Install OpenStack on your workstation and launch your first instance

Before you get started!

Welcome to OpenStack!

In this series of tutorials, we will walk you through all the necessary steps to install, configure and get started with OpenStack. Using just your workstation, you will learn how to use OpenStack for cloud infrastructure implementation purposes, from a single-node installation to large-scale clusters.

This tutorial is the first in the “Phase I - Single-node OpenStack on your workstation” series.

Explore other tutorials >

What is OpenStack?

OpenStack is a collection of open-source projects designed to work together to form the basis of a cloud. OpenStack can be used for both private and public cloud implementation.

What is Sunbeam?

Sunbeam is an OpenStack project created to set the foundation for zero-ops OpenStack. By using highly opinionated architecture and native Kubernetes principles, Sunbeam delivers distilled OpenStack excellence on top of K8s.

What is MicroStack?

MicroStack (based on Sunbeam) is an OpenStack flavour designed for small-scale cloud environments, edge deployments, testing and development, with full commercial support available from Canonical.

In this tutorial, you will learn how to:

• Install OpenStack on your workstation
• Launch your first instance on OpenStack

You will only need:

One fresh physical or virtual machine with:

• The latest Ubuntu LTS installed,
• Static IP address assigned to its primary network interface,
• OpenSSH server installed and configured,
• 4+ core amd64 CPU,
• 16 GB of RAM,
• 50 GB of storage.

We’re going to follow MicroStack quickstart installation instructions. Those aim to install OpenStack in the most straightforward way possible by making a number of assumptions. For more configurable installation, refer to guided installation instructions.

! openstackclients
If you have the openstackclients snap installed, you have to remove it first to avoid namespace conflict. Sunbeam ships with the latest version of the OpenStack client, so the openstackclients snap is redundant.

Install OpenStack

In order to install OpenStack, execute the following command:

$ sudo snap install openstack --edge

Install dependencies

In order to install all necessary dependencies, execute the following command:

$ sunbeam prepare-node-script | bash -x && newgrp snap_daemon

Bootstrap the cloud

In order to bootstrap the cloud, execute the following command:

$ sunbeam cluster bootstrap --accept-defaults

This command takes a while to finish. Be patient.

Configure the cloud

In order to configure the cloud with default options, execute the following command:

$ sunbeam configure --accept-defaults --openrc demo-openrc

For more advanced scenarios, refer to guided installation instructions.

Launch an instance

In order to launch your first instance, execute the following command:

$ sunbeam launch ubuntu --name test

Sample output:

Access instance with `ssh -i /home/ubuntu/.config/openstack/sunbeam ubuntu@10.20.20.16`

At this point the instance should be accessible over the SSH protocol. In order to connect to it, execute the command from the output:

$ ssh -i /home/ubuntu/.config/openstack/sunbeam ubuntu@10.20.20.16

That’s it. You’re connected to the instance. You can use regular shell commands to execute various tasks.

$ uptime
 11:08:36 up 2 min,  1 users,  load average: 0.05, 0.05, 0.01

In the following tutorials, we’ll demonstrate how to use other images and how to customise instances during the provisioning process.

To disconnect from the instance, type exit (or press CTRL+D).

Congratulations! You have reached the end of this tutorial.

You can now move to the next tutorial - “2. Components” - or explore other tutorials.

In this tutorial, you have learnt how to:

• Install OpenStack on your workstation
• Launch your first instance on OpenStack

Where to go from here?

• Refer to Sunbeam documentation
• Join the community and ask questions
• Report a bug in Sunbeam
• Explore Charmed OpenStack