Getting Started With ProfitBricks#

ProfitBricks provides an enterprise-grade Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) solution that can be managed through a browser-based "Data Center Designer" (DCD) tool or via an easy to use API. A unique feature of the ProfitBricks platform is that it allows you to define your own settings for cores, memory, and disk size without being tied to a particular server size.

Dependencies#

profitbricks >= 4.1.1

Configuration#

Using the new format, set up the cloud configuration at /etc/salt/cloud.providers or /etc/salt/cloud.providers.d/profitbricks.conf:

my-profitbricks-config:
  driver: profitbricks

  # Set the location of the salt-master
  #
  minion:
    master: saltmaster.example.com

  # Configure ProfitBricks authentication credentials
  #
  username: user@domain.com
  password: 123456
  # datacenter is the UUID of a pre-existing virtual data center.
  datacenter: 9e6709a0-6bf9-4bd6-8692-60349c70ce0e
  # delete_volumes is forcing a deletion of all volumes attached to a server on a deletion of a server
  delete_volumes: true
  # Connect to public LAN ID 1.
  public_lan: 1
  ssh_public_key: /path/to/id_rsa.pub
  ssh_private_key: /path/to/id_rsa

Note

Changed in version 2015.8.0.

The provider parameter in cloud provider definitions was renamed to driver. This change was made to avoid confusion with the provider parameter that is used in cloud profile definitions. Cloud provider definitions now use driver to refer to the Salt cloud module that provides the underlying functionality to connect to a cloud host, while cloud profiles continue to use provider to refer to provider configurations that you define.

Virtual Data Center#

ProfitBricks uses the concept of Virtual Data Centers. These are logically separated from one another and allow you to have a self-contained environment for all servers, volumes, networking, snapshots, and so forth.

A list of existing virtual data centers can be retrieved with the following command:

salt-cloud -f list_datacenters my-profitbricks-config

A new data center can be created with the following command:

salt-cloud -f create_datacenter my-profitbricks-config name=example location=us/las description="my description"

Authentication#

The username and password are the same as those used to log into the ProfitBricks "Data Center Designer".

Profiles#

Here is an example of a profile:

profitbricks_staging
  provider: my-profitbricks-config
  size: Micro Instance
  image_alias: 'ubuntu:latest'
  # image or image_alias must be provided
  # image: 2f98b678-6e7e-11e5-b680-52540066fee9
  cores: 2
  ram: 4096
  public_lan: 1
  private_lan: 2
  ssh_public_key: /path/to/id_rsa.pub
  ssh_private_key: /path/to/id_rsa
  ssh_interface: private_lan

profitbricks_production:
  provider: my-profitbricks-config
  image: Ubuntu-15.10-server-2016-05-01
  image_password: MyPassword1
  disk_type: SSD
  disk_size: 40
  cores: 8
  cpu_family: INTEL_XEON
  ram: 32768
  public_lan: 1
  public_ips:
    - 172.217.18.174
  private_lan: 2
  private_ips:
    - 192.168.100.10
  public_firewall_rules:
    Allow SSH:
      protocol: TCP
      source_ip: 1.2.3.4
      port_range_start: 22
      port_range_end: 22
    Allow Ping:
      protocol: ICMP
      icmp_type: 8
  ssh_public_key: /path/to/id_rsa.pub
  ssh_private_key: /path/to/id_rsa
  ssh_interface: private_lan
  volumes:
    db_data:
      disk_size: 500
    db_log:
      disk_size: 50
      disk_type: SSD

Locations can be obtained using the --list-locations option for the salt-cloud command:

# salt-cloud --list-locations my-profitbricks-config

Images can be obtained using the --list-sizes option for the salt-cloud command:

# salt-cloud --list-images my-profitbricks-config

Sizes can be obtained using the --list-sizes option for the salt-cloud command:

# salt-cloud --list-sizes my-profitbricks-config

Changed in version 2019.2.0: One or more public IP address can be reserved with the following command:

# salt-cloud -f reserve_ipblock  my-profitbricks-config location='us/ewr' size=1

Profile Specifics:#

The following list explains some of the important properties.

size - Can be one of the options listed in the output of the following command:
```
salt-cloud --list-sizes my-profitbricks-config
```
image - Can be one of the options listed in the output of the following command:
```
salt-cloud --list-images my-profitbricks-config
```
image_alias - Can be one of the options listed in the output of the following command:
```
salt-cloud -f list_images my-profitbricks-config
```
disk_size - This option allows you to override the size of the disk as defined by the size. The disk size is set in gigabytes (GB).
disk_type - This option allow the disk type to be set to HDD or SSD. The default is HDD.

New in version 2019.2.0.
image_password - A password is set on the image for the "root" or "Administrator" account. This field may only be set during volume creation. Only valid with ProfitBricks supplied HDD (not ISO) images. The password must contain at least 8 and no more than 50 characters. Only these characters are allowed: [a-z][A-Z][0-9]
cores - This option allows you to override the number of CPU cores as defined by the size.
ram - This option allows you to override the amount of RAM defined by the size. The value must be a multiple of 256, e.g. 256, 512, 768, 1024, and so forth.
public_lan - This option will connect the server to the specified public LAN. If no LAN exists, then a new public LAN will be created. The value accepts a LAN ID (integer).

New in version 2019.2.0.
public_ips - Public IPs assigned to the NIC in the public LAN.

public_firewall_rules - This option allows for a list of firewall rules assigned to the public network interface.

Firewall Rule Name:
  protocol: <protocol> (TCP, UDP, ICMP)
  source_mac: <source-mac>
  source_ip: <source-ip>
  target_ip: <target-ip>
  port_range_start: <port-range-start>
  port_range_end: <port-range-end>
  icmp_type: <icmp-type>
  icmp_code: <icmp-code>

private_lan - This option will connect the server to the specified private LAN. If no LAN exists, then a new private LAN will be created. The value accepts a LAN ID (integer).

New in version 2019.2.0.
private_ips - Private IPs assigned in the private LAN. NAT setting is ignored when this setting is active.

private_firewall_rules - This option allows for a list of firewall rules assigned to the private network interface.

Firewall Rule Name:
  protocol: <protocol> (TCP, UDP, ICMP)
  source_mac: <source-mac>
  source_ip: <source-ip>
  target_ip: <target-ip>
  port_range_start: <port-range-start>
  port_range_end: <port-range-end>
  icmp_type: <icmp-type>
  icmp_code: <icmp-code>

ssh_private_key - Full path to the SSH private key file
ssh_public_key - Full path to the SSH public key file
ssh_interface - This option will use the private LAN IP for node connections (such as as bootstrapping the node) instead of the public LAN IP. The value accepts 'private_lan'.
cpu_family - This option allow the CPU family to be set to AMD_OPTERON or INTEL_XEON. The default is AMD_OPTERON.
volumes - This option allows a list of additional volumes by name that will be created and attached to the server. Each volume requires 'disk_size' and, optionally, 'disk_type'. The default is HDD.
deploy - Set to False if Salt should not be installed on the node.
wait_for_timeout - The timeout to wait in seconds for provisioning resources such as servers. The default wait_for_timeout is 15 minutes.

For more information concerning cloud profiles, see here.