Apache CloudStack Ubuntu/KVM Install Guide

This is a build your own IaaS private cloud guide using Apache CloudStack, Ubuntu 22.04/24.04 (LTS) and KVM. If you’re new to Apache CloudStack, here a video for you: CloudStack 101: The Best Way to Build Your Private Cloud

Getting Started

First install Ubuntu 22.04/24.04 LTS on your x86_64 system that has at least 8GB RAM (prerably 16GB RAM or more) with Intel VT-X or AMD-V enabled. Ensure that the universe repository is enabled in /etc/apt/sources.list.

Install basic packages:

    apt-get install openntpd openssh-server sudo vim htop tar

Optionally, if you’ve Intel based system install/update CPU microcode:

    apt-get install intel-microcode

Allow the root user for ssh access using password, fix /etc/ssh/sshd_config. Change and remember the root password:

    passwd root

Network Setup

Setup Linux bridges that will handle CloudStack’s public, guest, management and storage traffic. For simplicity, we will use a single bridge cloudbr0 to be used for all these networks. Install bridge utilities:

    apt-get install bridge-utils

This guide assumes that you’re in a 192.168.1.0/24 network which is a typical RFC1918 private network.

Ubuntu 22.04/24.04

Starting Ubuntu bionic, admins can use netplan to configure networking. The default installation creates a file at /etc/netplan/50-cloud-init.yaml that you should comment, and create a file at /etc/netplan/01-netcfg.yaml applying your network and interface/name specific changes:

     network:
       version: 2
       renderer: networkd
       ethernets:
         eno1:
           dhcp4: false
           dhcp6: false
           optional: true
       bridges:
         cloudbr0:
           addresses: [192.168.1.10/24]
           routes:
            - to: default
              via: 192.168.1.1
           nameservers:
             addresses: [1.1.1.1, 8.8.8.8]
           interfaces: [eno1]
           dhcp4: false
           dhcp6: false
           parameters:
             stp: false
             forward-delay: 0

  ethernets:
    eno1:
      match:
        macaddress: 00:01:2e:4f:f7:d0
      mtu: 1550
      dhcp4: false
      dhcp6: false
    enp3s0:
      mtu: 1550

Apply network config and reboot/re-ssh:

    netplan generate
    netplan apply

Repo Setup

For Ubuntu 22.04, 24.04 and onwards run this to setup the CloudStack repository:

    mkdir -p /etc/apt/keyrings
    wget -O- http://packages.shapeblue.com/release.asc | gpg --dearmor | sudo tee /etc/apt/keyrings/cloudstack.gpg > /dev/null

    echo deb [signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/cloudstack.gpg] http://packages.shapeblue.com/cloudstack/upstream/debian/4.20 / > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/cloudstack.list
    apt-get update -y

This should be run on all hosts where CloudStack software packages (management server, usage server, agent etc) needs to be installed.

Management Server Setup

Install CloudStack management server and MySQL server: (run as root, once the CloudStack repository is setup)

    apt-get update -y
    apt-get install cloudstack-management mysql-server

Optionally, if you want usage server you can run:

    apt-get install cloudstack-usage

Database Setup

Make a note of the MySQL server’s root user password. Configure InnoDB settings in mysql server’s /etc/mysql/mysql.conf.d/mysqld.cnf:

    [mysqld]

    server_id = 1
    sql-mode="STRICT_TRANS_TABLES,NO_ENGINE_SUBSTITUTION,ERROR_FOR_DIVISION_BY_ZERO,NO_ZERO_DATE,NO_ZERO_IN_DATE,NO_ENGINE_SUBSTITUTION"
    innodb_rollback_on_timeout=1
    innodb_lock_wait_timeout=600
    max_connections=1000
    log-bin=mysql-bin
    binlog-format = 'ROW'

Restart MySQL server and setup database:

    systemctl restart mysql
    cloudstack-setup-databases cloud:cloud@localhost --deploy-as=root:<root password, or leave default blank if MySQL server has no root password> -i <cloudbr0 IP here>

Storage Setup

Install NFS server:

    apt-get install nfs-kernel-server quota

Create exports:

    echo "/export  *(rw,async,no_root_squash,no_subtree_check)" > /etc/exports
    mkdir -p /export/primary /export/secondary
    exportfs -a

Configure and restart NFS server:

    sed -i -e 's/^RPCMOUNTDOPTS="--manage-gids"$/RPCMOUNTDOPTS="-p 892 --manage-gids"/g' /etc/default/nfs-kernel-server
    sed -i -e 's/^STATDOPTS=$/STATDOPTS="--port 662 --outgoing-port 2020"/g' /etc/default/nfs-common
    echo "NEED_STATD=yes" >> /etc/default/nfs-common
    sed -i -e 's/^RPCRQUOTADOPTS=$/RPCRQUOTADOPTS="-p 875"/g' /etc/default/quota
    service nfs-kernel-server restart

KVM Host Setup

Install KVM and CloudStack agent, configure libvirt:

    apt-get install qemu-kvm cloudstack-agent

Note: configure the CloudStack repo if your KVM host is not also the management server

Enable VNC for console proxy:

    sed -i -e 's/\#vnc_listen.*$/vnc_listen = "0.0.0.0"/g' /etc/libvirt/qemu.conf

On older Ubuntu versions (18.04/20.04), enable libvirtd in listen mode:

    sed -i -e 's/.*libvirtd_opts.*/libvirtd_opts="-l"/' /etc/default/libvirtd

On Ubuntu 22.04, add LIBVIRTD_ARGS="--listen" to /etc/default/libvirtd instead:

    echo LIBVIRTD_ARGS=\"--listen\" >> /etc/default/libvirtd

For Ubuntu 20.04/22.04/24.04 and later, the traditional socket/listen based configuration may not be supported, we can get the old behaviour as follows:

    systemctl mask libvirtd.socket libvirtd-ro.socket libvirtd-admin.socket libvirtd-tls.socket libvirtd-tcp.socket
    systemctl restart libvirtd

Configure libvirt to connect to libvirtd and not to per-driver daemons, especially important on newer distros such as EL9 and Ubuntu 24.04 by editing the /etc/libvirt/libvirt.conf and add the following:

      remote_mode="legacy"

Configure default libvirtd config:

    echo 'listen_tls=0' >> /etc/libvirt/libvirtd.conf
    echo 'listen_tcp=1' >> /etc/libvirt/libvirtd.conf
    echo 'tcp_port = "16509"' >> /etc/libvirt/libvirtd.conf
    echo 'mdns_adv = 0' >> /etc/libvirt/libvirtd.conf
    echo 'auth_tcp = "none"' >> /etc/libvirt/libvirtd.conf
    systemctl restart libvirtd

On certain hosts where you may be running docker and other services, you may need to add the following in /etc/sysctl.conf and then run sysctl -p:

    net.bridge.bridge-nf-call-arptables = 0
    net.bridge.bridge-nf-call-iptables = 0

    sysctl -p

Optional: If you’ve a server vendor, they may fail to make each server unique and libvirtd can complain that servers are not unique. To make them unique setup host specific UUID in libvirtd config:

    apt-get install uuid
    UUID=$(uuid)
    echo host_uuid = \"$UUID\" >> /etc/libvirt/libvirtd.conf
    systemctl restart libvirtd

Configure Firewall

By default ufw may be disabled and this may not be required. If your system uses ufw (you can check using ufw status), you may run the following:

    ufw allow mysql
    ufw allow proto tcp from any to any port 22
    ufw allow proto tcp from any to any port 1798
    ufw allow proto tcp from any to any port 16509
    ufw allow proto tcp from any to any port 16514
    ufw allow proto tcp from any to any port 5900:6100
    ufw allow proto tcp from any to any port 49152:49216

Alternatively, you can configure firewall rules using iptables for your management network:

    # configure firewall rules to allow useful ports
    NETWORK=192.168.1.0/24
    iptables -A INPUT -s $NETWORK -m state --state NEW -p udp --dport 111 -j ACCEPT
    iptables -A INPUT -s $NETWORK -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 111 -j ACCEPT
    iptables -A INPUT -s $NETWORK -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 2049 -j ACCEPT
    iptables -A INPUT -s $NETWORK -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 32803 -j ACCEPT
    iptables -A INPUT -s $NETWORK -m state --state NEW -p udp --dport 32769 -j ACCEPT
    iptables -A INPUT -s $NETWORK -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 892 -j ACCEPT
    iptables -A INPUT -s $NETWORK -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 875 -j ACCEPT
    iptables -A INPUT -s $NETWORK -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 662 -j ACCEPT
    iptables -A INPUT -s $NETWORK -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 8250 -j ACCEPT
    iptables -A INPUT -s $NETWORK -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 8080 -j ACCEPT
    iptables -A INPUT -s $NETWORK -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 9090 -j ACCEPT
    iptables -A INPUT -s $NETWORK -m state --state NEW -p tcp --dport 16514 -j ACCEPT

    apt-get install iptables-persistent

You must check and disable apparmour:

    # Disable apparmour on libvirtd
    ln -s /etc/apparmor.d/usr.sbin.libvirtd /etc/apparmor.d/disable/
    ln -s /etc/apparmor.d/usr.lib.libvirt.virt-aa-helper /etc/apparmor.d/disable/
    apparmor_parser -R /etc/apparmor.d/usr.sbin.libvirtd
    apparmor_parser -R /etc/apparmor.d/usr.lib.libvirt.virt-aa-helper

Launch Management Server

Start your cloud:

    cloudstack-setup-management
    systemctl status cloudstack-management
    tail -f /var/log/cloudstack/management/management-server.log

After management server is UP, proceed to http://192.168.1.10(i.e. the cloudbr0-IP):8080/client and log in using the default credentials - username admin and password password.

Build Your Private Cloud

The following is an example of how you can setup an advanced zone (without security groups) in a typical (home/private) 192.168.1.0/24 network.

Deploy DataCenter

Create Zone:

Go to Infrastructure > Zone and click on add zone button, select advanced zone and provide following configuration:
```
Name - any name
Public DNS 1 - 8.8.8.8
Internal DNS1 - 192.168.1.1
Hypervisor - KVM
```
Setup Network

Use the default, which is VLAN isolation method on a single physical nic (on the host) that will carry all traffic types (management, public, guest etc).

Note: If you’ve iproute2 installed and host’s physical NIC MTUs configured, you can used VXLAN as well.

Public traffic configuration:
```
Gateway - 192.168.1.1
Netmask - 255.255.255.0
VLAN/VNI - (leave blank for vlan://untagged or in case of VXLAN use vxlan://untagged)
Start IP - 192.168.1.20
End IP - 192.168.1.50
```

Pod Configuration:

Name - any name
Gateway - 192.168.1.1
Start/end reserved system IPs - 192.168.1.51 - 192.168.1.80

Guest traffic:
```
VLAN/VNI range: 700-900
```
Create a cluster with following:
```
Name - any name
Hypervisor - Choose KVM
```
Add your default/first host:
```
Hostname - 192.168.1.10
Username - root
Password - <password for root user, or leave blank to add by public key>
```
Note: root user ssh-access is disabled by default, please enable it. The recommended approach is to add the KVM host using ssh public-key based access, add the management server SSH public key which is usually at /var/cloudstack/management/.ssh/id_rsa.pub to the root user of the KVM host(s) at /root/.ssh/authorized_keys.

Add primary storage:

Name - any name
Scope - zone-wide
Protocol - NFS
Server - 192.168.1.10
Path - /export/primary

Add secondary storage:

Provider - NFS
Name - any name
Server - 192.168.1.10
Path - /export/secondary

Next, click Launch Zone which will perform following actions:

Create Zone
Create Physical networks:
  - Add various traffic types to the physical network
  - Update and enable the physical network
  - Configure, enable and update various network provider and elements such as the virtual network element
Create Pod
Configure public traffic
Configure guest traffic (vlan range for physical network)
Create Cluster
Add host
Create primary storage (also mounts it on the KVM host)
Create secondary storage
Complete zone creation

Enable Zone

Finally, confirm and enable the zone. Wait for the system VMs to come up under Infrastructure -> System VMs, then you can proceed using your IaaS cloud.

Register Templates

You can register publicly available cloud-init enabled guest templates such as:

Where to go next?

If you’re stuck on to something and have questions, then:

Join and ask on the CloudStack users@ mailing list: https://cloudstack.apache.org/mailing-lists
Start a discussion sharing the details of your problem: https://github.com/apache/cloudstack/discussions

Asides

Blockquotes

Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises,
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.

Cards

Check this out

Interesting content you want to highlight.

Other feature

More information you want to share.

Computer stuff

Build internet things with your computation machine.

Starlight ready

Just add Starlight and this theme comes to life.

Link cards

Internationalization Configure Starlight to support multiple languages.

Badges

Note
Success
Tip
Caution
Danger

Different sizes

Small
Medium
Large

Code

With an editor frame

---
// this is a code block example
---
<p>Code can include something dynamic: {Astro.props.variable}</p>

Or highlight important lines!

Including insertions or deletions.

Terminal commands

echo "Welcome, world!"

Basic

Code block without a frame:

// for example
console.log('Welcome, world!');

Labels

<button
  role="button"
  {...props}
  value={value}
  className={buttonClassName}
  disabled={disabled}
  active={active}
>
  {children && !active && (typeof children === 'string' ? <span>{children}</span> : children)}
</button>

File tree

astro.config.mjs
package.json
Directorysrc
- Directorycomponents
  - Header.astro
  - Title.astro
- Directorypages/
  - …

Link buttons

Get started

Configuration Reference

Learn more

Sirius, Vega, Betelgeuse

Details

Where and when is the Andromeda constellation most visible?

The Andromeda constellation is most visible in the night sky during the month of November at latitudes between +90° and −40°.

Tables

Left	Centered	Right
This is left	Text is centered	And this is right-aligned
More text	Even more text	And even more to the right