Open Stack

Hi,
I have added to https://etherpad.openstack.org/p/AdvancedServices_and_Neutron a note recalling two  technical challenges that do not exists when LBaaS runs as a Neutron extension.
-Sam.


From: Susanne Balle [mailto:sleipnir012 at gmail.com]
Sent: Wednesday, May 07, 2014 2:45 PM
To: OpenStack Development Mailing List (not for usage questions)
Cc: Balle, Susanne
Subject: [openstack-dev] [Neutron][LBaaS][FWaaS][VPNaaS] Advanced Services (particularly LBaaS) and Neutron

Hi Advanced Services/LBaaS Stackers,

We are setting up a meeting to discuss if it makes sense to separate the advanced services (LBaaS, FW, VPNaaS) from Neutron into separate projects. We want a healthy discussion around  the pros and cons of separating the advanced services from Neutron and its short or long term feasibility.

The meeting is planned for:
                Tuesday May 13th at 2pm in the Neutron pod.

There will be a designated pod for each of the official programs at: https://wiki.openstack.org/wiki/Programs
Some programs share a pod. There will be a map at the center of the space, as well as signage up to help find the relevant pod.

Based on discussions with Rackspace, Mirantis, and others it is clear that the advanced services (i.e. LBaaS) in Neutron are not getting the attention and the support to move forward and create a first in class load-balancer service; from a service provider or operator's perspective. We currently have a lot of momentum and energy behind the LBaaS effort but are being told that the focus for Neutron is bug fixing given the instability in Neutron itself. While the latter is totally understandable, as a high priority for Neutron it leaves the advanced services out in the cold with no way to make progress in developing features that are needed to support the many companies that rely on LBaaS for large scale deployments.

The current Neutron LB API and feature set meet minimum requirements for small-medium private cloud deployments, but does not meet the needs of larger, provider (or operator) deployments that include hundreds if not thousands of load balancers and multiple domain users (discrete customer organizations). The OpenStack LBaaS community looked at requirements and noted that the following operator-focused requirements are currently missing:

•         Scalability
•         SSL Certificate management – for an operator-based service, SSL certificate management is a much more important function that is currently not addressed in the current API or blueprint
•         Metrics Collection – a very limited set of metrics are currently provided by the current API.
•         Separate admin API for NOC and support operations
•         Minimal downtime when migrating to newer versions
•         Ability to migrate load balancers (SW to HW, etc.)
•         Resiliency functions like HA and failover
•         Operator-based load balancer health checks
•         Support multiple, simultaneous drivers.

We have had great discussions on the LBaaS mailing list and on IRC about all the things we want to do, the new APIs, the User use cases, requirements and priorities, the operator requirements for LBaaS, etc. and I am at this point wondering if Neutron LBaaS as a sub-project of Neutron can fulfill our requirements.

I would like this group to discuss the pros and cons of separating the advanced services, including LB, VPN, and FW, out of Neutron and allow for each of the three currently existing advanced services to become stand-alone projects or one standalone project.

This should be done under the following assumptions:
•         Keep backwards compatibility with the current Neutron LBaaS plugin/driver API (to some point) so that existing drivers/plug-ins continues to work for people who have already invested in Neutron LBaaS
•         Migration strategy.

We have a precedence in OpenStack of splitting up services that are becoming too big or where sub-services deserve to become an entity of its own e.g. baremetal Nova and Ironic, Nova-network and Neutron, nova-scheduler is being worked into the Gantt project, etc.

At a high-level I see the following steps/blueprints needing to be carried out:
•         Identify and create a library similar in concept to OpenStack core that contains the common components pieces needed by the advanced services in order to minimize code duplication between the advanced services and Neutron. This library should be consumable by external projects and will allow for cleaner code reuse by not only the three existing advanced services but by new services as well.
•         Start a new repo for the standalone LBaaS
o   http://git.openstack.org/cgit/openstack-dev/cookiecutter/tree/
•         Write a patch to bridge Neutron LBaaS with the standalone LBaaS for backwards compatibility. Longer term we can deprecate Neutron LBaaS  which will be possible once the new LBaaS service is a graduated OpenStack service.

Some of the background reasoning for suggesting this is available at:
https://etherpad.openstack.org/p/AdvancedServices_and_Neutron

Hope to see you there to discuss how we best make sure that the advanced services can support the many companies that rely on LBaaS or other advanced services for large scale deployment.

Regards Susanne
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