Alarm monitoring framework

This document describes how to use alarm-based monitoring driver in Tacker.

Sample TOSCA with monitoring policy

The following example shows monitoring policy using TOSCA template. The target (VDU1) of the monitoring policy in this example need to be described firstly like other TOSCA templates in Tacker.

policies:
  - vdu1_cpu_usage_monitoring_policy:
      type: tosca.policies.tacker.Alarming
      triggers:
          vdu_hcpu_usage_respawning:
              event_type:
                  type: tosca.events.resource.utilization
                  implementation: ceilometer
              metric: cpu_util
              condition:
                  threshold: 50
                  constraint: utilization greater_than 50%
                  granularity: 600
                  evaluations: 1
                  aggregation_method: mean
                  resource_type: instance
                  comparison_operator: gt
              metadata: VDU1
              action: [respawn]

Alarm framework already supported the some default backend actions like scaling, respawn, log, and log_and_kill.

Tacker users could change the desired action as described in the above example. Until now, the backend actions could be pointed to the specific policy which is also described in TOSCA template like scaling policy. The integration between alarming monitoring and scaling was also supported by Alarm monitor in Tacker:

tosca_definitions_version: tosca_simple_profile_for_nfv_1_0_0
description: Demo example

metadata:
 template_name: sample-tosca-vnfd

topology_template:
  node_templates:
    VDU1:
      type: tosca.nodes.nfv.VDU.Tacker
      capabilities:
        nfv_compute:
          properties:
            disk_size: 1 GB
            mem_size: 512 MB
            num_cpus: 2
      properties:
        image: cirros-0.4.0-x86_64-disk
        mgmt_driver: noop
        availability_zone: nova
        metadata: {metering.server_group: SG1}

    CP1:
      type: tosca.nodes.nfv.CP.Tacker
      properties:
        management: true
        anti_spoofing_protection: false
      requirements:
        - virtualLink:
            node: VL1
        - virtualBinding:
            node: VDU1

    VL1:
      type: tosca.nodes.nfv.VL
      properties:
        network_name: net_mgmt
        vendor: Tacker

  policies:
    - SP1:
        type: tosca.policies.tacker.Scaling
        targets: [VDU1]
        properties:
          increment: 1
          cooldown: 120
          min_instances: 1
          max_instances: 3
          default_instances: 1

    - vdu_cpu_usage_monitoring_policy:
        type: tosca.policies.tacker.Alarming
        triggers:
            vdu_hcpu_usage_scaling_out:
                event_type:
                    type: tosca.events.resource.utilization
                    implementation: ceilometer
                metric: cpu_util
                condition:
                    threshold: 80
                    constraint: utilization greater_than 80%
                    granularity: 300
                    evaluations: 1
                    aggregation_method: mean
                    resource_type: instance
                    comparison_operator: gt
                metadata: SG1
                action: [SP1]

            vdu_lcpu_usage_scaling_in:
                event_type:
                    type: tosca.events.resource.utilization
                    implementation: ceilometer
                metric: cpu_util
                condition:
                    threshold: 10
                    constraint: utilization less_than 10%
                    granularity: 300
                    evaluations: 1
                    aggregation_method: mean
                    resource_type: instance
                    comparison_operator: lt
                metadata: SG1
                action: [SP1]

NOTE: metadata defined in VDU properties must be matched with metadata in monitoring policy

How to setup environment

If OpenStack Devstack is used to test alarm monitoring in Tacker, OpenStack Ceilometer and Aodh plugins will need to be enabled in local.conf:

enable_plugin ceilometer https://opendev.org/openstack/ceilometer master

enable_plugin aodh https://opendev.org/openstack/aodh master

How to monitor VNFs via alarm triggers

How to setup alarm configuration

Tacker provides templates that implemented Ceilometer as alarm for monitoring VNFs, which are located in tacker/samples/tosca-templates/vnfd.

  1. tosca-vnfd-alarm-multi-actions.yaml

  2. tosca-vnfd-alarm-respawn.yaml

  3. tosca-vnfd-alarm-scale.yaml

The following commands shows creating VNF with alarms for scaling in and out.

$ cd ~/tacker/samples/tosca-templates/vnfd
$ openstack vnf create --vnfd-template tosca-vnfd-alarm-scale.yaml VNF1

Firstly, vnfd and vnf need to be created successfully using pre-defined TOSCA template for alarm monitoring. Then, in order to know whether alarm configuration defined in Tacker is successfully passed to Ceilometer, Tacker users could use CLI:

$ openstack alarm list

+--------------------------------------+--------------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------+-------------------+----------+---------+
| alarm_id                             | type                                       | name                                                                              | state             | severity | enabled |
+--------------------------------------+--------------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------+-------------------+----------+---------+
| f418ebf8-f8a6-4991-8f0d-938e38434411 | gnocchi_aggregation_by_resources_threshold | VNF1_7582cdf4-58ed-4df8-8fa2-c15938adf70b-vdu_hcpu_usage_scaling_out-4imzw3c7cicb | insufficient data | low      | True    |
| 70d86622-940a-4bc3-87c2-d5dfbb01bbea | gnocchi_aggregation_by_resources_threshold | VNF1_7582cdf4-58ed-4df8-8fa2-c15938adf70b-vdu_lcpu_usage_scaling_in-dwvdvbegiqdk  | insufficient data | low      | True    |
+--------------------------------------+--------------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------+-------------------+----------+---------+
$ openstack alarm show 70d86622-940a-4bc3-87c2-d5dfbb01bbea
+---------------------------+------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Field                     | Value                                                                                                            |
+---------------------------+------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| aggregation_method        | mean                                                                                                             |
| alarm_actions             | [u'http://ubuntu:9890/v1.0/vnfs/7582cdf4-58ed-4df8-8fa2-c15938adf70b/vdu_lcpu_usage_scaling_in/SP1-in/v2fq7rd7'] |
| alarm_id                  | 70d86622-940a-4bc3-87c2-d5dfbb01bbea                                                                             |
| comparison_operator       | lt                                                                                                               |
| description               | utilization less_than 10%                                                                                        |
| enabled                   | True                                                                                                             |
| evaluation_periods        | 1                                                                                                                |
| granularity               | 60                                                                                                               |
| insufficient_data_actions | []                                                                                                               |
| metric                    | cpu_util                                                                                                         |
| name                      | VNF1_7582cdf4-58ed-4df8-8fa2-c15938adf70b-vdu_lcpu_usage_scaling_in-dwvdvbegiqdk                                 |
| ok_actions                | []                                                                                                               |
| project_id                | b5e054a3861b4da2b084aca9530096be                                                                                 |
| query                     | {"=": {"server_group": "SG1-64beb5e4-c0"}}                                                                       |
| repeat_actions            | True                                                                                                             |
| resource_type             | instance                                                                                                         |
| severity                  | low                                                                                                              |
| state                     | insufficient data                                                                                                |
| state_reason              | Not evaluated yet                                                                                                |
| state_timestamp           | 2018-07-20T06:00:33.142762                                                                                       |
| threshold                 | 10.0                                                                                                             |
| time_constraints          | []                                                                                                               |
| timestamp                 | 2018-07-20T06:00:33.142762                                                                                       |
| type                      | gnocchi_aggregation_by_resources_threshold                                                                       |
| user_id                   | 61fb5c6193e549f3baee26bd508c0b29                                                                                 |
+---------------------------+------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

How to trigger alarms:

As shown in the above Ceilometer command, alarm state is shown as “insufficient data”. Alarm is triggered by Ceilometer once alarm state changes to “alarm”. To make VNF instance reach to the pre-defined threshold, some simple scripts could be used.

Note: Because Ceilometer pipeline set the default interval to 600s (10 mins), in order to reduce this interval, users could edit “interval” value in /etc/ceilometer/pipeline.yaml file and then restart Ceilometer service.

Another way could be used to check if backend action is handled well in Tacker:

curl -H "Content-Type: application/json" -X POST -d '{"alarm_id": "35a80852-e24f-46ed-bd34-e2f831d00172", "current": "alarm"}' http://ubuntu:9890/v1.0/vnfs/7582cdf4-58ed-4df8-8fa2-c15938adf70b/vdu_lcpu_usage_scaling_in/SP1-in/v2fq7rd7

Then, users can check Horizon to know if vnf is respawned. Please note that the url used in the above command could be captured from “ceilometer alarm-show command as shown before. “key” attribute in body request need to be captured from the url. The reason is that key will be authenticated so that the url is requested only one time.