[openstack-dev] [Neutron] Relationship between Neutron LBaaS and Libra

Andrew Hutchings andrew at linuxjedi.co.uk
Sat Jan 18 09:20:02 UTC 2014


Hi,

I haven’t read through those (need to go spend time with family so replying quickly) but given the dates the planning phases for Quantum/Neutron LBaaS and Libra LBaaS were at the same time.

There was an internal evaluation of the current LBaaS solutions done at the time and it was believed by the people evaluating that Atlas was a good place to start.  I came in just as that evaluation had finished (late August 2012) and the decision was pretty much made.  In retrospect I may have personally gone the Mirantis LBaaS as a starting point.  But either way there were some good starting places.

Libra was initially a few trees so history is hard to track, but we had something in production by December that year.

In response to Alex, the Libra team in HP is growing (it is currently still pretty small) and that should help us have more engineers to work with the Neutron team.  The current goal is to get 5.x out of the door which adds things like metering/billing support and then planning how we can integrate well with Neutron.  I believe the Libra team have a few diagrams flying around on a mutually beneficial way of doing that.

Kind Regards
Andrew

On 17 Jan 2014, at 23:00, Georgy Okrokvertskhov <gokrokvertskhov at mirantis.com> wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> 
> Here are e-mail threads which keeps the history of LBaaS decisions:
> LBaaS IIRC meeting minutes: http://lists.openstack.org/pipermail/openstack-dev/2012-August/000390.html
> LBaaS e-mail discussion: http://lists.openstack.org/pipermail/openstack-dev/2012-August/000785.html
> 
> As you see there was a comparison of existed at that moment LBaaS solutions:
>  * Atlas-LB
>  * Mirantis LBaaS
>  * eBay LBaaS
> 
> Git history shows that the initial commit for Libra was on September 10th 2012. This commit contains few files without any LBaaS functionality.
> 
> I think it is quite fair to say that OpenStack community did a great job on carefully evaluating existing and working LBaaS projects and made a decision to add some of existing functionality to Quantum.
> 
> Thanks
> Georgy
> 
> 
> On Fri, Jan 17, 2014 at 1:12 PM, Alex Freedland <afreedland at mirantis.com> wrote:
> Andrew, Jay and all,
> 
> Thank you for bringing this topic up. Incidentally, just a month ago at OpenStack Israel I spoke to Monty and other HP folks about getting the Libra initiatives integrated into LBaaS.  I am happy that this discussion is now happening on the mailing list. 
> 
> I remember the history of how this got started. Mirantis was working with a number of customers (GAP, PayPal, and a few others) who were asking for LBaaS feature. At that time, Atlas was the default choice in the community, but its Java-based implementation did not agree with the rest of OpenStack. 
> 
> There was no Libra anywhere in the OpenStack sandbox, so we have proposed a set of blueprints and Eugene Nikonorov and the team started moving ahead with the implementation. Even before the code was accepted into Quantum, a number of customers started to use it and a number of vendors (F5, Radware, etc.) joined the community to add there own plugins. 
> 
> Consequently, the decision was made to add LBaaS to Quantum (aka Neutron). 
> 
> We would love to see the Libra developers join the Neutron team and collaborate on the ways to bring the two initiatives together.
> 
> 
> Alex Freedland
> Community Team
> Mirantis, Inc.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Fri, Jan 17, 2014 at 11:53 AM, Jay Pipes <jaypipes at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Fri, 2014-01-17 at 17:03 +0000, Andrew Hutchings wrote:
> > On 17 Jan 2014, at 16:10, Jay Pipes <jaypipes at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > On Fri, 2014-01-17 at 14:34 +0100, Thomas Herve wrote:
> > >> Hi all,
> > >>
> > >> I've been looking at Neutron default LBaaS provider using haproxy, and while it's working nicely, it seems to have several shortcomings in terms of scalability and high availability. The Libra project seems to offer a more robust alternative, at least for scaling. The haproxy implementation in Neutron seems to continue to evolve (like with https://blueprints.launchpad.net/neutron/+spec/lbaas-ha-haproxy), but I'm wondering why we can't leverage Libra. The APIs are a bit different, but the goals look very similar, and there is a waste of effort with 2 different implementations. Maybe we could see a Libra driver for Neutron LBaaS for example?
> > >
> > > Yep, it's a completely duplicative and wasteful effort.
> > >
> > > It would be great for Libra developers to contribute to Neutron LBaaS.
> >
> > Hi Jay and Thomas,
> >
> > I am the outgoing technical lead of Libra for HP.  But will reply whilst the new technical lead (Marc Pilon) gets subscribed to this.
> 
> :( I had no idea, Andrew!
> 
> > I would go as far as duplicative or wasteful. Libra existed before Neutron LBaaS and is originally based on the Atlas API specifications.  Neutron LBaaS has started duplicating some of our features recently which we find quite flattering.
> 
> I presume you meant you would *not* go as far as duplicative or
> wasteful :)
> 
> So, please don't take this the wrong way... but does anyone other than
> HP run Libra? Likewise, does anyone other than Rackspace run Atlas?
> 
> I find it a little difficult to comprehend why, if Libra preceded work
> on Neutron LBaaS, that it wasn't used as the basis of Neutron's LBaaS
> work. I can understand this for Atlas, since it's Java, but Libra is
> Python code... so it's even more confusing to me.
> 
> Granted, I don't know the history of Neutron LBaaS, but it just seems to
> be that this particular area (LBaaS) has such blatantly overlapping
> codebases with separate contributor teams. Just baffling really.
> 
> Any background or history you can give me (however opinionated!) would
> be very much appreciated :)
> 
> > After the 5.x release of Libra has been stabilised we will be working towards integration with Neutron.  It is a very important thing on our roadmap and we are already working with 2 other large companies in Openstack to figure that piece out.
> 
> Which large OpenStack companies? Are these companies currently deploying
> Libra?
> 
> Thanks,
> -jay
> 
> > If anyone else wants to get involved or just wants to play with Libra I’m sure the HP team would be happy to hear about it and help where they can.
> >
> > Hope this helps
> >
> > Kind Regards
> > Andrew
> > _______________________________________________
> > OpenStack-dev mailing list
> > OpenStack-dev at lists.openstack.org
> > http://lists.openstack.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/openstack-dev
> 
> 
> 
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> 
> -- 
> Georgy Okrokvertskhov
> Technical Program Manager,
> Cloud and Infrastructure Services,
> Mirantis
> http://www.mirantis.com
> Tel. +1 650 963 9828
> Mob. +1 650 996 3284
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