Preparing for the Certified OpenStack Administrator Exam

Matt Dorn

• Editore: Packt Publishing
• Anno: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781787121201
• Edizione: 1
• Argomento: Computer Science
• Categoria: Certification Guides in Computer Science

Master the objectives required to pass the Certified OpenStack Administrator exam.About This Book• Focuses on providing a clear, concise strategy so you gain the specific skills required to pass the Certified OpenStack Administrator exam• Includes exercises and performance-based tasks to ensure all exam objectives can be completed via the Horizon dashboard and command-line interface• Includes a free OpenStack Virtual Appliance to practice the objectives covered throughout the book• Includes a practice exam to put your OpenStack skills to the test to prove you have what it takes to conquer the live exam• Updated for the 2017 exam featuring OpenStack NewtonWho This Book Is ForThis book is for IT professionals, system administrators, DevOps engineers, and software developers with basic Linux command-line and networking knowledge. It's also a great guide for those interested in an entry-level OpenStack position but have limited real-world OpenStack experience. After passing the exam, Certified OpenStack Administrators will prove they have the required skills for the job.What You Will Learn• Manage the Keystone identity service by creating and modifying domains, groups, projects, users, roles, services, endpoints, and quotas.• Upload Glance images, launch new Nova instances, and create flavors, key pairs, and snapshots.• Discover Neutron tenant and provider networks, security groups, routers, and floating IPs.• Manage the Cinder block storage service by creating volumes and attaching them to instances.• Create Swift containers and set access control lists to allow read/write access to your objects.• Explore Heat orchestration templates and create, list, and update stacks.In DetailThis book provides you with a specific strategy to pass the OpenStack Foundation's first professional certification: the Certified OpenStack Administrator. In a recent survey, 78% of respondents said the OpenStack skills shortage had deterred them from adopting OpenStack. Consider this an opportunity to increase employer and customer confidence by proving you have the skills required to administrate real-world OpenStack clouds.You will begin your journey by getting well-versed with the OpenStack environment, understanding the benefits of taking the exam, and installing an included OpenStack all-in-one virtual appliance so you can work through objectives covered throughout the book. After exploring the basics of the individual services, you will be introduced to strategies to accomplish the exam objectives relevant to Keystone, Glance, Nova, Neutron, Cinder, Swift, Heat, and troubleshooting.Finally, you'll benefit from the special tips section and a practice exam to put your knowledge to the test. By the end of the journey, you will be ready to become a Certified OpenStack Administrator!Style and approachClear, concise, and straightforward with supporting diagrams and lab environment tutorials, this book will help you confidently pass Certified OpenStack Administrator objectives on the Horizon dashboard and command-line interface.

Neutron Networking Service

In the previous chapter, we discussed the Nova compute service and the Nova-related objectives of the Certified OpenStack Administrator exam. Now we will discuss Neutron. Neutron is a networking service that manages the OpenStack environment's virtual networks, subnets, IP addresses, routers, firewall rules, and more. Because Neutron makes up approximately 17% of the COA objectives, fully understanding how it works from the administrator perspective is essential to passing the exam. Neutron, and SDN (Software Defined Networking) in particular, is a complex topic and spans many areas. However, it's important to remember that the exam does not require you to modify Neutron configuration files or work with configuring networks outside of the OpenStack environment.

In this chapter, we will cover the following topics:

• Neutron architecture
• Neutron concepts
• Exam objective - managing tenant networks
• Exam objective - managing tenant subnets
• Exam objective - managing security groups and rules
• Exam objective - managing routers (east/west traffic)
• Exam objective - managing provider networks
• Exam objective - managing provider subnets
• Exam objective - managing routers (north/south traffic)
• Exam objective - managing floating IPs

After this chapter, you should have a solid understanding of Neutron and the skills necessary to successfully fulfill all Neutron-related objectives on the exam.

About Neutron

In Chapter 5, we discussed the minimum requirements for booting an instance in an OpenStack environment:

• A boot source
• A flavor
• An available Neutron network

Neutron allows users to create the necessary virtual resources not only to ensure that their instances obtain internal IP addresses (also known as fixed IPs), but also to have the ability to map external IP addresses (also known as floating IPs) to instances. This allows applications residing in OpenStack instances to be externally accessible. With Neutron, users can view their own networks, subnet, firewall rules, routers, and load balancers, all through the Horizon dashboard, command-line interface, OpenStack SDKs, or directly via the API. Neutron also contains a modular framework powered by a variety of plugins, agents, and drivers, including LinuxBridge and Open vSwitch.

This chapter provides a brief explanation of Neutron. For a deeper dive, check out OpenStack Networking Essentials by James Denton, Packt, 2016.

Neutron architecture

Neutron is made up of five daemons, as shown in Figure 6.1.

Figure 6.1: High-level view of Neutron architecture

• neutron-server: The API and primary gateway to Neutron. One must interact with neutron-server to create, list, delete, and manage networks and other network resources.
• neutron-dhcp-agent: Provides DHCP services to DHCP-enabled Neutron subnets. Behind the scenes, neutron-dhcp-agent actually uses dnsmasq, the popular lightweight DHCP server software, within a network namespace. Network namespaces are a feature of the Linux kernel and partition the use of the network, allowing segregation of network resources despite similar IP address ranges.
• neutron-l3-agent: Creates Neutron routers. Behind the scenes, Neutron routers are network namespaces with unique routing tables and iptables rules.
• neutron-metadata-agent: Provides metadata services to instances. The metadata service was popularized by Amazon Web Services and is a non-routable IP address (169.254.169.254) that a user or script can contact for personal information regarding that instance.
• neutron-linuxbridge-agent: Runs on each compute node in the environment. Responsible for the creation and management of all network-related functions on the compute nodes—including the creation of virtual network interfaces for newly-created instances, as well as the creation and connection of Linux bridges and iptables rules.

LinuxBridge plugin

In the virtual appliance provided with this book, Neutron is configured to utilize the LinuxBridge plugin. The LinuxBridge plugin utilizes existing Linux kernel features, as well as Linux programs, to provide virtual networking components. The exam does not require you to understand ...