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Getting Started

Video: https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/shapeblue-engineering-videos/hackerbook/0-init/0-init.mp4

About

This fast learning course is designed to onboard new CloudStack developers and get them to speed in few weeks by means of hacking. Following guildelines are recommended:

  • Learn by programming, debugging and experimentation
  • Avoid being stuck with only theory
  • Do not attempt to understand everything the first time
  • Do not read everything end to end
  • Use Stackoverflow and Google for terms, concepts, programming questions
  • Learn to ask the smart way: http://www.catb.org/esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

Prerequisites

We assume you know:

  • Basic Linux adminstration and terminal usage
  • Programming in Java, Python, shell scripting
  • Development: git, maven3, IntelliJ IDEA, MySQL
  • Tools: bash/zsh, ssh, scp, vi/emacs, wget/curl, tmux
  • Basic virtualization (try KVM, VirtualBox, VMware fusion/workstation etc)

What is CloudStack?

Hour long talks: (optional)

Know the Project

Useful links:

Contribution guideline: https://github.com/apache/cloudstack/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md

Core Concepts

An IaaS (infrastructure as a service) platform provide means to partition and primarily consume compute, storage and network resources usually by means of virtualization.

Apache CloudStack is an IaaS platform with support for several hypervisors such as KVM, VMware and XenServer. The usual setup consists of a management server and the resoures it should manage such as the hypervisor and storage hosts and networking configuration such as IP address ranges, VLANs etc.

The management server is a monolith that provides orchestration and control plane accessible via query based http APIs through its UI and CLI. Various authentication mechanisms such as the default authentication (pbkdf2), ldap, saml2, api/secret key based etc are supported. Authorization is supported through Roles which have access to a set/subset of APIs.

For user management CloudStack has Domains that have Accounts that have Users, and all Accounts have some Role. It has Projects that allows users across domains to participate as a team.

For cloud infrastructure management, CloudStack has concepts of organization units much like filesystems have files and directories. Resources are in a Region that represents a management server environment that can have Zones that may be a datacenter. Zone can have Pods (like racks) that can have Clusters that can have Hosts which runs your workload i.e. VMs. In addition, there are Primary Storage (zone or cluster wide) that have the disks of an instance and Secondary Storage (zone wide) that have disk templates, ISO images and snapshots.

CloudStack supports many networking models and topologies:

  • AWS-styled shared/flat network with L3 isolation (security groups)
  • NAT-ed network with single (isolated network) and multiple tiers (VPC) with L2 isolation such as VLANs with L3 services (nat, routing, firewall, port-forwarding, dhcp, dns etc) provided by a virtual router
  • Pure L2 network with VLAN isolation

What is L2/L3, VLAN etc? We'll cover that in later chapters.

Lastly, CloudStack has several features including events and customizations via compute, network, storage/disk, system offerings, and limits/thresholds/settings for various resources.

CloudStack architecture overview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLRtAzp_YuM

Recommended reading: http://docs.cloudstack.apache.org/en/latest/conceptsandterminology/index.html

Workstation Setup

The workstation setup varies depending on personal preference. One can buy a performant and expensive workstation laptop or a more optimal setup of a cost-effective thin/light laptop and a powerful and cost-effective mini PC. For example, getting a decent i7/i9/M1/M2 laptop with 16-32GB RAM (usually in USD 1200-1800 range) and a powerful Intel NUC mini-PC (i7/i9, 64GB RAM, 1TB NVMe, usually in USD 800-1200 range) which can used with wireguard and mbx for development purposes.

Suggested laptop spec:

  • Intel x64 i7/i9 with VTx/VTd enabled or equivalent AMD
  • 6 or more physical CPU cores
  • 32GB RAM, 1TB NVMe
  • OS: Ubuntu 24.04 (recommended), Mac OS, Fedora

Reference laptop models:

  • MacBook Air M2/M3 (16/24 GB RAM)
  • Dell XPS 13/15 series (32GB RAM)
  • HP Spectre or ZBook/Elite series (32GB RAM)
  • Thinkpad P/X Extreme Series (32GB RAM)
  • Any high spec workstation laptop

Reference mini PC models:

  • NUC13 i7 PRO Desk-mini
  • NUC9 Extreme i9

Other Laptop spec/build purchase questions to review:

  • Does laptop have good input devices, ports, extensionabilty?
  • Is the laptop durable, and have sturdy hinges, flex-resistant screen and keyboard?
  • Is the laptop model/brand serviceable in your area?
  • What is the post-sales support and warranty?

Software Setup

Check if hardware virutalization is enabled on the workstation

apt install cpu-checker
kvm-ok

Setup your workstation with Ubuntu 24.04 and install following:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

# general packages
sudo apt-get install vim git subversion mercurial patch rsync curl wget sed openssh-client gpg gnupg2 build-essential gzip bzip2 zip unzip p7zip-full p7zip-rar
# cloudstack related development
sudo apt-get install openjdk-11-jdk maven mysql-client mysql-server nfs-kernel-server quota genisoimage qemu-kvm qemu-utils libvirt-daemon virt-manager ipmitool jq uuid uuid-runtime python3 python3-dev python3-setuptools python3-openssl python3-pip libffi-dev build-essential libssl-dev dpkg-dev libffi-dev rpm rpm2cpio bridge-utils iproute2 iptables ebtables ethtool vlan ipset tcpdump telnet fakeroot ca-certificates
# (optional) misc and development related
sudo apt-get install zsh guake kazam ipython3 pv sshpass htop tmux tig vlc mutt bc cmake cowsay gcc g++ net-tools wireshark openvpn network-manager-openvpn clisp

In order to launch a VM from the virt-manager (GUI), Perform the following steps

sudo systemctl enable --now libvirtd
sudo systemctl start libvirtd
sudo systemctl status libvirtd
sudo usermod -aG kvm $USER
sudo usermod -aG libvirt $USER

Logout and Logback so that the changes are applied

sudo virt-manager

(Preferred) Install software using snap:

sudo snap install slack --classic
sudo snap install intellij-idea-community --classic
sudo snap install code --classic

Note: Intellij IDEA is the preferred and recommended IDE for developing CloudStack

(Optional) Gnome extensions:

https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/1060/timezone/ (useful extension to see team around the world)
https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/120/system-monitor/

Productivity recommendations:

  • Develop muscle memory for git, maven, vi/vim and IntelliJ IDEA.
  • Create and maintain a dotfiles repo for your env configuration. For example, see https://github.com/rohityadavcloud/dotfiles.
  • Learn to touch type faster.

References: Additional Books and Readings List

CloudStack:

Java:

  • Effective Java
  • Java Concurrency in Practice
  • Java Performance
  • Clean Code

Design and software engineering:

  • The Pragmatic Programmer
  • Release It!: Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software (Pragmatic Programmers)
  • SOLID papers

Distributed systems: