Describe the feature
I would like to propose and have been developing an installation tool based on the 2025 OpenCHAMI tutorial to deploy a quadlet based installation of OpenCHAMI from scratch on an appropriately configured system. The should work with minimal preparation on both ARM 64 and x86-64 / AMD-64 virtual machines with nested virtualization enabled and be packaged with OpenCHAMI so that once the OpenCHAMI Release RPM has been installed the tool can be used. The installer should both deploy OpenCHAMI and run a simple sanity check at the end of the deployment that verifies that it is possible to SSH to compute nodes (virtual or real) booted from OpenCHAMI.
Why do you want this feature?
The motivation for creating this tool is to provide a quick and simple way for developers and users seeking to test or evaluate OpenCHAMI to deploy OpenCHAMI onto test or evaluation platforms without having to walk through the tutorial process each time. It is intended as a supplement to the tutorials, not a replacement of them. A secondary motivation is to provide the vtds-application-openchami vTDS layer with an OpenCHAMI maintained mechanism for deploying OpenCHAMI so that the vTDS tool used in OpenCHAMI integration testing does not experience bitrot as OpenCHAMI evolves. The motivation for packaging this with OpenCHAMI Release is to make it easy for developers and users to find and to make it easy to maintain as OpenCHAMI evolves over time.
Alternatives you've considered
I originally implemented a similar mechanism within the vtds-application-openchami vTDS Application Layer code, but this mechanism is limited by two factors:
- It does not provide a simple stand-alone tool for use by developers and evaluators, since it is tied into the vTDS infrastructure.
- It is prone to bitrot as OpenCHAMI deployment procedures evolve into the future.
Having the core of that mechanism here and making it a stand-alone solution that can run on a simple virtual machine on a user's laptop or desktop addresses those limitations and will allow me to remove the similar mechanism from vtds-application-openchami.
Additional context
I have the initial implementation of this, suitable for deployment onto any x86-64 or ARM-64 VM with nested virtualization enabled ready integration.
Assuming the proposed PR is accepted, I will be working on enhancements that permit deployment onto a "real" cluster defined as a cluster consisting of
- a head-node where OpenCHAMI runs
- a set of managed (compute) nodes managed by OpenCHAMI
- a set of RedFish servers (BMCs or equivalent) capable of power and reset operations on managed nodes
Once that work is complete, this will become a suitable replacement for the vTDS implementation as well as a tool capable of deploying OpenCHAMI onto an actual OpenCHAMI cluster with the appropriate configuration overlay.
Code of Conduct
Describe the feature
I would like to propose and have been developing an installation tool based on the 2025 OpenCHAMI tutorial to deploy a quadlet based installation of OpenCHAMI from scratch on an appropriately configured system. The should work with minimal preparation on both ARM 64 and x86-64 / AMD-64 virtual machines with nested virtualization enabled and be packaged with OpenCHAMI so that once the OpenCHAMI Release RPM has been installed the tool can be used. The installer should both deploy OpenCHAMI and run a simple sanity check at the end of the deployment that verifies that it is possible to SSH to compute nodes (virtual or real) booted from OpenCHAMI.
Why do you want this feature?
The motivation for creating this tool is to provide a quick and simple way for developers and users seeking to test or evaluate OpenCHAMI to deploy OpenCHAMI onto test or evaluation platforms without having to walk through the tutorial process each time. It is intended as a supplement to the tutorials, not a replacement of them. A secondary motivation is to provide the
vtds-application-openchamivTDS layer with an OpenCHAMI maintained mechanism for deploying OpenCHAMI so that the vTDS tool used in OpenCHAMI integration testing does not experience bitrot as OpenCHAMI evolves. The motivation for packaging this with OpenCHAMI Release is to make it easy for developers and users to find and to make it easy to maintain as OpenCHAMI evolves over time.Alternatives you've considered
I originally implemented a similar mechanism within the
vtds-application-openchamivTDS Application Layer code, but this mechanism is limited by two factors:Having the core of that mechanism here and making it a stand-alone solution that can run on a simple virtual machine on a user's laptop or desktop addresses those limitations and will allow me to remove the similar mechanism from
vtds-application-openchami.Additional context
I have the initial implementation of this, suitable for deployment onto any x86-64 or ARM-64 VM with nested virtualization enabled ready integration.
Assuming the proposed PR is accepted, I will be working on enhancements that permit deployment onto a "real" cluster defined as a cluster consisting of
Once that work is complete, this will become a suitable replacement for the vTDS implementation as well as a tool capable of deploying OpenCHAMI onto an actual OpenCHAMI cluster with the appropriate configuration overlay.
Code of Conduct