Using PVFS2

From Bootable Cluster CD

What is PVFS2?

From the official PVFS2 website: PVFS2 is an open-source, scalable parallel file system targeted at production parallel computation environments. It is designed specifically to scale to very large numbers of clients and servers. The architecture is very modular, allowing for easy inclusion of new hardware support and new algorithms. This makes PVFS2 a perfect research testbed as well.

What can you do with PVFS2 support in the BCCD?

That depends upon your particular interests! For me (Paul), I find most usefulness in using pvfs2 support on the BCCD to

• support teaching aspects of filesystems related to parallel environments (this is the whole motivation for the BCCD, after all).
• access existing pvfs2 volumes served up by our Opteron cluster. Find yourself wanting to access the cluster but stuck behind a computer that doesn't support PVFS2? Easy! Just reboot into the BCCD, fire up the pvfs2-client, and mount your pvfs2 volumes from practically anywhere.
• set up pvfs2 to support filesystem distrubution over a drop-in cluster environment. If you have a room full of networked PC's, drop in the BCCD, set up pvfs2, and you have a beautiful computational environment. Yes, you too can run parallel jobs at the local Best Buy or Circuit City (ask permission first, of course). The BCCD even supports running in ram, so all it takes is one 210-MB (fits in your wallet) CD image.

Which version of PVFS2 does the BCCD contain?

The BCCD currently contains pvfs2 version 1.2.0, released July 2005. The BCCD uses the 2.4.26 kernel, so the pvfs2 module (and hence the mounting paradigm) adheres to the 2.4-specific instructions as outlined in the PVFS2 quickstart guide.

Configuring Pvfs2 on the BCCD

Single Host PVFS2 -- Step-by-step guide to configuring a pvfs2 client and/or server on the BCCD.

Cluster PVFS2 -- Step-by-step guide to setting up your own pvfs2 cluster using the BCCD!

How do I access an existing PVFS2 server using this nifty Bootable Cluster CD?

Accessing an existing pvfs2 server is very analogous to setting up the pvfs2 client described above. The only issue is that you may not be able to replicate the mount point that is in your PVFS2 server's configuration files.

For example, the PVFS2 quickstart guide consistently shows the mount points as /mnt/pvfs2, but that's not going to work for the BCCD image. I (we) can tailor an image so that "works" for you out of the box, but just put an additional entry in your /etc/pvfs2tab and you'll be good-to-go.

Personally, our Opteron cluster exports a pvfs2 volume under /mnt/rw/users/pvfs2, which the BCCD handles without issues at all.