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F5 OpenStack Neutron LBaaSv2

Build Status Documentation Status

Release

Release 10.0.0 is compatible with OpenStack Newton. For more information, please see the F5® OpenStack Releases, Versioning, and Support Matrix.

Overview

The F5® OpenStack LBaaSv2 service provider driver and agent (also called, simply, ‘F5 LBaaSv2’) make it possible to provision F5 BIG-IP® Local Traffic Manager (LTM®) services in an OpenStack cloud.

How the plugin works

The F5 LBaaSv2 plugin consists of an agent and a service provider driver (also just called ‘driver’, for short). The driver listens to the Neutron RPC messaging queue. When you make a call to the LBaaSv2 API – for example, neutron lbaas-loadbalancer-create – the F5 LBaaSv2 service provider driver picks it up and directs it to the agent.

The F5 agent manages services on your BIG-IP. When it first receives a task from the F5 driver, it starts and communicates with the BIG-IP(s) identified in the Agent Configuration File. Then, it registers its own named queue. The F5 driver assigns all lbaas tasks in the Neutron messaging queue to the agent’s queue. The F5 agent makes callbacks to the F5 driver to query additional Neutron network, port, and subnet information; to allocate Neutron objects (for example, fixed IP addresses); and to report provisioning and pool status.

F5 LBaaSv2 Plugin architecture

Important

As of v9.3.1, the F5 LBaaSv2 driver no longer manages Neutron ports for LBaaS pool members.

For example, say you create a pool member using the command below:

neutron lbaas-member-create --subnet private-subnet --address 172.16.101.89 --protocol-port 80 pool1

If a Neutron port corresponding to the requested subnet and IP address exists, it will be allocated to the pool member. If no corresponding Neutron port exists, the following warnings print to the logs:

f5-openstack-agent.log -- “Member definition does not include Neutron port"
server.log -- “Lbaas member has no associated neutron port”

In addition, the F5 OpenStack Agent does not create a forwarding database (FBD) entry for the pool member if it doesn’t have a corresponding Neutron port.

If the requested subnet and IP address do not already have a corresponding Neutron port, you may need to create one manually. This depends on your deployment and use case.