maas-devel team mailing list archive

[Andres Rodriguez <andres.rodriguez@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I'm happy to announce that MAAS 1.9.0 has now been released. For more
information about 1.9.0 please refer to the release notes below.

*Availability*
MAAS 1.9.0 is available in:

*ppa:maas/proposed*

MAAS 1.9.0 will replace MAAS 1.8 series in after a maximum of a 2 week
period in:

*ppa:maas/stable*

*Filing bugs*
Users can file bugs in [1], please use a prefix for the subject such as
[1.9.0].

https://bugs.launchpad.net/maas/+filebug

Release Notes

Important announcements


   -

   New Networking Concepts and API's: Fabrics, Spaces and Subnets

With the introduction of new MAAS networking concepts, new API's are also
been introduced. These are:



   - fabrics
      - spaces
      - subnets
      - vlans
      - fan-networks

MAAS 1.9.0 will continue to provide backwards compatibility with the old
network API for reading purposes, but moving forward, users are required to
use the new API to manipulate fabrics, spaces and subnets.



   -

   Advanced Network and Storage Configuration only available for Ubuntu
   deployments

Users can now perform advanced network and storage configurations for nodes
before deployment. The advanced configuration is only available for Ubuntu
deployments. All other deployments using third party OS', including CentOS,
RHEL, Windows and Custom Images, won't result in such configuration.


   -

   Re-commissioning required for upgraded MAAS’

Now that storage partitioning and advanced configuration is supported
natively, VM nodes in MAAS need to be re-commissioned.


   - If upgrading from MAAS 1.8, only VM nodes with VirtIO storage devices
      need to be re-commissioned.
      - If upgrading from MAAS 1.7, all nodes will need to be
      re-commissioned in order for MAAS to correctly capture the storage and
      networking devices.


This does not affect nodes that are currently deployed.


   -

   Default Storage Partitioning Layout - Flat

With the introduction of custom storage, MAAS has also introduced the
concept of partitioning layouts. Partitioning layouts allow the user to
quickly auto-configure the disk partitioning scheme after first
commissioning or re-commissioning (if selected to do so). The partitioning
layouts are set globally on the Settings page.

The current default Partitioning layout is Flat, maintaining backwards
compatibility with previous MAAS releases. This means MAAS will take the
first disk it finds in the system and use it as the root and boot disk.


   -

   Deployment with configured /etc/network/interfaces

Starting with MAAS 1.9, all node deployments will result in writing
/etc/network/interfaces statically, by default. This increases MAAS'
robustness and reliability as users no longer have to depend on DHCP for IP
address allocation solely.

MAAS will continue to provide IP addresses via DHCP, even though interfaces
in /etc/network/interfaces may have been configured statically.

Major new features


   -

   Storage Partitioning and Advanced Configuration

MAAS now supports Storage Partitioning and Advanced Configuration natively.
This allows MAAS to deploy machines with different Storage Layouts, as well
as different complex partitioning configurations. Storage support includes:


   - LVM
   - Bcache
   - Software RAID levels 0, 1, 5, 6, 10.
   - Advanced partitioning


Storage configuration is available both via the WebUI and API. For more
information refer to http://maas.ubuntu.com/docs1.9/storage.html.


   -

   Advanced Networking (Fabrics, Spaces, Subnetworks) and Node Network
   Configuration

MAAS now supports Advanced Network configuration, allowing users to not
only perform advanced node network configuration, but also allowing users
to declare and map their infrastructure in the form of Fabrics, VLANs,
Spaces and Subnets.

Fabrics, Spaces, Subnets and Fan networks

MAAS now supports the concept of Fabrics, Spaces, Subnets and FANS, which
introduce a whole new way of declaring and mapping your network and
infrastructure in MAAS.

The MAAS WebUI allows users to view all the declared Fabrics, Spaces, VLANs
inside fabrics and Subnets inside Spaces. The WebUI does not yet  support
the ability to create new of these, but the API does.

These new concepts replace the old Network concepts from MAAS' earlier
versions.

For more information about the API, please refer to
http://maas.ubuntu.com/docs1.9/api.html.

Advanced Node Networking Configuration

MAAS can now perform the Node's networking configuration. Doing so, results
in /etc/network/interfaces being written. Advanced

configuration includes:


   - Assign subnets, fabrics, and IP to interfaces.
      - Create VLAN interfaces.
      - Create bond interfaces.
      - Change interface names.


MAAS also allows configuration of node interfaces in different modes:


   - Auto Assign - Node interface will be configured statically and MAAS
      will auto assign an IP address.
      - DHCP - The node interface will be configured to DHCP.
      - Static - The user will be able to specify what IP address the
      interface will obtain, while MAAS will configure it statically.
      - Unconfigured - MAAS will leave the interface with LINK UP.


For more information, please refer to
http://maas.ubuntu.com/docs1.9/networking.html.


   -

   Curtin & cloud-init status updates

Starting from MAAS 1.9.0, curtin and cloud-init will now send messages to
MAAS providing information regarding various of the actions being taken.
This information will be displayed in MAAS in the Node Event Log.

Note that this information is only available when using MAAS 1.9.0 and the
latest version for curtin. For cloud-init messages this information is only
available when deploying 15.10 + (Wily + ).


   -

   Fabric and subnet creation

MAAS now auto-creates multiple fabrics per physical interface connected to
the Cluster Controller, and will correctly create subnetworks under each
fabric, as well as VLAN's, if any of the Cluster Controller interface is a
VLAN interface.


   -

   HWE Kernels

MAAS now has a different approach to deploying Hardware Enablement Kernels.
Start from MAAS 1.9, the HWE kernels are no longer coupled to
sub-architectures of a machine. For each Ubuntu release, users will be able
to select any of the available HWE kernels for such release, as well as set
the minimum kernel the machine will be deployed with by default.

For more information, please refer to
http://maas.ubuntu.com/docs1.9/hardware-enablement-kernels.html.


   -

   CentOS images can be imported automatically

CentOS Image (CentOS 6 and 7) can now be imported automatically from the
MAAS Images page. These images are currently part of the daily streams.

In order to test this images, you need to use the daily image stream. This
can be changed in the Settings page under Boot Images to
http://maas.ubuntu.com/images/ephemeral-v2/daily/. Once changed, images can
be imported from the MAAS Images page. The CentOS image will be published
in the Releases stream shortly.

Minor notable changes


   -

   Minimal Config Files for Daemons

Starting from MAAS 1.9, minimal configuration files have been introduced
for both, the MAAS Region Controller and the MAAS Cluster Controller
daemons.


   - The Region Controller (maas-regiond) has now dropped the usage of
      /etc/maas/maas_local_settings.py in favor of /etc/maas/regiond.conf.
      Available configuration options are now database_host, database_name,
      database_user, database_pass, maas_url. MAAS will attempt to migrate
      any configuration on upgrade, otherwise it will use sane defaults.



   - The Cluster Controller (maas-clusterd) has now dropped the usage of
      /etc/maas/pserv.yaml and /etc/maas/maas_cluster.conf in favor of
      /etc/maas/clusterd.conf. Available configuration options are now
      maas_url and cluster_uuid only. MAAS will attempt to migrate any
      configuration on upgrade, otherwise it will use sane defaults.



   -

   Commissioning Actions

MAAS now supports commissioning actions. These allow the user to specify
how commissioning should behave in certain scenarios. The commissioning
actions available are:

   - Enable SSH during commissioning & Keep machine ON after commissioning
      - Keep network configuration after commissioning
      - Keep storage configuration after commissioning



   -

   Warn users about missing power control tools

MAAS now warns users about the missing power control tools. Each MAAS power
driver use a set of power tools that may or may not be installed by
default. If these power tools are missing from the system, MAAS will warn
users.


   -

   Python Power Drivers

Starting from MAAS 1.9, MAAS is moving away from using shell scripts
templates for Power Drivers. These are being migrated to MAAS' internal
control as power drivers. Currently supported are APC, MSCM, MSFT OCS,
SM15k, UCSM, Virsh, VMWare and IPMI.

Remaining Power Drivers include AMT, Fence CDU's, Moonshot.

Major bugs fixed in this release

See https://launchpad.net/maas/+milestone/1.9.0 for details.




-- 
Andres Rodriguez
Engineering Manager, MAAS
Canonical USA, Inc.