PowerScale

Installing Dell CSI Driver for PowerScale via Dell CSM Operator

Installing CSI Driver for PowerScale via Dell CSM Operator

The CSI Driver for Dell PowerScale can be installed via the Dell CSM Operator. To deploy the Operator, follow the instructions available here.

Note that the deployment of the driver using the operator does not use any Helm charts and the installation and configuration parameters will be slightly different from the one specified via the Helm installer.

Listing installed drivers with the ContainerStorageModule CRD

User can query for all Dell CSI drivers using the following command:

kubectl get csm --all-namespaces

Prerequisite

Create namespace. Execute kubectl create namespace isilon to create the isilon namespace (if not already present). Note that the namespace can be any user-defined name, in this example, we assume that the namespace is ‘isilon’.

Create isilon-creds secret by creating a yaml file called secret.yaml with the following content:

 isilonClusters:
    # logical name of PowerScale Cluster
    - clusterName: "cluster1"

      # username for connecting to PowerScale OneFS API server
      # Default value: None
      username: "user"

      # password for connecting to PowerScale OneFS API server
      password: "password"

      # HTTPS endpoint of the PowerScale OneFS API server
      # Default value: None
      # Examples: "1.2.3.4", "https://1.2.3.4", "https://abc.myonefs.com"
      endpoint: "1.2.3.4"

      # Is this a default cluster (would be used by storage classes without ClusterName parameter)
      # Allowed values:
      #   true: mark this cluster config as default
      #   false: mark this cluster config as not default
      # Default value: false
      isDefault: true

      # Specify whether the PowerScale OneFS API server's certificate chain and host name should be verified.
      # Allowed values:
      #   true: skip OneFS API server's certificate verification
      #   false: verify OneFS API server's certificates
      # Default value: default value specified in values.yaml
      # skipCertificateValidation: true

      # The base path for the volumes to be created on PowerScale cluster
      # This will be used if a storage class does not have the IsiPath parameter specified.
      # Ensure that this path exists on PowerScale cluster.
      # Allowed values: unix absolute path
      # Default value: default value specified in values.yaml
      # Examples: "/ifs/data/csi", "/ifs/engineering"
      # isiPath: "/ifs/data/csi"

      # The permissions for isi volume directory path
      # This will be used if a storage class does not have the IsiVolumePathPermissions parameter specified.
      # Allowed values: valid octal mode number
      # Default value: "0777"
      # Examples: "0777", "777", "0755"
      # isiVolumePathPermissions: "0777"

    - clusterName: "cluster2"
      username: "user"
      password: "password"
      endpoint: "1.2.3.4"
      endpointPort: "8080"

Replace the values for the given keys as per your environment.

If replication feature is enabled, ensure the secret includes all the PowerScale clusters involved in replication.

After creating the secret.yaml, the following command can be used to create the secret,

kubectl create secret generic isilon-creds -n isilon --from-file=config=secret.yaml

Use the following command to replace or update the secret

kubectl create secret generic isilon-creds -n isilon --from-file=config=secret.yaml -o yaml --dry-run | kubectl replace -f -

Note: The user needs to validate the YAML syntax and array related key/values while replacing the isilon-creds secret. The driver will continue to use previous values in case of an error found in the YAML file.

Create isilon-certs-n secret. Please refer this section for creating cert-secrets.

If certificate validation is skipped, empty secret must be created. To create an empty secret. Ex: empty-secret.yaml
```
apiVersion: v1
kind: Secret
metadata:
   name: isilon-certs-0
   namespace: isilon
type: Opaque
data:
   cert-0: ""
```
Execute command: kubectl create -f empty-secret.yaml

Install Driver

Follow all the prerequisites above
Create a CR (Custom Resource) for PowerScale using the sample files provided here. This file can be modified to use custom parameters if needed.

Users should configure the parameters in CR. The following table lists the primary configurable parameters of the PowerScale driver and their default values:

Parameter	Description	Required	Default
dnsPolicy	Determines the DNS Policy of the Node service	Yes	ClusterFirstWithHostNet
fsGroupPolicy	Defines which FS Group policy mode to be used, Supported modes `None, File and ReadWriteOnceWithFSType`. In OCP <= 4.16 and K8s <= 1.29, fsGroupPolicy is an immutable field.	No	“ReadWriteOnceWithFSType”
storageCapacity	Enable/Disable storage capacity tracking feature	No	false
Common parameters for node and controller
CSI_ENDPOINT	The UNIX socket address for handling gRPC calls	No	/var/run/csi/csi.sock
X_CSI_ISI_SKIP_CERTIFICATE_VALIDATION	Specifies whether SSL security needs to be enabled for communication between PowerScale and CSI Driver	No	true
X_CSI_ISI_PATH	Base path for the volumes to be created	Yes
X_CSI_ALLOWED_NETWORKS	Custom networks for PowerScale export. List of networks that can be used for NFS I/O traffic, CIDR format should be used	No	empty
X_CSI_ISI_AUTOPROBE	To enable auto probing for driver	No	true
X_CSI_ISI_NO_PROBE_ON_START	Indicates whether the controller/node should probe during initialization	Yes
X_CSI_ISI_VOLUME_PATH_PERMISSIONS	The permissions for isi volume directory path	Yes	0777
X_CSI_ISI_AUTH_TYPE	Indicates the authentication method to be used. If set to 1 then it follows as session-based authentication else basic authentication. If CSM Authorization is enabled, this value must be set to 1.	No	0
Controller parameters
X_CSI_MODE	Driver starting mode	No	controller
X_CSI_ISI_ACCESS_ZONE	Name of the access zone a volume can be created in	No	System
X_CSI_ISI_QUOTA_ENABLED	To enable SmartQuotas	Yes
Node parameters
X_CSI_MAX_VOLUMES_PER_NODE	Specify the default value for the maximum number of volumes that the controller can publish to the node	Yes	0
X_CSI_MODE	Driver starting mode	No	node

Execute the following command to create PowerScale custom resource:
```
kubectl create -f <input_sample_file.yaml>
```
This command will deploy the CSI-PowerScale driver in the namespace specified in the input YAML file.
Verify the CSI Driver installation
Refer https://github.com/dell/csi-powerscale/tree/main/samples for the sample files.

Note :

“Kubelet config dir path” is not yet configurable in case of Operator based driver installation.
Also, snapshotter and resizer sidecars are not optional to choose, it comes default with Driver installation.

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