster) in the foreman-discovery-image package. This tool remasters the image to include these kernel parameters. To remaster the image, run the discovery-remaster tool. For example:

# discovery-remaster ~/iso/foreman-discovery-image-3.4.4-5.iso \
"fdi.pxip=192.168.140.20/24 fdi.pxgw=192.168.140.1 \
fdi.pxdns=192.168.140.2 proxy.url=https://{foreman-example-com}:{smartproxy_port} \
proxy.type=proxy fdi.pxfactname1=customhostname \
fdi.pxfactvalue1=myhost fdi.pxmac=52:54:00:be:8e:8c fdi.pxauto=1"

The tool creates a new ISO file in the same directory as the original discovery image. In this scenario, it saves in the /usr/share/foreman-discovery-image/ directory.

Copy this media to either a CD, DVD, or a USB stick. For example, to copy to a USB stick at /dev/sdb:

# dd bs=4M \
if=/usr/share/foreman-discovery-image/foreman-discovery-image-3.4.4-5.iso \
of=/dev/sdb

Insert the Discovery boot media into a bare metal host, start the host, and boot from the media.

For more information about provisioning discovered hosts, see Creating Hosts from Discovered Hosts.

Final Notes

The host needs to resolve to the following provisioning templates:

  • kexec Template: Discovery Red Hat kexec

  • provision Template: Satellite Kickstart Default

For more information about associating provisioning templates, see Creating Provisioning Templates.

6.9. Deploying SSH Keys during Provisioning

Use this procedure to deploy SSH keys added to a user during provisioning. For information on adding SSH keys to a user, see Adding SSH Keys to a User in Administering Red Hat Satellite.

Procedure

To deploy SSH keys during provisioning, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Provisioning Templates.

  2. Create a provisioning template, or clone and edit an existing template. For more information, see Creating Provisioning Templates.

  3. In the template, click the Template tab.

  4. In the Template editor field, add the create_users snippet to the %post section:

    <%= snippet('create_users') %>

  5. Select the Default check box.

  6. Click the Association tab.

  7. From the Application Operating Systems list, select an operating system.

  8. Click Submit to save the provisioning template.

  9. Create a host that is associated with the provisioning template or rebuild a host using the OS associated with the modified template. For more information, see Creating a Host in the Managing Hosts guide.

    The SSH keys of the Owned by user are added automatically when the create_users snippet is executed during the provisioning process. You can set Owned by to an individual user or a user group. If you set Owned by to a user group, the SSH keys of all users in the user group are added automatically.

6.10. Building a Satellite Discovery Image

Use this procedure to build a Satellite discovery image or rebuild an image if you change configuration files.

Do not use this procedure on your production Satellite or Capsule.

Prerequisites

Install the livecd-tools package:

# yum install livecd-tools

Because Anaconda installer cannot publish through HTTPS, you must enable publishing through HTTP for Kickstart repositories:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Content > Products and in the Products window, click the Repositories tab.

  2. Select a Kickstart repository and for the Publish via HTTP, option, click the Edit icon, select the check box, and click Save.

  3. Repeat the previous steps for the Satellite repository.

Note that publishing via HTTP does not apply to any Red Hat repositories.

Procedure

To build the Satellite discovery image, complete the following steps:

  1. Open the /usr/share/foreman-discovery-image/foreman-discovery-image.ks file for editing:

    # vim /usr/share/foreman-discovery-image/foreman-discovery-image.ks

  2. Replace repo --name=rhel --baseurl=http://download/00000 with with your own repos for RHEL and Satellite with your repository URLs. To find the URLs, navigate to Content > Products and click the Repositories tab and copy the URL for both repositories into the file:

    repo --name=rhel --baseurl=http://download/released/RHEL-7/7.4/Server/x86_64/os/
repo --name=sat --baseurl=http://download2/nightly/Satellite/6.4/candidate/latest-Satellite-6.4-RHEL-7/compose/Satellite/x86_64/os/

  3. Run the livecd-creator tool:

    # livecd-creator --title="Discovery-Image" \
--compression-type=xz \
--cache=var/cache/build-fdi \
--config /usr/share/foreman-discovery-image/foreman-discovery-image.ks \
--fslabel fdi \
--tmpdir /var/tmp

    If you change fdi in the --fslabel option, you must also change the root label on the kernel command line when loading the image. fdi or the alternative name is appended to the .iso file that is created as part of this procedure. The PXE Discovery tool uses this name when converting from .iso to PXE.

    Use /var/tmp because this process requires close to 3GB of space and /tmp might have problems if the system is low on swap space.

  4. Verify that your fdi.iso file is created:

    # ls *.iso -h

When you create the .iso file, you can boot the .iso file over a network or locally. Complete one of the following procedures.

To boot the iso file over a network:

  1. To extract the initial ramdisk and kernel files from the .iso file over a network, enter the following command:

    # discovery-iso-to-pxe fdi.iso

  2. Create a directory to store your boot files:

    # mkdir /var/lib/tftpboot/boot/myimage

  3. Copy the initrd0.img and vmlinuz0 files to your new directory.

  4. Edit the KERNEL and APPEND entries in the /var/lib/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg file to add the information about your own initial ramdisk and kernel files.

To boot the iso file locally:

If you want to create a hybrid .iso file for booting locally, complete the following steps:

  1. To convert the .iso file to an .iso hybrid file for PXE provisioning, enter the following command:

    # isohybrid --partok fdi.iso

    If you have grub2 packages installed, you can also use the following command to install a grub2 bootloader:

    # isohybrid --partok --uefi fdi.iso

  2. To add md5 checksum to the .iso file so it can pass installation media validation tests in Satellite, enter the following command:

    # implantisomd5 fdi.iso

7. Provisioning Virtual Machines on a KVM Server (libvirt)

Kernel-based Virtual Machines (KVMs) use an open source virtualization daemon and API called libvirt running on Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Red Hat Satellite 6 can connect to the libvirt API on a KVM server, provision hosts on the hypervisor, and control certain virtualization functions.

7.1. Prerequisites for KVM Provisioning

The requirements for KVM provisioning include:

ifeval::["{build}" == "satellite"]
 * Synchronized content repositories for the version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux that you want to use. For more information, see link:/html/content_management_guide/importing_red_hat_content#Importing_Red_Hat_Content-Synchronizing_Red_Hat_Repositories[Synchronizing Red Hat Repositories] in the _Content Management Guide_.
endif::[]
ifeval::["{build}" == "foreman"]
 * Installation media or synchronized content when using Katello plugin.
endif::[]
 * A {SmartProxyServer} managing a network on the KVM server. Ensure no other DHCP services run on this network to avoid conflicts with the {SmartProxyServer}. For more information about network service configuration for {SmartProxyServer}s, see xref:Configuring_Networking[].
ifeval::["{build}" == "satellite"]
 * An activation key for host registration. For more information, see link:/html/content_management_guide/managing_activation_keys#Managing_Activation_Keys-Creating_an_Activation_Key[Creating An Activation Key] in the _Content Management_ guide.
 * A Red Hat Enterprise Linux server running KVM virtualization tools (libvirt daemon). For more information, see the https://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/7/html/Virtualization_Getting_Started_Guide/index.html[Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Virtualization Getting Started Guide].
endif::[]
ifeval::["{build}" == "foreman"]
 * A server running KVM virtualization tools (libvirt daemon).
 * Virtual network running on the libvirt server. Only NAT and isolated virtual networks can be managed through {ProjectX}.
endif::[]
 * An existing virtual machine image if you want to use image-based provisioning. Ensure that this image exists in a storage pool on the KVM host. The `default` storage pool is usually located in `/var/lib/libvirt/images`. Only directory pool storage types can be managed through {ProjectX}.
User Roles and Permissions to Provision Libvirt Compute Resources

To provision a Libvirt host in Satellite, you must have a user account with the following roles:

  • Edit hosts

  • View hosts

For more information, see Assigning Roles to a User in the Administering Red Hat Satellite guide.

You must also create a custom role with the following permissions:

  • view_compute_resources

  • destroy_compute_resources_vms

  • power_compute_resources_vms

  • create_compute_resources_vms

  • view_compute_resources_vms

  • view_locations

  • view_subnets

For more information about creating roles, see Creating a Role. For more information about adding permissions to a role, see Adding Permissions to a Role in the Administering Red Hat Satellite guide.

7.2. Configuring Satellite Server for KVM Connections

Before adding the KVM connection, Satellite Server requires some configuration to ensure a secure connection. This means creating an SSH key pair for the user that performs the connection, which is the foreman user.

Non-root users

These examples use the root user for KVM. However, if you want to use a non-root user on the KVM server, add the user to the libvirt group on the KVM server:

useradd -a -G libvirt non_root_user
Procedure

To configure Satellite Server for KVM connections, complete the following steps:

  1. On Satellite Server, switch to the foreman user:

    # su foreman -s /bin/bash

  2. Generate the key pair:

    $ ssh-keygen

  3. Copy the public key to the KVM server:

    $ ssh-copy-id root@kvm.example.com

  4. Exit the bash shell for the foreman user:

    $ exit

  5. Install the libvirt-client package:

    # yum install libvirt-client

  6. Use the following command to test the connection to the KVM server:

    # su foreman -s /bin/bash -c 'virsh -c qemu+ssh://root@kvm.example.com/system list'

    When you add the KVM connection in Satellite Server, use the qemu+ssh protocol and the address to the server. For example:

    qemu+ssh://root@kvm.example.com/system

7.3. Adding a KVM Connection to Satellite Server

Use this procedure to add a KVM connection to Satellite Server’s compute resources.

Procedure

To add a KVM connection to Satellite, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources, and in the Compute Resources window, click Create Compute Resource.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the new compute resource.

  3. From the Provider list, select Libvirt

  4. In the Description field, enter a description for the compute resource.

  5. In the URL field, enter the connection URL to the KVM server. For example:

     qemu+ssh://root@kvm.example.com/system

  6. From the Display type list, select either VNC or Spice.

  7. Optional: To secure console access for new hosts with a randomly generated password, select the Set a randomly generated password on the display connection check box. You can retrieve the password for the VNC console to access the guest virtual machine console from the output of the following command executed on the KVM server:

    # virsh edit your_VM_name
<graphics type='vnc' port='-1' autoport='yes' listen='0.0.0.0' passwd='your_randomly_generated_password'>

    The password is randomly generated every time the console for the virtual machine is opened, for example, with virt-manager.

  8. Click Test Connection to ensure that Satellite Server connects to the KVM server without fault.

  9. Verify that the Locations and Organizations tabs are automatically set to your current context. If you want, add additional contexts to these tabs.

  10. Click Submit to save the KVM connection.

For CLI Users

Create the connection with the hammer compute-resource create command:

# hammer compute-resource create --name "My_KVM_Server" \
--provider "Libvirt" --description "KVM server at kvm.example.com" \
--url "qemu+ssh://root@kvm.example.com/system" --locations "New York" \
--organizations "My_Organization"

7.4. Adding KVM Images to Satellite Server

If you want to use image-based provisioning to create hosts, you must add information about the image to your Satellite Server. This includes access details and the image location.

Supported Storage Types

Note that you can manage only directory pool storage types through Satellite 6.

Procedure

To add KVM images on Satellite Server, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources, and in the Compute Resources window, click the name of your KVM connection.

  2. Click the Image tab, and then click Create Image.

  3. In the Name field, enter a name for the image.

  4. From the Operatingsystem list, select the image’s base operating system.

  5. From the Architecture list, select the operating system architecture.

  6. In the Username field, enter the SSH user name for image access. This is normally the root user.

  7. In the Password field, enter the SSH password for image access.

  8. In the Image path field, enter the full path that points to the image on the KVM server. For example:

     /var/lib/libvirt/images/TestImage.qcow2

  9. Click Submit to save the image details.

For CLI Users

Create the image with the hammer compute-resource image create command. Use the --uuid field to store the full path of the image location on the KVM server.

# hammer compute-resource image create --name "Test KVM Image" \
--operatingsystem "RedHat version" --architecture "x86_64" --username root \
--user-data false --uuid "/var/lib/libvirt/images/TestImage.qcow2" \
--compute-resource "My_KVM_Server"

7.5. Adding KVM Details to a Compute Profile

We can predefine certain hardware settings for KVM-based virtual machines by adding these hardware settings to a compute profile.

Procedure

To add KVM details to a compute profile, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Profiles.

  2. In the Compute Profiles window, click the name of an existing compute resource or click Create Compute Profile and select a compute resource to use to create a compute profile.

  3. In the CPUs field, enter the number of CPUs to allocate to the new host.

  4. In the Memory field, enter the amount of memory to allocate to the new host.

  5. From the Image list, select the image to use if performing image-based provisioning.

  6. From the Network Interfaces list, select the network parameters for the host’s network interface. You can create multiple network interfaces. However, at least one interface must point to a Capsule-managed network.

  7. In the Storage area, enter the storage parameters for the host. You can create multiple volumes for the host.

  8. Click Submit to save the settings to the compute profile.

For CLI Users

The compute profile CLI commands are not yet implemented in Red Hat Satellite 6.4. As an alternative, you can include the same settings directly during the host creation process.

7.6. Creating Hosts on a KVM Server

In Satellite, you can use KVM provisioning to create hosts over a network connection and from an existing image.

If you want to create a host over a network connection, the new host must have access either to Satellite Server’s integrated Capsule or an external Capsule Server on a KVM virtual network, so that the host has access to PXE provisioning services. This new host entry triggers the KVM server to create and start a virtual machine. If the virtual machine detects the defined Capsule Server through the virtual network, the virtual machine boots to PXE and begins to install the chosen operating system.

If you create a host with an existing image, the new host entry triggers the KVM server to create the virtual machine, using the pre-existing image as a basis for the new volume.

DHCP Conflicts

For network-based provisioning, if you use a virtual network on the KVM server for provisioning, select a network that does not provide DHCP assignments. This causes DHCP conflicts with Satellite Server when booting new hosts.

Procedure

To create a KVM host, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Create Host.

  2. In the Name field, enter the name that you want to become the provisioned system’s host name.

  3. Click the Organization and Location tabs to ensure that the provisioning context is automatically set to the current context.

  4. From the Host Group list, select the host group that you want to use to populate the form.

  5. From the Deploy on list, select the KVM connection.

  6. From the Compute Profile list, select a profile to use to automatically populate virtual machine-based settings.

  7. Click the Interface tab and click Edit on the host’s interface.

  8. Verify that the fields are automatically populated with values. Note in particular:

    • The Name from the Host tab becomes the DNS name.

    • Satellite Server automatically assigns an IP address for the new host.

  9. Ensure that the MAC address field is blank. The KVM server assigns one to the host.

  10. Verify that the Managed, Primary, and Provision options are automatically selected for the first interface on the host. If not, select them.

  11. In the interface window, review the KVM-specific fields that are populated with settings from your compute profile. Modify these settings to suit your needs.

  12. Click the Operating System tab, and confirm that all fields automatically contain values.

  13. For network-based provisioning, ensure that the Provisioning Method is set to Network Based. For image-based provisioning, ensure that the Provisioning Method is set to Image Based

  14. Click Resolve in Provisioning templates to check the new host can identify the right provisioning templates to use.

  15. Click the Virtual Machine tab and confirm that these settings are populated with details from the host group and compute profile. Modify these settings to suit your needs.

  16. Click the Parameters tab and ensure that a parameter exists that provides an activation key. If not, add an activation key.

  17. Click Submit to save the host entry.

For CLI Users

Create the host with the hammer host create command and include --provision-method build to use network-based provisioning.

# hammer host create --name "kvm-test1" --organization "My_Organization" \
--location "New York" --hostgroup "Base" \
--compute-resource "My_KVM_Server" --provision-method build \
--build true --enabled true --managed true \
--interface "managed=true,primary=true,provision=true,compute_type=network,compute_network=examplenetwork" \
--compute-attributes="cpus=1,memory=1073741824" \
--volume="pool_name=default,capacity=20G,format_type=qcow2" \
--root-password "password"

Create the host with the hammer host create command and include --provision-method image to use image-based provisioning.

# hammer host create --name "kvm-test2" --organization "My_Organization" \
--location "New York" --hostgroup "Base" \
--compute-resource "My_KVM_Server" --provision-method image \
--image "Test KVM Image" --enabled true --managed true \
--interface "managed=true,primary=true,provision=true,compute_type=network,compute_network=examplenetwork" \
--compute-attributes="cpus=1,memory=1073741824" \
--volume="pool_name=default,capacity=20G,format_type=qcow2"

For more information about additional host creation parameters for this compute resource, see Additional Host Parameters for Hammer CLI.

8. Provisioning Virtual Machines in Red Hat Virtualization

Red Hat Virtualization (version 4.0 and later) or Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization (version 3.6 and earlier) is an enterprise-grade server and desktop virtualization platform built on Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

With Red Hat Satellite 6, you can manage virtualization functions through Red Hat Virtualization’s REST API version 3. REST API version 4 is not yet supported by Satellite 6. This includes creating virtual machines and controlling their power states.

Use the following procedures to add a connection to a Red Hat Virtualization environment and provision a virtual machine.

8.1. Prerequisites for Red Hat Virtualization Provisioning

The requirements for Red Hat Virtualization provisioning include:

  • Synchronized content repositories for Red Hat Enterprise Linux. For more information, see Synchronizing Red Hat Repositories in the Content Management Guide.

  • A Capsule Server managing a logical network on the Red Hat Virtualization environment. Ensure no other DHCP services run on this network to avoid conflicts with the Capsule Server. For more information, see Configuring Networking.

  • An existing template, other than the blank template, if you want to use image-based provisioning. For more information about creating templates for virtual machines, see Templates in the Virtual Machine Management Guide.

  • An activation key for host registration. For more information, see Creating An Activation Key in the Content Management guide.

8.2. Creating a Red Hat Virtualization User

The Red Hat Virtualization server requires an administration-like user for Satellite Server communication. For security reasons, Red Hat advises against using the admin@internal user for such communication. Instead, create a new Red Hat Virtualization user with the following permissions:

  • System

    • Configure System

      • Login Permissions

  • Network

    • Configure vNIC Profile

      • Create

      • Edit Properties

      • Delete

      • Assign vNIC Profile to VM

      • Assign vNIC Profile to Template

  • Template

    • Provisioning Operations

      • Import/Export

  • VM

    • Provisioning Operations

      • Create

      • Delete

      • Import/Export

      • Edit Storage

  • Disk

    • Provisioning Operations

      • Create

    • Disk Profile

      • Attach Disk Profile

For more information about how to create a user and add permissions in Red Hat Virtualization, see Administering User Tasks From the Administration Portal in the Red Hat Virtualization Administration Guide.

8.3. Adding a Red Hat Virtualization Connection to Satellite Server

Use this procedure to add a Red Hat Virtualization connection to Satellite Server’s compute resources.

Procedure

To add a Red Hat Virtualization connection to Satellite, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources, and in the Compute Resources window, click Create Compute Resource.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the new compute resource.

  3. From the Provider list, select RHV.

  4. In the Description field, enter a description for the compute resource.

  5. In the URL field, enter the connection URL for the Red Hat Virtualization Manager’s API.

    For example, in RHEV 3.6 and earlier, the URL is of the following form: https://rhv.example.com/ovirt-engine/api. In RHV 4.0 and later, the URL is of the following form: https://rhv.example.com/ovirt-engine/api/v3.

  6. Optionally, select the Use APIv4 (experimental) check box to evaluate the new engine API.

    Warning
    		 The items listed in this step are provided as Technology Previews. For further information about the scope of Technology Preview status, and associated support implications, see Technology Preview Features Support Scope.

  7. In the User field, enter the name of a user with permissions to access Red Hat Virtualization Manager’s resources.

  8. In the Password field, enter the password of the user.

  9. Click Load Datacenters to populate the Datacenter list with data centers from your Red Hat Virtualization environment.

  10. From the Datacenter list, select a data center.

  11. From the Quota ID list, select a quota to limit resources available to Satellite.

  12. In the X509 Certification Authorities field, enter the certificate authority for SSL/TLS access. Alternatively, if you leave the field blank, a self-signed certificate is generated on the first API request by the server.

  13. Click the Locations tab and select the location you want to use.

  14. Click the Organizations tab and select the organization you want to use.

  15. Click Submit to save the compute resource.

For CLI Users

To create a Red Hat Virtualization connection, enter the hammer compute-resource create command with Ovirt for --provider and the name of the data center you want to use for --datacenter.

# hammer compute-resource create \
--name "MyRHV_" --provider "Ovirt" \
--description "RHV server at rhv.example.com" \
--url "https://rhv.example.com/ovirt-engine/api" \
--use-v4 "false" --user "Satellite_User" \
--password "My_Password" \
--locations "New York" --organizations "My_Organization" \
--datacenter "My_Datacenter"

Optionally, to evaluate the new engine API, change false to true for the --use-v4 option.

Warning

The items listed in this step are provided as Technology Previews. For further information about the scope of Technology Preview status, and associated support implications, see Technology Preview Features Support Scope.

8.4. Adding Red Hat Virtualization Images to Satellite Server

Red Hat Virtualization uses templates as images for creating virtual machines. If you use image-based provisioning to create hosts, you must add Red Hat Virtualization template details to your Satellite Server. This includes access details and the template name.

Procedure

To add Red Hat Virtualization images on Satellite Server, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources, and in the Compute Resources window, click the name of your Red Hat Virtualization connection.

  2. Click the Image tab, and then click New Image.

  3. In the Name field, enter a name for the image.

  4. From the Operatingsystem list, select the image’s base operating system.

  5. From the Architecture list, select the operating system architecture.

  6. In the Username field, enter the SSH user name for image access. This is normally the root user.

  7. In the Password field, enter the SSH password for image access.

  8. From the Image list, select the name of the image on Red Hat Virtualization.

  9. Click Submit to save the image details.

For CLI Users

Create the image with the hammer compute-resource image create command. Use the --uuid option to store the template UUID on the Red Hat Virtualization server.

# hammer compute-resource image create --name "TestRHV_Image_" \
--operatingsystem "RedHat 7.2" --architecture "x86_64" --username root \
--uuid "9788910c-4030-4ae0-bad7-603375dd72b1" \
--compute-resource "MyRHV_"

8.5. Adding Red Hat Virtualization Details to a Compute Profile

You can predefine certain hardware settings for virtual machines on Red Hat Virtualization. You achieve this through adding these hardware settings to a compute profile.

Procedure

To add Red Hat Virtualization details to a compute profile, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Profiles and in the Compute Profiles window, click the name of the Red Hat Virtualization connection.

  2. From the Cluster list, select the target host cluster in the Red Hat Virtualization environment.

  3. From the Template list, select the RHV template to use for the Cores and Memory settings.

  4. In the Cores field, enter the number of CPU cores to allocate to the new host.

  5. In the Memory field, enter the amount of memory to allocate to the new host.

  6. From the Image list, select image to use for image-based provisioning.

  7. In the Network Interfaces area, enter the network parameters for the host’s network interface. You can create multiple network interfaces. However, at least one interface must point to a Capsule-managed network. For each network interface, enter the following details:

    1. In the Name field, enter the name of the network interface.

    2. From the Network list, select The logical network that you want to use.

  8. In the Storage area, enter the storage parameters for the host. You can create multiple volumes for the host. For each volume, enter the following details:

    1. In the Size (GB) enter the size, in GB, for the new volume.

    2. From the Storage domain list, select the storage domain for the volume.

    3. From the Preallocate disk, select either thin provisioning or preallocation of the full disk.

    4. From the Bootable list, select whether you want a bootable or non bootable volume.

  9. Click Submit to save the compute profile.

For CLI Users

The compute profile CLI commands are not yet implemented in Red Hat Satellite 6.4. As an alternative, you can include the same settings directly during the host creation process.

8.6. Creating Network-Based Hosts on a Red Hat Virtualization Server

In Satellite, you can create Red Hat Virtualization hosts over a network connection or from an existing image.

To create a host over a network, the new host must have access to either Satellite Server’s integrated Capsule or an external Capsule Server on a Red Hat Virtualization virtual network, so that the host has access to PXE provisioning services. The new host entry triggers the Red Hat Virtualization server to create the virtual machine. If the virtual machine detects the defined Capsule Server through the virtual network, the virtual machine boots to PXE and begins to install the chosen operating system.

DHCP conflicts

If you use a virtual network on the Red Hat Virtualization server for provisioning, ensure to select one that does not provide DHCP assignments. This causes DHCP conflicts with Satellite Server when booting new hosts.

When you create a host with an existing image, the new host entry triggers the Red Hat Virtualization server to create the virtual machine, using the pre-existing image as a basis for the new volume.

Procedure

To create a host for Red Hat Virtualization Server, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > New Host.

  2. In the Name field, enter the name that you want to become the provisioned system’s host name.

  3. Click the Organization and Location tabs to ensure that the provisioning context is automatically set to the current context.

  4. From the Host Group list, select the host group that you want to use to populate the form.

  5. From the Deploy on list, select the Red Hat Virtualization connection.

  6. From the Compute Profile list, select a profile to use to automatically populate virtual machine-based settings.

  7. Click the Interface tab and click Edit on the host’s interface.

  8. Verify that the fields are automatically populated with values. Note in particular:

    • The Name from the Host tab becomes the DNS name.

    • Satellite Server automatically assigns an IP address for the new host.

  9. Ensure that the MAC address field is blank. The Red Hat Virtualization server assigns one to the host.

  10. Verify that the Managed, Primary, and Provision options are automatically selected for the first interface on the host. If not, select them.

  11. In the interface window, ensure that the Red Hat Virtualization-specific fields are populated with settings from the compute profile. Modify these settings to suit your needs.

  12. Click the Operating System tab, and confirm that all fields automatically contain values.

  13. For network-based provisioning, ensure that the Provisioning Method is set to Network Based. For image-based provisioning, ensure that the Provisioning Method is set to Image Based.

  14. Click Resolve in Provisioning templates to check the new host can identify the right provisioning templates to use.

  15. Click the Virtual Machine tab and confirm that these settings are populated with details from the host group and compute profile. Modify these settings to suit your needs.

  16. Click the Parameters tab and ensure that a parameter exists that provides an activation key. If not, add an activation key.

  17. Click Submit to save the host entry.

For CLI Users

To create a host with network-based provisioning, use the hammer host create command and include --provision-method build.

# hammer host create --name "RHV-test1" --organization "My_Organization" \
--location "New York" --hostgroup "Base" \
--compute-resource "MyRHV_" --provision-method build \
--build true --enabled true --managed true \
--interface "managed=true,primary=true,provision=true,compute_name=eth0,compute_network=satnetwork" \
--compute-attributes="cluster=Default,cores=1,memory=1073741824,start=true" \
--volume="size_gb=20G,storage_domain=Data,bootable=true"

To create a host with image-based provisioning, use the hammer host create command and include --provision-method image.

# hammer host create --name "RHV-test2" --organization "My_Organization" \
--location "New York" --hostgroup "Base" \
--compute-resource "MyRHV_" --provision-method image \
--image "Test_RHV_Image" --enabled true --managed true \
--interface "managed=true,primary=true,provision=true,compute_name=eth0,compute_network=satnetwork" \
--compute-attributes="cluster=Default,cores=1,memory=1073741824,start=true" \
--volume="size_gb=20G,storage_domain=Data,bootable=true"

For more information about additional host creation parameters for this compute resource, see Additional Host Parameters for Hammer CLI.

9. Provisioning Virtual Machines in VMware vSphere

VMware vSphere is an enterprise-level virtualization platform from VMware. Red Hat Satellite 6 can interact with the vSphere platform, including creating new virtual machines and controlling their power management states.

9.1. Prerequisites for VMware vSphere Provisioning

The requirements for VMware vSphere provisioning include:

  • Synchronized content repositories for the version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux that you want to use. For more information, see Synchronizing Red Hat Repositories in the Content Management Guide.

  • A Capsule Server managing a network on the vSphere environment. Ensure no other DHCP services run on this network to avoid conflicts with the Capsule Server. For more information, see Configuring Networking.

  • An existing VMware template if you want to use image-based provisioning.

  • An activation key for host registration. For more information, see Creating An Activation Key in the Content Management guide.

9.2. Creating a VMware vSphere User

The VMware vSphere server requires an administration-like user for Satellite Server communication. For security reasons, do not use the administrator user for such communication. Instead, create a user with the following permissions:

For VMware vCenter Server version 6.7, set the following permissions:

  • All Privileges → Datastore → Allocate Space, Browse datastore, Update Virtual Machine files, Low level file operations

  • All Privileges → Network → Assign Network

  • All Privileges → Resource → Assign virtual machine to resource pool

  • All Privileges → Virtual Machine → Change Config (All)

  • All Privileges → Virtual Machine → Interaction (All)

  • All Privileges → Virtual Machine → Edit Inventory (All)

  • All Privileges → Virtual Machine → Provisioning (All)

For VMware vCenter Server version 6.5, set the following permissions:

  • All Privileges → Datastore → Allocate Space, Browse datastore, Update Virtual Machine files, Low level file operations

  • All Privileges → Network → Assign Network

  • All Privileges → Resource → Assign virtual machine to resource pool

  • All Privileges → Virtual Machine → Configuration (All)

  • All Privileges → Virtual Machine → Interaction (All)

  • All Privileges → Virtual Machine → Inventory (All)

  • All Privileges → Virtual Machine → Provisioning (All)

9.3. Adding a VMware vSphere Connection to Satellite Server

Use this procedure to add a VMware vSphere connection in Satellite Server’s compute resources.

Ensure that the host and network-based firewalls are configured to allow Satellite to vCenter communication on TCP port 443. Verify that Satellite is able to resolve the host name of vCenter and vCenter is able to resolve Satellite Server’s host name.

Procedure

To add a connection, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources, and in the Compute Resources window, click Create Compute Resource.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the resource.

  3. From the Provider list, select VMware.

  4. In the Description field, enter a description for the resource.

  5. In the VCenter/Server field, enter the IP address or host name of the vCenter server.

  6. In the User field, enter the user name with permission to access the vCenter’s resources.

  7. In the Password field, enter the password for the user.

  8. Click Load Datacenters to populate the list of data centers from your VMware vSphere environment.

  9. From the Datacenter list, select a specific data center to manage from this list.

  10. In the Fingerprint field, ensure that this field is populated with the fingerprint from the data center.

  11. From the Display Type list, select a console type, for example, VNC or VMRC. Note that VNC consoles are unsupported on VMware ESXi 6.5 and later.

  12. Optional: In the VNC Console Passwords field, select the Set a randomly generated password on the display connection check box to secure console access for new hosts with a randomly generated password. You can retrieve the password for the VNC console to access guest virtual machine console from the libvirtd host from the output of the following command:

    # virsh edit your_VM_name
<graphics type='vnc' port='-1' autoport='yes' listen='0.0.0.0' passwd='your_randomly_generated_password'>

    The password randomly generates every time the console for the virtual machine opens, for example, with virt-manager.

  13. From the Enable Caching list, you can select whether to enable caching of compute resources. For more information, see Caching of Compute Resources.

  14. Click the Locations and Organizations tabs and verify that the values are automatically set to your current context. You can also add additional contexts.

  15. Click Submit to save the connection.

For CLI Users

Create the connection with the hammer compute-resource create command. Select Vmware as the --provider and set the instance UUID of the data center as the --uuid:

# hammer compute-resource create --name "_My_vSphere_" \
--provider "Vmware" \
--description "vSphere server at _vsphere.example.com_" \
--server "_vsphere.example.com_" --user "_{Project}_User_" \
--password "p@55w0rd!" --locations "New York" --organizations "_My_Organization_" \
--uuid 72cb9454-81cd-4231-a863-d9baf0f399f8

9.4. Adding VMware vSphere Images to Satellite Server

VMware vSphere uses templates as images for creating new virtual machines. If using image-based provisioning to create new hosts, you need to add VMware template details to your Satellite Server. This includes access details and the template name.

Procedure

To add an image, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources and in the Compute Resources window, click the VMware vSphere connection.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the image.

  3. From the Operatingsystem list, select the image’s base operating system.

  4. From the Architecture list, select the operating system architecture.

  5. In the User field, enter the SSH user name for image access. This is normally the root user.

  6. In the Password field, enter the SSH password for image access.

  7. From the User data list, select whether you want the images to support user data input, such as cloud-init data.

  8. In the Image field, enter the relative path and name of the template on the vSphere environment. Do not include the data center in the relative path.

  9. Click Submit to save the image details.

For CLI Users

Create the image with the hammer compute-resource image create command. Use the --uuid field to store the relative template path on the vSphere environment.

# hammer compute-resource image create --name "Test_vSphere_Image" \
--operatingsystem "RedHat 7.2" --architecture "x86_64" \
--username root --uuid "Templates/RHEL72" \
--compute-resource "My_vSphere"

9.5. Adding VMware vSphere Details to a Compute Profile

You can predefine certain hardware settings for virtual machines on VMware vSphere. You achieve this through adding these hardware settings to a compute profile.

Procedure

To add VMware vSphere details to a compute profile, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Profiles and, in the Compute Profiles window, click the name of the compute profile, and then click the vSphere connection.

  2. In the CPUs field, enter the number of CPUs to allocate to the new host.

  3. In the Cores per socket field, enter the number of cores to allocate to each CPU.

  4. In the Memory field, enter the amount of memory to allocate to the new host.

  5. In the Cluster field, enter the name of the target host cluster on the VMware environment.

  6. From the Resource pool list, select an available resource allocations for the host.

  7. In the Folder field, enter the folder to organize the host.

  8. From the Guest OS list, select the operating system you want to use in VMware vSphere.

  9. From the SCSI controller list, select the disk access method for the host.

  10. From the Virtual H/W version list, select the underlying VMware hardware abstraction to use for virtual machines.

  11. You can select the Memory hot add or CPU hot add check boxes if you want to add more resources while the virtual machine is powered.

  12. From the Image list, select the image to use if performing image-based provisioning.

  13. From the Network Interfaces list, select the network parameters for the host’s network interface. You can create multiple network interfaces. However, at least one interface must point to a Capsule-managed network.

  14. Select the Eager zero check box if you want to use eager zero thick provisioning. If unchecked, the disk uses lazy zero thick provisioning.

  15. Click Submit to save the compute profile.

For CLI Users

The compute profile CLI commands are not yet implemented in Red Hat Satellite. As an alternative, you can include the same settings directly during the host creation process.

9.6. Creating Hosts on a VMware vSphere Server

The VMware vSphere provisioning process provides the option to create hosts over a network connection or using an existing image.

For network-based provisioning, you must create a host to access either Satellite Server’s integrated Capsule or an external Capsule Server on a VMware vSphere virtual network, so that the host has access to PXE provisioning services. The new host entry triggers the VMware vSphere server to create the virtual machine. If the virtual machine detects the defined Capsule Server through the virtual network, the virtual machine boots to PXE and begins to install the chosen operating system.

DHCP Conflicts

If you use a virtual network on the VMware vSphere server for provisioning, ensure that you select a virtual network that does not provide DHCP assignments. This causes DHCP conflicts with Satellite Server when booting new hosts.

For image-based provisioning, use the pre-existing image as a basis for the new volume.

Procedure

To create a host for a VMware vSphere server, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > New host.

  2. In the Name field, enter the name that you want to become the provisioned system’s host name.

  3. Click the Organization and Location tabs to ensure that the provisioning context is automatically set to the current context.

  4. From the Host Group list, select the host group that you want to use to populate the form.

  5. From the Deploy on list, select the VMware vSphere connection.

  6. From the Compute Profile list, select a profile to use to automatically populate virtual machine-based settings.

  7. Click the Interface tab and click Edit on the host’s interface.

  8. Verify that the fields are automatically populated with values. Note in particular:

    • The Name from the Host tab becomes the DNS name.

    • The Satellite Server automatically assigns an IP address for the new host.

  9. Ensure that the MAC address field is blank. The VMware vSphere server assigns one to the host.

  10. Verify that the Managed, Primary, and Provision options are automatically selected for the first interface on the host. If not, select them.

  11. In the interface window, review the VMware vSphere-specific fields that are populated with settings from our compute profile. Modify these settings to suit your needs.

  12. Click the Operating System tab, and confirm that all fields automatically contain values.

  13. For network-based provisioning, ensure that the Provisioning Method is set to Network Based. For image-based provisioning, ensure that the Provisioning Method is set to Image Based

  14. Click Resolve in Provisioning templates to check the new host can identify the right provisioning templates to use.

  15. Click the Virtual Machine tab and confirm that these settings are populated with details from the host group and compute profile. Modify these settings to suit your needs.

  16. Click the Parameters tab and ensure that a parameter exists that provides an activation key. If not, add an activation key.

  17. Click Submit to save the host entry.

For CLI Users

Create the host from a network with the hammer host create command and include --provision-method build to use network-based provisioning.

# hammer host create --name "vmware-test1" --organization "My_Organization" \
--location "New York" --hostgroup "Base" \
--compute-resource "My_vSphere" --provision-method build \
--build true --enabled true --managed true \
--interface "managed=true,primary=true,provision=true,compute_type=VirtualE1000,compute_network=mynetwork" \
--compute-attributes="cpus=1,corespersocket=2,memory_mb=1024,cluster=MyCluster,path=MyVMs,start=true" \
--volume="size_gb=20G,datastore=Data,name=myharddisk,thin=true"
Note
 See Additional Host Parameters for Hammer CLI for more information on additional host creation parameters for this compute resource.
For CLI Users

Create the host from an image with the hammer host create command and include --provision-method image to use image-based provisioning.

# hammer host create --name "vmware-test2" --organization "My_Organization" \
--location "New York" --hostgroup "Base" \
--compute-resource "My_VMware" --provision-method image \
--image "Test VMware Image" --enabled true --managed true \
--interface "managed=true,primary=true,provision=true,compute_type=VirtualE1000,compute_network=mynetwork" \
--compute-attributes="cpus=1,corespersocket=2,memory_mb=1024,cluster=MyCluster,path=MyVMs,start=true" \
--volume="size_gb=20G,datastore=Data,name=myharddisk,thin=true"

For more information about additional host creation parameters for this compute resource, see Additional Host Parameters for Hammer CLI.

9.7. Using the VMware vSphere Cloud-init and Userdata Templates for Provisioning

You can use VMware with the Cloud-init and Userdata templates to insert user data into the new virtual machine, to make further VMware customization, and to enable the VMware-hosted virtual machine to call back to Satellite.

You can use the same procedures to set up a VMware compute resource within Satellite, with a few modifications to the work flow.

VMware cloud-init Provisioning Overview

When you set up the compute resource and images for VMware provisioning in Satellite, the following sequence of provisioning events occur:

  • The user provisions one or more virtual machines using the Satellite web UI, API, or hammer

  • Satellite calls the VMware vCenter to clone the virtual machine template

  • Satellite userdata provisioning template adds customized identity information

  • When provisioning completes, the Cloud-init provisioning template instructs the virtual machine to call back to Capsule when cloud-init runs

  • VMware vCenter clones the template to the virtual machine

  • VMware vCenter applies customization for the virtual machine’s identity, including the host name, IP, and DNS

  • The virtual machine builds, cloud-init is invoked and calls back Satellite on port 80, which then redirects to 443

Port and Firewall Requirements

Because of the cloud-init service, the virtual machine always calls back to Satellite even if you register the virtual machine to Capsule. Ensure that you configure port and firewall settings to open any necessary connections.

For more information about port and firewall requirements, see Port and Firewall Requirements in the Installation Guide.

Associating the userdata and Cloud-init Templates with the Operating System

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Operating Systems, and select the operating system that you want to use for provisioning.

  2. Click the Template tab.

  3. From the Cloud-init template list, select Cloudinit default.

  4. From the User data template list, select UserData open-vm-tools.

  5. Click Submit to save the changes.

Preparing an Image to use the cloud-init Template

To prepare an image, you must first configure the settings that you require on a virtual machine that you can then save as an image to use in Satellite.

To use the cloud-init template for provisioning, you must configure a virtual machine so that cloud-init is installed, enabled, and configured to call back to Satellite Server.

For security purposes, you must install a CA certificate to use HTTPs for all communication. This procedure includes steps to clean the virtual machine so that no unwanted information transfers to the image you use for provisioning.

If you have an image with cloud-init, you must still follow this procedure to enable cloud-init to communicate with Satellite because cloud-init is disabled by default.

  1. On the virtual machine that you use to create the image, install cloud-init, open-vm-tools, and perl:

    # yum -y install cloud-init open-vm-tools perl

  2. Create a configuration file for cloud-init:

    # vi /etc/cloud/cloud.cfg.d/example_cloud-init_config.cfg

  3. Add the following information to the example_cloud_init_config.cfg file:

    datasource_list: [NoCloud]
datasource:
  NoCloud:
    seedfrom: https://satellite.example.com/userdata/
EOF

  4. Enable the CA certificates for the image:

    # update-ca-trust enable

  5. Download the katello-server-ca.crt file from Satellite Server:

    +

# wget -O /etc/pki/ca-trust/source/anchors/cloud-init-ca.crt http://_{foreman-example-com}_/pub/katello-server-ca.crt

+ . To update the record of certificates, enter the following command:

+

# update-ca-trust extract

  1. Use the following commands to clean the image:

    # systemctl stop rsyslog
# systemctl stop auditd
# package-cleanup -oldkernels -count=1
# yum clean all

  2. Use the following commands to reduce logspace, remove old logs, and truncate logs:

    # logrotate -f /etc/logrotate.conf
# rm -f /var/log/*-???????? /var/log/*.gz
# rm -f /var/log/dmesg.old
# rm -rf /var/log/anaconda
# cat /dev/null > /var/log/audit/audit.log
# cat /dev/null > /var/log/wtmp
# cat /dev/null > /var/log/lastlog
# cat /dev/null > /var/log/grubby

  3. Remove udev hardware rules:

    # rm -f /etc/udev/rules.d/70*

  4. Remove the uuid from ifcfg scripts:

    # cat > /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-ens192 <<EOM
DEVICE=ens192
ONBOOT=yes
EOM

  5. Remove the SSH host keys:

    # rm -f /etc/ssh/SSH_keys

  6. Remove root user’s shell history:

    # rm -f ~root/.bash_history
# unset HISTFILE

  7. Remove root user’s SSH history:

    # rm -rf ~root/.ssh/known_hosts

You can now create an image from this virtual machine.

You can use the Adding VMware vSphere Images to Satellite Server section to add the image to Satellite.

9.8. Caching of Compute Resources

Caching of compute resources speeds up rendering of VMware information.

9.8.1. Enabling Caching of Compute Resources

To enable or disable caching of compute resources:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources.

  2. Click the Edit button to the right of the VMware server you want to update.

  3. Select the Enable caching check box.

9.8.2. Refreshing the Compute Resources Cache

To refresh the cache of compute resources to update compute resources information:

Procedure

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources.

  2. Select a VMware server you want to refresh the compute resources cache for and click the Refresh Cache button.

For CLI Users

Use this API call to refresh the compute resources cache:

# curl -H "Accept:application/json,version=2" \
-H "Content-Type:application/json" -X PUT \
-u username:password -k \
https://satellite.example.com/api/compute_resources/compute_resource_id/refresh_cache

Use the hammer compute-resource list command to determine the ID of the VMware server you want to refresh the compute resources cache for.

10. Provisioning Cloud Instances in Red Hat OpenStack Platform

Red Hat OpenStack Platform provides the foundation to build a private or public Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) cloud on Red Hat Enterprise Linux. It offers a massively scalable, fault-tolerant platform for the development of cloud-enabled workloads. In Red Hat Satellite 6, you can interact with Red Hat OpenStack Platforms REST API to create new cloud instances and control their power management states.

10.1. Prerequisites for Red Hat OpenStack Platform Provisioning:

Requirements for Red Hat OpenStack Platform Provisioning include:

10.2. Adding a Red Hat OpenStack Platform Connection to the Satellite Server

Use this procedure to add the Red Hat OpenStack Platform connection in the Satellite Server’s compute resources.

Procedure

To add a compute resource, use the following procedure:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources and in the Compute Resources window, click Create Compute Resource.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name to identify the compute resource for future use.

  3. From the Provider list, select RHEL OpenStack Platform.

  4. In the Description field, enter a description for the resource.

  5. In the URL field, enter a URL to point to the OpenStack Authentication keystone service’s API at the tokens resource. Use the following format: http://openstack.example.com:5000/v2.0/tokens.

  6. In the User and Password fields, enter the authentication user and password for Satellite to access the environment.

  7. In the Domain field, enter the domain for V3 authentication.

  8. From the Tenant list, select the tenant or project for Satellite Server to manage.

  9. To use external networks as primary networks for hosts, select the Allow external network as main network check box.

  10. Click the Locations and Organizations tabs and verify that the location and organization that you want to use are set to your current context. Add any additional contexts that you want to these tabs.

  11. Click Submit to save the Red Hat OpenStack Platform connection.

For CLI Users

Create the connection with the hammer compute-resource create command:

# hammer compute-resource create --name "My_OpenStack" \
--provider "OpenStack" \
--description "My OpenStack environment at openstack.example.com" \
--url "http://openstack.example.com:5000/v2.0/tokens" --user "My_Username" \
--password "My_Password" --tenant "openstack" --locations "New York" \
--organizations "My_Organization"

10.3. Adding Red Hat OpenStack Platform Images to the Satellite Server

Red Hat OpenStack Platform uses image-based provisioning to create new hosts. You must add image details to your Satellite Server. This includes access details and image location.

Procedure

To add Red Hat OpenStack Platform images, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources and in the Computer Resources window, click the name of a Red Hat OpenStack Platform connection.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name that describes the image.

  3. From the Operatingsystem list, select the image’s base operating system.

  4. From the Architecture list, select the operating system architecture.

  5. In the User field, enter the SSH user name for image access. This is normally the root user.

  6. In the Password field, enter the SSH password for image access.

  7. From the Image list, select the image in OpenStack Image Storage.

  8. From the User data list, select whether you want to set if images support user data input, such as cloud-init data.

  9. Click Submit to save the image details.

For CLI Users

Create the image with the hammer compute-resource image create command. Use the --uuid field to store the full path of the image location on the Red Hat OpenStack Platform server.

# hammer compute-resource image create --name "Test OpenStack Image" \
--operatingsystem "RedHat 7.2" --architecture "x86_64" \
--user root --user-data true \
--compute-resource "My_OpenStack_Platform"

10.4. Adding Red Hat OpenStack Platform Details to a Compute Profile

In Satellite, you can define certain hardware settings for instances on Red Hat OpenStack Platform. You can add these hardware settings to a compute profile.

Procedure

To add Red Hat OpenStack Platform details to a compute profile, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Profiles and in the Compute Profiles window, click the name of the profile you want to use.

  2. From the Flavor list, select the hardware profile on OpenStack Platform to use for the host.

  3. From the Availability zone list, selec the target cluster to use within the OpenStack Platform environment.

  4. From the Image list, select the image to use for image-based provisioning.

  5. From the Tenant list, select the tenant or project for the OpenStack Platform instance.

  6. From the Security Group list, select the cloud-based access rules for ports and IP addresses.

  7. From the Internal network, select the private networks for the host to join.

  8. From the Floating IP network, select the external networks for the host to join and assign a floating IP address.

  9. From the Boot from volume, select whether a volume is created from the image. If not selected, the instance boots the image directly.

  10. In the New boot volume size (GB) field, enter the size, in GB, of the new boot volume.

  11. Click Submit to save the compute profile.

For CLI Users

The compute profile CLI commands are not yet implemented in Red Hat Satellite 6.4. As an alternative, you can include the same settings directly during the host creation process.

10.5. Creating Image-Based Hosts on Red Hat OpenStack Platform

In Satellite, you can provision Red Hat OpenStack Platform hosts from existing images on the Red Hat OpenStack Platform server.

Procedure

To provision a host, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > New Host.

  2. In the Name field, enter the name that you want to assign to the provisioned system’s host.

  3. From the Host Group list, you can select a host group to populate the host fields.

  4. From the Deploy on lits, select the OpenStack Platform connection.

  5. From the Compute profile list, select a profile to use to automatically populate cloud instance-based settings.

  6. Click the Interface tab, and click Edit on the host’s interface. Verify that the Name from the Host tab becomes the DNS name, and that the Satellite Server automatically assigns an IP address for the new host.

  7. Ensure that the MAC address field is blank. The Red Hat OpenStack Platform server assigns a MAC address to the host.

  8. Verify that Satellite Server automatically selects the Managed, Primary, and Provision options for the first interface on the host. If not, select them.

  9. Click the Operating System tab, and confirm that each aspect of the operating system is populated.

  10. If you want to change the image that populates automatically from your compute profile, from the Images list, select a different image to base the new host’s root volume.

  11. Click Resolve in Provisioning Templates to verify that the new host can identify the right provisioning templates to use.

  12. Click the Virtual Machine tab, and verify that the settings are populated with details from the host groups and compute profile. Modify these settings to suit your needs.

  13. Click the Parameters tab and ensure that a parameter exists that provides an activation key. If not, add an activation key.

  14. Click Submit to save the changes.

This new host entry triggers the Red Hat OpenStack Platform server to create the instance, using the pre-existing image as a basis for the new volume.

For CLI Users

Create the host with the hammer host create command and include the --provision-method image option to use image-based provisioning.

# hammer host create --name "openstack-test1" --organization "My_Organization" \
--location "New York" --hostgroup "Example_Hostgroup" \
--compute-resource "My_OpenStack_Platform" --provision-method image \
--image "Test OpenStack Image" --enabled true --managed true \
--interface "managed=true,primary=true,provision=true" \
--compute-attributes="flavor_ref=m1.small,tenant_id=openstack,security_groups=default,network=mynetwork"

For more information about additional host creation parameters for this compute resource, see Additional Host Parameters for Hammer CLI.

11. Provisioning Cloud Instances in Amazon EC2

Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) is a web service that provides public cloud compute resources. Using Satellite, you can interact with Amazon EC2’s public API to create cloud instances and control their power management states. Use the procedures in this chapter to add a connection to an Amazon EC2 account and provision a cloud instance.

11.1. Prerequisites for Amazon EC2 Provisioning

The requirements for Amazon EC2 provisioning include:

  • Synchronized content repositories for Red Hat Enterprise Linux. For more information, see Synchronizing Red Hat Repositories in the Content Management Guide.

  • A Capsule Server managing a network in your EC2 environment. Use a Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) to ensure a secure network between the hosts and the Capsule Server.

  • An Amazon Machine Image (AMI) for image-based provisioning.

  • An activation key for host registration. For more information, see Creating An Activation Key in the Content Management guide.

11.2. Adding an Amazon EC2 Connection to the Satellite Server

Use this procedure to add the Amazon EC2 connection in the Satellite Server’s compute resources.

Time Settings and Amazon Web Services

Amazon Web Services uses time settings as part of the authentication process. Ensure that Satellite Server’s time is correctly synchronized. Ensure that an NTP service, such as ntpd or chronyd, is running properly on the Satellite Server. Failure to provide the correct time to Amazon Web Services can lead to authentication failures.

For more information about synchronizing time in Satellite, see Synchronizing Time in Installing Satellite Server from a Connected Network.

Procedure

To add an Amazon EC2 connection, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources and in the Compute Resources window, click Create Compute Resource.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name to identify the Amazon EC2 compute resource.

  3. From the Provider list, select EC2.

  4. In the Description field, enter information that helps distinguish the resource for future use.

  5. From the HTTP proxy list, select a HTTP proxy to connect to external API services. You must add HTTP proxies to Satellite before you can select a proxy from this list. For more information, see Configuring Satellite Server with HTTP Proxy in Installing Satellite Server from a Connected Network.

  6. In the Access Key and Secret Key fields, enter the access keys for your Amazon EC2 account. For more information, see Managing Access Keys for your AWS Account on the Amazon documentation website.

  7. Click the Load Regions button to populate the Regions list.

  8. From the Region list, select the Amazon EC2 region or data center to use.

  9. Click the Locations tab and ensure that the location you want to use is selected, or add a different location.

  10. Click the Organizations tab and ensure that the organization you want to use is selected, or add a different organization.

  11. Click Submit to save the Amazon EC2 connection.

For CLI Users

Create the connection with the hammer compute-resource create command. Use --user and --password options to add the access key and secret key respectively.

# hammer compute-resource create --name "My_EC2" --provider "EC2" \
--description "Amazon EC2 Public Cloud` --user "user_name" \
--password "secret_key" --region "us-east-1" --locations "New York" \
--organizations "My_Organization"

11.3. Using an HTTP Smart Proxy with Compute Resources

In some cases, the EC2 compute resource that you use might require a specific HTTP proxy to communicate with Satellite. In Satellite, you can create an HTTP proxy entry and then assign the proxy to your EC2 compute resource.

However, if you configure a proxy for Satellite in Administer > Settings, and then add a proxy for your compute resource, the proxy that you define in Administer > Settings takes precedence.

Procedure

To add an HTTP proxy that you can assign to a compute resource, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > HTTP Capsules, and select New HTTP Proxy.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the proxy.

  3. In the URL field, enter the URL for the proxy, including the port number.

  4. Optional: Enter a username and password to authenticate to the proxy, if your proxy requires authentication.

  5. Click Test Connection to ensure that you can connect to the proxy from Satellite.

  6. Click the Locations tab and add a location.

  7. Click the Organization tab and add an organization.

  8. Click Submit.

11.4. Adding Amazon EC2 Images to Satellite Server

Amazon EC2 uses image-based provisioning to create hosts. You must add image details to your Satellite Server. This includes access details and image location.

Procedure

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources and select an Amazon EC2 connection.

  2. Click the Images tab, and then click New Image.

  3. In the Name field, enter a name to identify the image for future use.

  4. From the Operatingsystem list, select the operating system that corresponds with the image you want to add.

  5. From the Architecture list, select the operating system’s architecture.

  6. In the Username field, enter the SSH user name for image access. This is normally the root user.

  7. In the Password field, enter the SSH password for image access.

  8. In the Image ID field, enter the Amazon Machine Image (AMI) ID for the image. This is usually in the following format: ami-xxxxxxxx.

  9. From the User data list, select whether the images support user data input, such as cloud-init data. If you enable user data, the Finish scripts are automatically disabled. This also applies in reverse: if you enable the Finish scripts, this disables user data.

  10. From the IAM role list, select the Amazon security role used for creating the image.

  11. Click Submit to save the image details.

For CLI Users

Create the image with the hammer compute-resource image create command. Use the --uuid field to store the full path of the image location on the Amazon EC2 server.

# hammer compute-resource image create --name "Test Amazon EC2 Image" \
--operatingsystem "RedHat 7.2" --architecture "x86_64" --username root \
--user-data true --uuid "ami-my_ami_id" --compute-resource "My_EC2"

11.5. Adding Amazon EC2 Details to a Compute Profile

You can add hardware settings for instances on Amazon EC2 to a compute profile.

Procedure

To add hardware settings, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Profiles and click the name of your profile, then click an EC2 connection.

  2. From the Flavor list, select the hardware profile on EC2 to use for the host.

  3. From the Image list, select the image to use for image-based provisioning.

  4. From the Availability zone list, select the target cluster to use within the chosen EC2 region.

  5. From the Subnet list, add the subnet for the EC2 instance. If you have a VPC for provisioning new hosts, use its subnet.

  6. From the Security Groups list, select the cloud-based access rules for ports and IP addresses to apply to the host.

  7. From the Managed IP list, select either a Public IP or a Private IP.

  8. Click Submit to save the compute profile.

For CLI Users

The compute profile CLI commands are not yet implemented in Red Hat Satellite. As an alternative, you can include the same settings directly during the host creation process.

11.6. Creating Image-Based Hosts on Amazon EC2

The Amazon EC2 provisioning process creates hosts from existing images on the Amazon EC2 server.

Procedure

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > New Host.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the host.

  3. From the Host Group list, you can select a host group to populate most of the new host’s fields.

  4. From the Deploy on list, select the EC2 connection.

  5. From the Compute Profile list, select a profile to use to automatically populate virtual machine-based settings.

  6. Click the Interface tab, and then click Edit on the host’s interface, and verify that the fields are populated with values. Leave the Mac Address field blank. The Satellite Server automatically selects and IP address and the Managed, Primary, and Provision options for the first interface on the host.

  7. Click the Operating System tab and confirm that all fields are populated with values.

  8. Click the Virtual Machine tab and confirm that all fields are populated with values.

  9. Click the Parameters tab, and ensure that a parameter exists that provides an activation key. If not, add an activation key.

  10. Click Submit to save your changes.

This new host entry triggers the Amazon EC2 server to create the instance, using the pre-existing image as a basis for the new volume.

For CLI Users

Create the host with the hammer host create command and include --provision-method image to use image-based provisioning.

# hammer host create --name "ec2-test1" --organization "My_Organization" \
--location "New York" --hostgroup "Base" \
--compute-resource "My_EC2" --provision-method image \
--image "Test Amazon EC2 Image" --enabled true --managed true \
--interface "managed=true,primary=true,provision=true,subnet_id=EC2" \
--compute-attributes="flavor_id=m1.small,image_id=TestImage,availability_zones=us-east-1a,security_group_ids=Default,managed_ip=Public"

For more information about host creation parameters for this compute resource, see Additional Host Parameters for Hammer CLI.

11.7. Connecting to an Amazon EC2 instance using SSH

You can connect remotely to an Amazon EC2 instance from Satellite Server using SSH. However, to connect to any Amazon Web Services EC2 instance that you provision through Red Hat Satellite, you must first access the private key that is associated with the compute resource in the Foreman database, and use this key for authentication.

To locate the private key and connect to an Amazon EC2 server using SSH, complete the following steps:

  1. To locate the compute resource list, on your Satellite Server base system, enter the following command, and note the ID of the compute resource that you want to use:

    # hammer compute-resource list

  2. Switch user to the postgres user:

    # su - postgres

  3. Initiate the postgres shell:

    $ psql

  4. Connect to the Foreman database as the user postgres:

    # postgres=# \c foreman

  5. Select the secret from key_pairs where compute_resource_id = 3:

    # select secret from key_pairs where compute_resource_id = 3; secret

  6. Copy the key from after -----BEGIN RSA PRIVATE KEY----- until -----END RSA PRIVATE KEY-----.

  7. Create a .pem file and paste your key into the file:

    # vim Keyname.pem

  8. Ensure that you restrict access to the .pem file:

    # chmod 600 Keyname.pem

  9. To connect to the Amazon EC2 instance, enter the following command:

    ssh -i Keyname.pem   ec2-user@example.aws.com

11.8. Configuring a Finish Template for an Amazon Web Service EC2 Environment

You can use Red Hat Satellite finish templates during the provisioning of Red Hat Enterprise Linux instances in an Amazon EC2 environment.

To configure a finish template for Amazon EC2, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Red Hat Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Provisioning Templates.

  2. In the Provisioning Templates page, enter Kickstart default finish into the search field and click Search.

  3. On the Kickstart default finish template, select Clone.

  4. In the Name field, enter a unique name for the template.

  5. In the template, prefix each command that requires root privileges with sudo, except for subscription-manager register and yum commands, or add the following line to run the entire template as the sudo user:

    sudo -s << EOS
_Template_ _Body_
EOS

  6. Click the Association tab, and associate the template with a Red Hat Enterprise Linux operating system that you want to use.

  7. Click the Locations tab, and add the the location where the host resides.

  8. Click the Organizations tab, and add the organization that the host belongs to.

  9. Make any additional customizations or changes that you require, then click Submit to save your template.

  10. Navigate to Hosts > Operating systems and select the operating system that you want for your host.

  11. Click the Templates tab, and from the Finish Template list, select your finish template.

  12. Navigate to Hosts > Create Host and enter the information about the host that you want to create.

  13. Click the Parameters tab and navigate to Host parameters.

  14. In Host parameters, click the Add Parameter button three times to add three new parameter fields. Add the following three parameters:

    1. In the Name field, enter remote_execution_ssh_keys. In the corresponding Value field, enter the output of cat /usr/share/foreman/.ssh/id_rsa_foreman_proxy.pub.

    2. In the Name field, enter remote_execution_ssh_user. In the corresponding Value field, enter ec2-user.

    3. In the Name field, enter activation_keys. In the corresponding Value field, enter your activation key.

  15. Click Submit to save the changes.

11.9. More Information about Amazon Web Services and Satellite

For information about how to locate Red Hat Gold Images on Amazon Web Services EC2, see How to Locate Red Hat Cloud Access Gold Images on AWS EC2.

For information about how to install and use the Amazon Web Service Client on Linux, see Install the AWS Command Line Interface on Linux in the Amazon Web Services documentation.

For information about importing and exporting virtual machines in Amazon Web Services, see VM Import/Export in the Amazon Web Services documentation.

12. Provisioning Cloud Instances in Google Compute Engine

Red Hat Satellite can interact with Google Compute Engine (GCE), including creating new virtual machines and controlling their power management states. Only image-based provisioning is supported for creating GCE hosts.

12.1. Prerequisites for GCE Provisioning

Before you begin, ensure that the following conditions are met:

  • In your GCE project, configure a service account with the necessary IAM Compute role. For more information, see Compute Engine IAM roles in the GCE documentation.

  • In your GCE project-wise metadata, set the enable-oslogin to FALSE. For more information, see Enabling or disabling OS Login in the GCE documentation.

  • Optional: If you want to use Puppet with GCE hosts, navigate to Administer > Settings > Puppet and enable the Use UUID for certificates setting to configure Puppet to use consistent Puppet certificate IDs.

  • Based on your needs, associate a finish or user_data provisioning template with the operating system you want to use. For more information about provisioning templates, see Types of Provisioning Templates.

  • Synchronize content repositories for the version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux that you want to use.

  • Create an activation key for host registration.

12.2. Adding a GCE Connection to Satellite Server

Use this procedure to add a GCE connection to Satellite to be able to add images and provision hosts on GCE.

Procedure

To add a connection, complete the following steps:

  1. In GCE, generate a service account key in JSON format and upload this file to the /usr/share/foreman/ directory on Satellite Server.

  2. On Satellite Server, configure permissions for the service account key to ensure that the file is readable by the foreman user:

    # chown foreman /usr/share/foreman/gce_key.json
# chmod 0600 /usr/share/foreman/gce_key.json
# restorecon -vv /usr/share/foreman/gce_key.json

  3. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources and click Create Compute Resource.

  4. In the Name field, enter a name for the resource.

  5. From the Provider list, select Google.

  6. Optional: In the Description field, enter a description for the resource.

  7. In the Google Project ID field, enter the project ID.

  8. In the Client Email field, enter the client email.

  9. In the Certificate Path field, enter the path to the service account key. For example, /usr/share/foreman/gce_key.json.

  10. Click Load Zones to populate the list of zones from your GCE environment.

  11. From the Zone list, select the GCE zone to use.

  12. Click Submit.

12.3. Adding GCE Images to Satellite Server

GCE uses image-based provisioning to create hosts. You must add image details to your Satellite Server.

Procedure

To add an image, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Resources and click the GCE connection.

  2. Click the Images tab.

  3. Click Create Image.

  4. In the Name field, enter a name for the image.

  5. From the Operating system list, select the base operating system for the image.

  6. From the Architecture list, select the operating system architecture.

  7. In the User field, enter the SSH user name for image access. Specify a user other than root, because the root user cannot connect to a GCE instance using SSH keys. The username must begin with a letter and consist of lowercase letters and numbers.

  8. From the Image list, select the GCE image.

  9. Optional: If the selected image supports cloud-init, select the User data check box to enable user data input.

  10. Click Submit to save the image details.

12.4. Adding GCE Details to a Compute Profile

You can add GCE details to a compute profile to automatically populate virtual machine-based settings on host creation.

Procedure

To add details to a compute profile, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Compute Profiles and click the name of your profile.

  2. Select a GCE connection.

  3. From the Machine Type list, select the machine type to use for provisioning.

  4. From the Image list, select the image to use for provisioning.

  5. From the Network list, select the GCE network to use for provisioning.

  6. Optional: Select the Associate Ephemeral External IP check box to assign a dynamic ephemeral IP address that Satellite uses to communicate with the host. This public IP address changes when you reboot the host. If you need a permanent IP address, reserve a static public IP address on GCE and attach it to the host.

  7. In the Size (GB) field, enter the size of the storage to create on the host.

  8. Click Submit to save the compute profile.

12.5. Creating Image-Based Hosts on GCE

The GCE provisioning process creates hosts from existing images on GCE.

Procedure

To create a host on GCE, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Create host.

  2. In the Name field, enter a name for the host.

  3. Click the Organization and Location tabs to ensure that the provisioning context is automatically set to the current context.

  4. Optional: From the Host Group list, you can select a host group to populate most of the new host’s fields.

  5. From the Deploy on list, select the GCE connection.

  6. From the Compute Profile list, select a profile to use to automatically populate virtual machine-based settings.

  7. Click the Interface tab and click Edit on the host’s interface.

  8. Verify that the fields are automatically populated with values, particularly the following items:

    • The Name from the Host tab becomes the DNS name.

    • The MAC address field is blank.

    • The Domain field is populated with the required domain.

    • The Managed, Primary, and Provision options are automatically selected for the first interface on the host. If not, select them.

  9. Click the Operating System tab, and select the operating system to install.

  10. Click Resolve in Provisioning templates to verify that the new host can identify the correct provisioning templates to use. You must select either a finish or user_data provisioning template.

  11. Click the Parameters tab and ensure that a parameter exists that provides an activation key. If not, add an activation key.

  12. Click Submit to save the host entry.

Appendix A: Initialization Script for Provisioning Examples

If you have not followed the examples in the Red Hat Satellite 6 Content Management Guide, you can use the following initialization script to create an environment for provisioning examples.

Create a script file (sat6-content-init.sh) and include the following:

#!/bin/bash

MANIFEST=$1

# Import the content from Red Hat CDN
hammer organization create --name "ACME" --label "ACME" \
--description "Our example organization for managing content."
hammer subscription upload --file ~/$MANIFEST --organization "ACME"
hammer repository-set enable \
--name "Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Server (RPMs)" \
--releasever "7Server" --basearch "x86_64" \
--product "Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server" --organization "ACME"
hammer repository-set enable \
--name "Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Server (Kickstart)" \
--releasever "7Server" --basearch "x86_64" \
--product "Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server" --organization "ACME"
hammer repository-set enable \
--name "Red Hat Satellite Tools {ProductVersion} (for RHEL 7 Server) (RPMs)" \
--basearch "x86_64" --product "Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server" \
--organization "ACME"
hammer product synchronize --name "Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server" \
--organization "ACME"

# Create our application life cycle
hammer lifecycle-environment create --name "Development" \
--description "Environment for ACME's Development Team" \
--prior "Library" --organization "ACME"
hammer lifecycle-environment create --name "Testing" \
--description "Environment for ACME's Quality Engineering Team" \
--prior "Development" --organization "ACME"
hammer lifecycle-environment create --name "Production" \
--description "Environment for ACME's Product Releases" \
--prior "Testing" --organization "ACME"

# Create and publish our Content View
hammer content-view create --name "Base" \
--description "Base operating system" \
--repositories "Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Server RPMs x86_64 7Server,Red Hat Satellite Tools {ProductVersion} for RHEL 7 Server RPMs x86_64" \
--organization "ACME"
hammer content-view publish --name "Base" \
--description "Initial content view for our operating system" \
--organization "ACME"
hammer content-view version promote --content-view "Base" --version 1 \
--to-lifecycle-environment "Development" --organization "ACME"
hammer content-view version promote --content-view "Base" --version 1 \
--to-lifecycle-environment "Testing" --organization "ACME"
hammer content-view version promote --content-view "Base" --version 1 \
--to-lifecycle-environment "Production" --organization "ACME"

Set executable permissions on the script:

# chmod +x sat6-content-init.sh

Download a copy of your Subscription Manifest from the Red Hat Customer Portal and run the script on the manifest:

# ./sat6-content-init.sh manifest_98f4290e-6c0b-4f37-ba79-3a3ec6e405ba.zip

This imports the necessary Red Hat content for the provisioning examples in this guide.

Appendix B: Additional Host Parameters for Hammer CLI

This appendix provides some information on additional parameters for the hammer host create command.

B.1. Common Interface Parameters

These parameters are used with the --interface option for all provisioning types:

Parameter Description

mac

MAC address for the interface

ip

IP address for the interface

type

The type of interface. For example: interface, bmc, or bond

name

The host name associated with this interface`

subnet_id

The subnet ID on the Satellite Server

domain_id

The domain ID on the Satellite Server

identifier

The device identifier. For example: eth0

managed

Boolean for managed interfaces. Set to true or false

primary

Boolean for primary interfaces. Managed hosts needs to have one primary interface. Set to true or false

provision

Boolean for whether to provision on this interface. Set to true or false

virtual

Boolean for whether the interface is a VLAN interface. Set to true or false

Use the following parameters if virtual is true:

Parameter Description

tag

VLAN tag, this attribute has precedence over the subnet VLAN ID. Only for virtual interfaces.

attached_to

Identifier of the interface to which this interface belongs. For example: eth1.

Use the following parameters if type is bond:

Parameter Description

mode

The bonding mode. One of balance-rr, active-backup, balance-xor, broadcast, 802.3ad, balance-tlb, balance-alb

attached_devices

Identifiers of slave interfaces. For example: [eth1,eth2]

bond_options

Additional bonding options

Use the following parameters if type is bmc:

Parameter Description

provider

The BMC provider. Only IPMI is supported

username

The username for the BMC device

password

The password for the BMC device

B.2. EC2 Parameters

Available parameters for --compute-attributes:

Parameter Description

flavor_id

The EC2 flavor to use

image_id

The AMI ID of the image to use

availability_zone

The availability zone within the region of the EC2 provider

security_group_ids

The IDs for security groups to use

managed_ip

To utilize a public or private IP

B.3. Libvirt Parameters

Available keys for --compute-attributes:

Parameter Description

cpus

Number of CPUs

memory

Amount of memory in bytes

start

Boolean to start the machine

Available keys for --interface:

Parameter Description

compute_type

Either bridge or network

compute_network / compute_bridge

Name of the network or physical interface

compute_model

The interface model. One of virtio, rtl8139, ne2k_pci, pcnet, or e1000

Available keys for --volume:

Parameter Description

pool_name

The storage pool to store the volume

capacity

The capacity of the volume. For example: 10G

format_type

The disk type. Either raw or qcow2

B.4. Red Hat OpenStack Platform Parameters

Available keys for --compute-attributes:

Parameter Description

flavor_ref

The flavor to use

image_ref

The image to use

tenant_id

The tenant to use

security_groups

A list of security groups to use

network

The network to connect the instance

B.5. Red Hat Virtualization Parameters

Available keys for --compute-attributes:

Parameter Description

cluster

The cluster ID to contain the host

template

The hardware profile to use

cores

The number of CPU cores to use

memory

The amount of memory in bytes

start

Boolean to start the machine

Available keys for --interface:

Parameter Description

compute_name

The interface name. For example: eth0

compute_network

The network in the cluster to use

Available keys for --volume:

Parameter Description

size_gb

Volume size in GB

storage_domain

The storage domain to use

bootable

Boolean to set the volume as bootable. Only one volume can be bootable

B.6. VMware Interface Parameters

Available keys for --compute-attributes:

Parameter Description

cpus

Number of CPUs for the host

corespersocket

Number of cores per CPU socket. Applicable to hosts using hardware versions less than v10.

memory_mb

Amount of memory in MB

cluster

Cluster ID for the host

path

Path to folder to organize the host

guest_id

Guest OS ID

scsi_controller_type

ID of the VMware controller

hardware_version

VMware hardware version ID

start

Boolean to start the machine

Available keys for --interface:

Parameter Description

compute_type

Type of the network adapter. One of VirtualVmxnet, VirtualVmxnet2, VirtualVmxnet3, VirtualE1000, VirtualE1000e, VirtualPCNet32.

compute_network

VMware network ID

Available keys for --volume:

Parameter Description

datastore

The datastore ID

name

The name of the volume

size_gb

The size in GB

thin

Boolean value to enable thin provisioning

eager_zero

Boolean value to enable Eager Zero thick provisioning

Appendix C: Provisioning FIPS Compliant Hosts

Red Hat Satellite 6 supports provisioning hosts that comply with the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s Security Requirements for Cryptographic Modules standard, reference number FIPS 140-2, referred to here as FIPS.

Red Hat Satellite 6 is not supported on a FIPS enabled host.

To enable the provisioning of hosts that are FIPS compliant, complete the following changes:

  • Identify the relevant operating systems, locations, and organizations

  • Create and enable the FIPS provisioning templates

  • Change the provisioning password hashing algorithm

  • Change the Puppet message digest algorithm

  • Set the FIPS enabled parameter

When these changes are complete, the new provisioning templates will be associated with those operating systems, locations, and organizations you specify. When you provision a host to those operating systems, locations, and organizations, the host will have the FIPS-compliant settings applied. To confirm that these settings have been successful, complete the steps in Verifying FIPS Mode is Enabled.

Prerequisites

  • Complete the configuration steps from the Authentication section in the Hammer CLI Guide. This allows you to run Hammer commands without providing your Satellite username and password each time.

C.1. Identifying the Relevant Operating Systems, Locations, and Organizations

Before creating the FIPS-compliant templates in Satellite, you must identify those locations, organizations and operating systems to which you want to deploy FIPS-compliant hosts. For example, if you will only deploy Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 hosts as FIPS compliant, associate the template with only Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.

  1. List all locations.

    Example
    $ hammer location list
---|-----------------
ID | NAME
---|-----------------
2  | Default Location
---|-----------------

    Note the value in the NAME column of those locations to which you want to deploy FIPS-compliant hosts.

  2. List all organizations.

    Example
    $ hammer organization list
---|----------------------|----------------------|------------
ID | NAME                 | LABEL                | DESCRIPTION
---|----------------------|----------------------|------------
1  | Default Organization | Default_Organization |
2  | Sales                | Sales_Department     |
---|----------------------|----------------------|------------

    Note the value in the NAME column of those organizations to which you want to deploy FIPS-compliant hosts.

  3. List all operating systems.

    Example
    $ hammer os list

    Note the value in the TITLE column of those operating systems to which you want to deploy FIPS-compliant hosts.

C.2. Creating and Enabling the FIPS Provisioning Templates

The FIPS provisioning templates are provided in a git repository. In this procedure you import them into the Satellite environment, then associate them with the desired operating systems, locations, and organizations.

  1. On the Satellite Server, clone the git repository containing the FIPS enabled templates, then change into the repository’s directory.

    $ git clone https://github.com/RedHatSatellite/satellite6-fips-client
$ cd satellite6-fips-client

    This repository contains the following Embedded RuBy (ERB) templates. These are plain text files, which you can view to see in detail the configuration settings they contain.

    • Kickstart_Default_PXELinux_FIPS.erb

      • Updated PXELinux template

    • fips_packages.erb

      • Packages required by FIPS mode (for example, dracut-fips)

    • Kickstart_Default_FIPS.erb

      • Kickstart template with modifications to call the fips_packages snippet

    • puppet.conf.erb

      • Updated puppet.conf configuration file with updated (SHA256) message digest algorithm

  2. Add the PXELinux FIPS template.

    $ hammer template create  --name "Kickstart Default PXELinux FIPS" \
  --file Kickstart_Default_PXELinux_FIPS.erb  \
  --locations LOCATIONS \
  --organizations ORGANIZATION \
  --operatingsystems OS \
  --type PXELinux

    Replace the placeholder values LOCATIONS, ORGANIZATION, and OS with the values you noted in Identifying the Relevant Operating Systems, Locations, and Organizations. If any value contains non-alphabetical characters, enclose the value in quotation marks (").

    The message Config template created indicates success.

    Example
    $ hammer template create  --name "Kickstart Default PXELinux FIPS" \
  --file Kickstart_Default_PXELinux_FIPS.erb \
  --locations "Default Location" \
  --organizations "Default Organization","Sales" \
  --operatingsystems "RedHat 6.6","RedHat 7.1","RedHat 7.2","RedHat 6.7" \
  --type PXELinux

  3. Add the Kickstart Default FIPS_ template.

    $ hammer template create  --name "Kickstart Default FIPS" \
  --file Kickstart_Default_FIPS.erb  \
  --locations LOCATIONS \
  --organizations ORGANIZATION \
  --operatingsystems OS \
  --type provision

    Replace the placeholder values LOCATIONS, ORGANIZATION, and OS with the values you noted in Identifying the Relevant Operating Systems, Locations, and Organizations. If any value contains non-alphabetical characters, enclose the value in quotation marks (").

    The message Config template created indicates success.

    Example
    $ hammer template create  --name "Kickstart Default FIPS" \
  --file Kickstart_Default_FIPS.erb  \
  --locations "Default Location" \
  --organizations "Default Organization","Sales" \
  --operatingsystems "OS Name _OS Version_7" \
  --type provision

  4. Add the FIPS Packages snippet.

    $ hammer template create  --name "fips_packages" \
  --file fips_packages.erb \
  --locations LOCATIONS \
  --organizations ORGANIZATION \
  --type snippet

    Replace the placeholder values LOCATIONS and ORGANIZATION with the values you noted in Identifying the Relevant Operating Systems, Locations, and Organizations. If any value contains non-alphabetical characters, enclose the value in quotation marks (").

    The message Config template created indicates success.

    Example
    $ hammer template create  --name "fips_packages" \
  --file fips_packages.erb \
  --locations "Default Location" \
  --organizations "Default Organization","Sales" \
  --type snippet

  5. Update the default Puppet configuration snippet.

    $ hammer template update --name puppet.conf \
  --file puppet.conf.erb  \
  --type snippet

    The message Config template created indicates success.

  6. Update the Operating System Object to use the new templates.

    Now that the new FIPS templates have been added to Satellite, they must be set as default templates for the desired operating system.

    1. Identify the IDs of the Kickstart Default FIPS and Kickstart Default PXELinux FIPS templates.

      Example
      $ hammer template list
----|--------------------------------------|----------
ID  | NAME                                 | TYPE
----|--------------------------------------|----------
38  | Alterator default                    | provision
26  | Alterator default finish             | finish
10  | Alterator default PXELinux           | PXELinux
52  | alterator_pkglist                    | snippet
53  | ansible_provisioning_callback        | snippet
54  | ansible_tower_callback_script        | snippet
55  | ansible_tower_callback_service       | snippet
39  | Atomic Kickstart default             | provision
40  | AutoYaST default                     | provision
33  | AutoYaST default iPXE                | iPXE
11  | AutoYaST default PXELinux            | PXELinux
86  | AutoYaST default user data           | user_data
41  | AutoYaST SLES default                | provision
56  | blacklist_kernel_modules             | snippet
57  | bmc_nic_setup                        | snippet
110 | Boot disk iPXE - generic host        | Bootdisk
109 | Boot disk iPXE - host                | Bootdisk
58  | chef_client                          | snippet
59  | coreos_cloudconfig                   | snippet
42  | CoreOS provision                     | provision
12  | CoreOS PXELinux                      | PXELinux
60  | create_users                         | snippet
61  | csr_attributes.yaml                  | snippet
112 | Discovery Debian kexec               | kexec
111 | Discovery Red Hat kexec              | kexec
62  | epel                                 | snippet
63  | fix_hosts                            | snippet
27  | FreeBSD (mfsBSD) finish              | finish
43  | FreeBSD (mfsBSD) provision           | provision
13  | FreeBSD (mfsBSD) PXELinux            | PXELinux
64  | freeipa_register                     | snippet
51  | Grubby default                       | script
65  | http_proxy                           | snippet
34  | iPXE default local boot              | iPXE
35  | iPXE global default                  | iPXE
44  | Jumpstart default                    | provision
28  | Jumpstart default finish             | finish
2   | Jumpstart default PXEGrub            | PXEGrub
29  | Junos default finish                 | finish
45  | Junos default SLAX                   | provision
25  | Junos default ZTP config             | ZTP
46  | Kickstart default                    | provision
30  | Kickstart default finish             | finish
36  | Kickstart default iPXE               | iPXE
3   | Kickstart default PXEGrub            | PXEGrub
6   | Kickstart default PXEGrub2           | PXEGrub2
14  | Kickstart default PXELinux           | PXELinux
87  | Kickstart default user data          | user_data
67  | kickstart_ifcfg_bonded_interface     | snippet
66  | kickstart_ifcfg_bond_interface       | snippet
68  | kickstart_ifcfg_generic_interface    | snippet
69  | kickstart_ifcfg_get_identifier_names | snippet
70  | kickstart_networking_setup           | snippet
47  | Kickstart oVirt-RHVH                 | provision
15  | Kickstart oVirt-RHVH PXELinux        | PXELinux
1   | NX-OS default POAP setup             | POAP
48  | Preseed default                      | provision
31  | Preseed default finish               | finish
37  | Preseed default iPXE                 | iPXE
7   | Preseed default PXEGrub2             | PXEGrub2
16  | Preseed default PXELinux             | PXELinux
88  | Preseed default user data            | user_data
71  | preseed_networking_setup             | snippet
72  | puppet.conf                          | snippet
74  | puppetlabs_repo                      | snippet
73  | puppet_setup                         | snippet
75  | pxegrub2_chainload                   | snippet
8   | PXEGrub2 default local boot          | PXEGrub2
76  | pxegrub2_discovery                   | snippet
9   | PXEGrub2 global default              | PXEGrub2
77  | pxegrub_chainload                    | snippet
4   | PXEGrub default local boot           | PXEGrub
78  | pxegrub_discovery                    | snippet
5   | PXEGrub global default               | PXEGrub
17  | PXELinux chain iPXE                  | PXELinux
18  | PXELinux chain iPXE UNDI             | PXELinux
79  | pxelinux_chainload                   | snippet
19  | PXELinux default local boot          | PXELinux
20  | PXELinux default memdisk             | PXELinux
80  | pxelinux_discovery                   | snippet
21  | PXELinux global default              | PXELinux
81  | rancheros_cloudconfig                | snippet
49  | RancherOS provision                  | provision
22  | RancherOS PXELinux                   | PXELinux
82  | redhat_register                      | snippet
83  | remote_execution_ssh_keys            | snippet
84  | saltstack_minion                     | snippet
85  | saltstack_setup                      | snippet
89  | UserData default                     | user_data
23  | WAIK default PXELinux                | PXELinux
50  | XenServer default answerfile         | provision
32  | XenServer default finish             | finish
24  | XenServer default PXELinux           | PXELinux
----|--------------------------------------|----------

      In this example, the IDs are 54 and 53 respectively. These IDs are installation specific.

    2. Specify the FIPS templates as default.

      $ hammer os set-default-template --config-template-id TEMPLATE \
--id OS

      Replace the placeholders TEMPLATE and OS with the IDs of the FIPS templates, and the desired operating system, noted earlier. Repeat this command for every combination of FIPS template and operating system. It does not accept a comma-separated list of values.

      In this example, the FIPS templates are set as default for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.2, identified in an earlier example as ID 1.

      Example
      $ hammer os set-default-template --config-template-id 54 --id 1
$ hammer os set-default-template --config-template-id 53 --id 1

C.3. Change the Provisioning Password Hashing Algorithm

This sets the password hashing algorithm used in provisioning to SHA256. This configuration setting must be applied for each operating system you want to deploy as FIPS compliant.

Note

This is required ONLY if Red Hat Satellite 6 was upgraded from Satellite 6.4. Satellite 6.4 uses SHA256 by default.

  1. Identify the Operating System IDs.

    Example
    $ hammer os list

  2. Update each operating system’s password hash value.

    $ hammer os update --title OS \
  --password-hash SHA256

    Repeat this command for each of the desired operating systems, using the matching value in the TITLE column. It does not accept a comma-separated list of values.

    Example
    $ hammer os update --title "RedHat 7.2" \
  --password-hash SHA256

C.4. Switching to a FIPS Compliant Message Algorithm for Puppet

On the Satellite Server, all external Capsule Servers, and all existing hosts, configure Puppet to use the SHA256 message digest algorithm.

Edit the /etc/puppet/puppet.conf file, adding the line digest_algorithm = sha256 in the [main] stanza.

Note

This change will be overwritten on every upgrade of Satellite, so needs to be reapplied afterward.

Because the Puppet message digest algorithm is changed on the Satellite Server and all Capsule Servers, it must also be changed on all hosts, including those that are not FIPS compliant.

In the event of a message digest algorithm mismatch, the client will download its facts again. This will result in a noticeable increased load on the Satellite Server or external Capsule Servers.

C.5. Setting the FIPS Enabled Parameter

To provision a FIPS compliant host, the FIPS templates require a parameter named fips_enabled to be set to true. If this is not set to true, or is absent, the FIPS specific changes will not be applied. This parameter can be specified when provisioning an individual host, or set for a hostgroup. Retrospectively enabling FIPS compliance on a host is outside the scope of this guide and likely to cause problems.

To set this parameter when provisioning a host, append --parameters fips_enabled=true to the Hammer command.

To set this parameter on an existing host group, use the Hammer sub-command set-parameter. For more information, see the output of the command hammer hostgroup set-parameter --help. Any host provisioned to this hostgroup will inherit the fips_enabled parameter from the hostgroup.

Example
$ hammer hostgroup set-parameter --name fips_enabled \
 --value 'true' \
 --hostgroup prod_servers

C.6. Verifying FIPS Mode is Enabled

To verify these FIPS compliance changes have been successful, you must provision a host and check its configuration.

  1. Deploy a host using the FIPS templates, ensuring that parameter named fips_enabled is set to true.

  2. Log in to the new host as a root-equivalent account.

  3. Enter the command cat /proc/sys/crypto/fips_enabled. A value of 1 confirms that FIPS mode is enabled.

Appendix D: Building Cloud Images for Red Hat Satellite

Use this section to build and register images to Red Hat Satellite.

You can use a preconfigured Red Hat Enterprise Linux KVM guest QCOW2 image:

These images contain cloud-init. To function properly, they must use ec2-compatible metadata services for provisioning an SSH key.

Note

For the KVM guest images:

  • The root account in the image is disabled, but sudo access is granted to a special user named cloud-user.

  • There is no root password set for this image.

The root password is locked in /etc/shadow by placing !! in the second field.

If you want to create custom Red Hat Enterprise Linux images, see Creating a Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Image and Creating a Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 Image.

D.1. Creating Custom Red Hat Enterprise Linux Images

Prerequisites:

  • Use a Linux host machine to create an image. In this example, we use a Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Workstation.

  • Use virt-manager on your workstation to complete this procedure. If you create the image on a remote server, connect to the server from your workstation with virt-manager.

  • A Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 or 6 ISO file (see Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.4 Binary DVD or Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.9 Binary DVD).

For more information about installing a Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation, see Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Installation Guide.

Before you can create custom images, install the following packages:

  • Install libvirt, qemu-kvm and graphical tools:

    [root@host]# yum install virt-manager virt-viewer libvirt qemu-kvm

  • Install the following command line tools:

    [root@host]# yum install virt-install libguestfs-tools-c
Note

In the following procedures, enter all commands with the [root@host]# prompt on the workstation that hosts the libvirt environment.

D.2. Creating a Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Image

Use this section to create an image in the QCOW2 format using a Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 ISO file.

  1. Using your web browser, download the Red Hat Enterprise Linux binary ISO file to a temporary location, for example, the Downloads directory.

  2. Copy the Red Hat Enterprise Linux binary ISO file to the /var/lib/libvirt/images/ directory.

    [root@host]# cp ~/home/user/Downloads/rhel-server-7.4-x86_64-dvd.iso /var/lib/libvirt/images/

  3. Verify that virtbr0 is the virtual bridge:

    [root@host]# ip a

  4. Start libvirtd:

    [root@host]# systemctl start libvirtd

  5. Navigate to the /var/lib/libvirt/images/ directory:

    [root@host]# cd /var/lib/libvirt/images/

  6. Prepare the QEMU image:

    [root@host]# qemu-img create -f qcow2 rhel7.qcow2 8G

  7. Start the installation using virt-install. Use the following example as a guide:

    [root@host]# virt-install --virt-type qemu --name rhel7 --ram 2048 \
--cdrom rhel-server-7.4-x86_64-dvd.iso \
--disk rhel7.qcow2,format=qcow2 \
--network=bridge:virbr0 --graphics vnc,listen=0.0.0.0 \
--noautoconsole --os-type=linux --os-variant=rhel7
    Note

    For GUI users, if the instance does not launch automatically, enter the virt-manager command to view the console:

    [root@host]# virt-manager

  8. Follow the steps of the Red Hat Enterprise Linux installation wizard.

    1. For the installation source, add an HTTP link to your repository in Red Hat Satellite, for example satellite.example.com/pub/export/RHEL7/content/dist/rhel/server/7/7Server/x86_64/os/

    2. For the type of devices your installation uses, select Auto-detected installation media.

    3. For the type of installation destination, select Local Standard Disks.

    4. For other storage options, select Automatically configure partitioning.

    5. For software selection, select Minimal Install.

    6. Set the network interface to ON to ensure the interface activates on system start.

    7. Enter a host name, and click Apply.

    8. Enter a root password.

  9. When the installation completes, reboot the instance and log in as the root user.

  10. Confirm that the network interface is up and that the IP address is assigned:

    # ip a

  11. Confirm that the hostname is correct:

    # hostname

  12. Create a /etc/NetworkManager/conf.d/XX-cloud-image.conf file where XX is a two-digit number that indicates order of precedence. Add the following contents to the file:

    [main]
dns=none

  13. Proceed to Configuring a Host for Registration.

D.3. Creating a Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 Image

Use this section to create an image in the QCOW2 format using a Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 ISO file.

  1. Start the installation using virt-install:

    [root@host]# qemu-img create -f qcow2 rhel6.qcow2 4G
[root@host]# virt-install --connect=qemu:///system --network=bridge:virbr0 \
--name=rhel6 --os-type linux --os-variant rhel6 \
--disk path=rhel6.qcow2,format=qcow2,size=10,cache=none \
--ram 4096 --vcpus=2 --check-cpu --accelerate \
--hvm --cdrom=rhel-server-6.8-x86_64-dvd.iso

    This launches an instance and starts the installation process.

    Note

    If the instance does not launch automatically, enter the virt-viewer command to view the console:

    [root@host]# virt-viewer rhel6

  2. Set up the virtual machines as follows:

    1. At the initial Installer boot menu, select the Install or upgrade an existing system option.

    2. Select the appropriate Language and Keyboard options.

    3. When prompted about which type of devices your installation uses, select Basic Storage Devices.

    4. Select a hostname for your device. The default host name is localhost.localdomain.

    5. Set a root password.

    6. Based on the space on the disk, select the type of installation.

    7. Select the Basic Server install, which includes an SSH server.

  3. Reboot the instance and log in as the root user.

  4. Update the /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0 file so it only contains the following values:

    TYPE=Ethernet
DEVICE=eth0
ONBOOT=yes
BOOTPROTO=dhcp
NM_CONTROLLED=no

  5. Restart the service network:

    # service network restart

  6. Proceed to Configuring a Host for Registration.

D.4. Configuring a Host for Registration

Red Hat Enterprise Linux virtual machines register to Customer Portal Subscription Management by default. You must update each virtual machine configuration so that they receive updates from the correct Satellite Server or Capsule Server.

Prerequisites

  • Hosts must be using the following Red Hat Enterprise Linux version:

    • 6.4 or later

    • 7.0 or later

  • All architectures of Red Hat Enterprise Linux are supported (i386, x86_64, s390x, ppc_64).

  • Ensure that a time synchronization tool is enabled and runs on the Satellite Servers, any Capsule Servers, and the hosts.

    • For Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6:

      # chkconfig ntpd on; service ntpd start

    • For Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7:

      # systemctl enable chronyd; systemctl start chronyd

  • Ensure that the daemon rhsmcertd is enabled and running on the hosts.

    • For Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6:

      # chkconfig rhsmcertd on; service rhsmcertd start

    • For Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7:

      # systemctl start rhsmcertd
To Configure a Host for Registration:

  1. Take note of the fully qualified domain name (FQDN) of the Satellite Server or Capsule Server, for example server.example.com.

  2. On the host, connect to a terminal on the host as the root user

  3. Install the consumer RPM from the Satellite Server or Capsule Server to which the host is to be registered. The consumer RPM updates the content source location of the host and allows the host to download content from the content source specified in Red Hat Satellite.

    # rpm -Uvh http://server.example.com/pub/katello-ca-consumer-latest.noarch.rpm

D.5. Registering a Host

Prerequisites

  • Ensure that an activation key that is associated with the appropriate content view and environment exists for the host. For more information, see Managing Activation Keys in the Content Management Guide. By default, an activation key has the auto-attach function enabled. The feature is commonly used with hosts used as hypervisors.

  • Ensure that the version of the subscription-manager utility is 1.10 or higher. The package is available in the standard Red Hat Enterprise Linux repository.

    1. On the Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation, connect to a terminal as the root user.

    2. Register the host using Red Hat Subscription Manager:

      # subscription-manager register --org="My_Organization" --activationkey="MyKey"
Note

You can use the --environment option to override the content view and life cycle environment defined by the activation key. For example, to register a host to the content view "MyView" in a "Development" life cycle environment:

# subscription-manager register --org="My_Organization" \
--environment=Development/MyView \
--activationkey="MyKey"
Note

For Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.3 hosts, the release version defaults to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 Server and must point to the 6.3 repository.

  1. On Red Hat Satellite, select Hosts > Content Hosts.

  2. Select the name of the host that needs to be changed.

  3. In the Content Host Content section click the edit icon to the right of Release Version.

  4. Select "6.3" from the Release Version drop-down menu.

  5. Click Save.

D.6. Installing the Katello Agent

Use the following procedure to install the Katello agent on a host registered to Satellite 6. The katello-agent package depends on the gofer package that provides the goferd service. This service must be enabled so that the Red Hat Satellite Server or Capsule Server can provide information about errata that are applicable for content hosts.

Prerequisites

The Satellite Tools repository must be enabled, synchronized to the Red Hat Satellite Server, and made available to your hosts as it provides the required packages. For more information about enabling Satellite Tools, see Installing the Katello Agent in Managing Hosts.

To Install the Katello Agent

  1. Install the katello-agent RPM package using the following command:

    # yum install katello-agent

  2. Ensure goferd is running:

    # systemctl start goferd

D.7. Installing the Puppet Agent

Use this section to install and configure the Puppet agent on a host. When you have correctly installed and configured the Puppet agent, you can navigate to Hosts > All hosts to list all hosts visible to Red Hat Satellite Server.

  1. Install the Puppet agent RPM package using the following command:

    # yum install puppet

  2. Configure the puppet agent to start at boot:

    On Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6:

    # chkconfig puppet on

    On Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7:

    # systemctl enable puppet

D.8. Completing the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 image

  1. Update the system:

    # yum update

  2. Install the cloud-init packages:

    # yum install cloud-utils-growpart cloud-init

  3. Open the /etc/cloud/cloud.cfg configuration file:

    # vi /etc/cloud/cloud.cfg

  4. Under the heading cloud_init_modules, add:

    - resolv-conf

    The resolv-conf option automatically configures the resolv.conf when an instance boots for the first time. This file contains information related to the instance such as nameservers, domain and other options.

  5. Open the /etc/sysconfig/network file:

    # vi /etc/sysconfig/network

  6. Add the following line to avoid problems accessing the EC2 metadata service:

    NOZEROCONF=yes

  7. Un-register the virtual machine so that the resulting image does not contain the same subscription details for every instance cloned based on it:

    # subscription-manager repos --disable=*
# subscription-manager unregister

  8. Power off the instance:

    # poweroff

  9. On your Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation, connect to the terminal as the root user and navigate to the /var/lib/libvirt/images/ directory:

    [root@host]# cd /var/lib/libvirt/images/

  10. Reset and clean the image using the virt-sysprep command so it can be used to create instances without issues:

    [root@host]# virt-sysprep -d rhel7

  11. Reduce image size using the virt-sparsify command. This command converts any free space within the disk image back to free space within the host:

    [root@host]# virt-sparsify --compress rhel7.qcow2 rhel7-cloud.qcow2

    This creates a new rhel7-cloud.qcow2 file in the location where you enter the command.

D.9. Completing the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 image

  1. Update the system:

    # yum update

  2. Install the cloud-init packages:

    # yum install cloud-utils-growpart cloud-init

  3. Edit the /etc/cloud/cloud.cfg configuration file and under cloud_init_modules add:

    - resolv-conf

    The resolv-conf option automatically configures the resolv.conf configuration file when an instance boots for the first time. This file contains information related to the instance such as nameservers, domain, and other options.

  4. To prevent network issues, create the /etc/udev/rules.d/75-persistent-net-generator.rules file as follows:

    # echo "#" > /etc/udev/rules.d/75-persistent-net-generator.rules

    This prevents /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules file from being created. If /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules is created, networking might not function properly when booting from snapshots (the network interface is created as "eth1" rather than "eth0" and IP address is not assigned).

  5. Add the following line to /etc/sysconfig/network to avoid problems accessing the EC2 metadata service:

    NOZEROCONF=yes

  6. Un-register the virtual machine so that the resulting image does not contain the same subscription details for every instance cloned based on it:

    # subscription-manager repos --disable=*
# subscription-manager unregister
# yum clean all

  7. Power off the instance:

    # poweroff

  8. On your Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation, log in as root and reset and clean the image using the virt-sysprep command so it can be used to create instances without issues:

    [root@host]# virt-sysprep -d rhel6

  9. Reduce image size using the virt-sparsify command. This command converts any free space within the disk image back to free space within the host:

    [root@host]# virt-sparsify --compress rhel6.qcow2 rhel6-cloud.qcow2

    This creates a new rhel6-cloud.qcow2 file in the location where you enter the command.

    Note

    You must manually resize the partitions of instances based on the image in accordance with the disk space in the flavor that is applied to the instance.

D.10. Next steps

  • Repeat the procedures for every image that you want to provision with Satellite.

  • Move the image to the location where you want to store for future use.