Before you begin installation, Lightbits recommends that you create a reference table to list the networking and server names that you will use for your Lightbits cluster. The following is an example of a table you can use with the Configuring the Ansible Environment __section.
Installation Planning Table
The following represents a cluster with three Lightbits servers with a single client.
| Server Name | Role | Management Network IP | Data NIC Interface Name | Data NIC IP | Data NVMe Drives | Journaling NVMe Drives* |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| server00 | Lightbits Storage Server 1 | 192.168.16.22 | ens1 | 10.10.10.100 | 6 | 2 |
| server01 | Lightbits Storage Server 2 | 192.168.16.92 | ens1 | 10.10.10.101 | 6 | 2 |
| server02 | Lightbits Storage Server 3 | 192.168.16.32 | ens1 | 10.10.10.102 | 6 | 2 |
| client00 | client | 192.168.16.45 | ens1 | 10.10.10.103 | N/A |
Journaling is a new tech preview feature that can be used to replace the need of NVRAM on servers, in order to ensure persistency of writes during node failure - even on single replica volumes.
Note that during this installation, client00 will function as the Ansible installation host. However, any server will work that has connectivity over SSH to the management IP of each server.
This table appears throughout this installation guide to help you follow the Lightbits installation process, to show the progress you have made to complete the installation, and to successfully configure a cluster of servers.
firewalld should be installed on all storage nodes. The installation could fail if there is a missing firewalld on the storage node.
Additional relevant information about this cluster:
- The server distros list and requirements are detailed in General System Requirements.
- The Lightbits RHEL release will be installed. Our Red Hat build supports Red Hat and AlmaLinux. For additional information, see General System Requirements.
- Lightbits will install in Single Instance/NUMA/node mode; however, if the servers have dual or more NUMAs, Lightbits could also do a dual instance/NUMA/node installation. Examples for this will be provided.
Lightbits Cluster Installation Process
| # | Installation Steps |
|---|---|
| 1 | Connecting your installation workstation to Lightbits’ software repository |
| 2 | Verifying the network connectivity of the servers used in the cluster |
| 3 | Setting up an Ansible environment on your installation workstation |
| 4 | Installing a Lightbits cluster by running the Ansible installation playbook |
| 5 | Updating clients (if required) |
| 6 | Provisioning storage, connecting clients, and performing IO tests |