82 lines
3.3 KiB
Markdown
82 lines
3.3 KiB
Markdown
# warewulf v4
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#### Quick Links:
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* [Website](https://warewulf.org)
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* [Documentation](https://warewulf.org/docs)
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* [Download / Releases](http://github.com/hpcng/warewulf/releases)
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* [Slack](http://hpcng.slack.com/#warewulf)
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* [Support](https://ciq.com/products/warewulf)
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## About Warewulf
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### History
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For over two decades, Warewulf has powered HPC systems around the
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world. From simple “under the desk” clusters to large institutional
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systems at HPC centers as well as enterprises who rely on performance
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critical computing.
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Through the evolution of Warewulf, we have seen various iterations
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provisioning models starting from CDROM / ISO images to Etherboot
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(predecessor to PXE), then PXE, and more recently iPXE, but even
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during these different bootloaders, Warewulf in it’s heart, has always
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been first and foremost a stateless provisioning system (e.g. the
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operating system node image is not written to any persistent storage
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and rather it boots from the network directly into a runtime system).
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Warewulf v3 has been in production for over 6 years now as it has
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stabilized into a very solid and full featured solution. But over the
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last few years, there have been many innovations in Enterprise
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technologies which can (and should) be leveraged as part of
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Warewulf. Additionally, some of the lessons learned from Warewulf v3
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architecture should be rolled into an updated architecture for
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provisioning management.
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### Warewulf v4
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Leveraging this legacy of provisioning and cluster management brings
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us to where we are today. The next generation of Warewulf. Warewulf v4
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is a complete rewrite in GoLang, taking in the legacy of what we've
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come to expect with Warewulf, bringing it into the present, and
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looking out into the future.
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Warewulf v4 combines ultra scalability, flexibility, and simplicity
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with being light weight, non-intrusive, and a great tool for
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scientists and seasoned system administrators alike. Warewulf empowers
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you to scalably and easily manage thousands of compute resources.
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### Architecture
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One of the design tenants of Warewulf is how to scalably administrate
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many thousands of compute nodes. Generally speaking, operating system
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state introduce a surface for potential discrepancies and version
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creep between nodes and thus Warewulf has always gone with the "single
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system image" approach to clustered operating system management. This
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means that you can have a single management node "image". For the last
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20 years, we've been calling this a Virtual Node File System (VNFS),
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but in hindsight, this is a container.
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At its core, Warewulf v4 focuses on what has made Warewulf so widely
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loved: simplicity, ultra scalable, lightweight, and an easy to manage
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solution built for both scientists and seasons system administrators
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to be able to design a highly functional yet easy to maintain cluster
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no matter how big or small or customized it needs to be.
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## iPXE
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Warewulf uses iPXE for network boot. Typically iPXE is provided by the
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operating system; but the iPXE binaries can be rebuilt with the
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`ipxe-update.sh` script. This script accepts command-line arguments
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that are passed to the underlying `make` process. e.g.,
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```bash
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echo "#!ipxe
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echo Tagging with vlan 1000
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vcreate --tag 1000 net0 autoboot || shell" >vlan-1000.ipxe
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sh ipxe-update.sh EMBED=$(readlink -f vlan-1000.ipxe)
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```
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