pve-storage-iscsi.adoc

   1 http://www.open-iscsi.org/[Open-iSCSI] initiator
   2 ------------------------------------------------
   3 ifdef::wiki[]
   4 :pve-toplevel:
   5 :title: Storage: iSCSI
   6 endif::wiki[]
   7
   8 Storage pool type: `iscsi`
   9
  10 iSCSI is a widely employed technology used to connect to storage
  11 servers. Almost all storage vendors support iSCSI. There are also open
  12 source iSCSI target solutions available,
  13 e.g. http://www.openmediavault.org/[OpenMediaVault], which is based on
  14 Debian.
  15
  16 To use this backend, you need to install the `open-iscsi`
  17 package. This is a standard Debian package, but it is not installed by
  18 default to save resources.
  19
  20   # apt-get install open-iscsi
  21
  22 Low-level iscsi management task can be done using the `iscsiadm` tool.
  23
  24
  25 Configuration
  26 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~
  27
  28 The backend supports the common storage properties `content`, `nodes`,
  29 `disable`, and the following iSCSI specific properties:
  30
  31 portal::
  32
  33 iSCSI portal (IP or DNS name with optional port).
  34
  35 target::
  36
  37 iSCSI target.
  38
  39
  40 .Configuration Example (`/etc/pve/storage.cfg`)
  41 ----
  42 iscsi: mynas
  43      portal 10.10.10.1
  44      target iqn.2006-01.openfiler.com:tsn.dcb5aaaddd
  45      content none
  46 ----
  47
  48 TIP: If you want to use LVM on top of iSCSI, it make sense to set
  49 `content none`. That way it is not possible to create VMs using iSCSI
  50 LUNs directly.
  51
  52
  53 File naming conventions
  54 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
  55
  56 The iSCSI protocol does not define an interface to allocate or delete
  57 data. Instead, that needs to be done on the target side and is vendor
  58 specific. The target simply exports them as numbered LUNs. So {pve}
  59 iSCSI volume names just encodes some information about the LUN as seen
  60 by the linux kernel.
  61
  62
  63 Storage Features
  64 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
  65
  66 iSCSI is a block level type storage, and provides no management
  67 interface.  So it is usually best to export one big LUN, and setup LVM
  68 on top of that LUN. You can then use the LVM plugin to manage the
  69 storage on that iSCSI LUN.
  70
  71 .Storage features for backend `iscsi`
  72 [width="100%",cols="m,m,3*d",options="header"]
  73 |==============================================================================
  74 |Content types  |Image formats  |Shared |Snapshots |Clones
  75 |images none    |raw            |yes    |no        |no
  76 |==============================================================================
  77
  78
  79 Examples
  80 ~~~~~~~~
  81
  82 Scan a remote iSCSI portal, and returns a list of possible targets:
  83
  84  pvesm iscsiscan -portal <HOST[:PORT]>
  85
  86 ifdef::wiki[]
  87
  88 See Also
  89 ~~~~~~~~
  90
  91 * link:/wiki/Storage[Storage]
  92
  93 endif::wiki[]
  94
  95