aws-bare-metal-kvm

The purpose of this repository is to show virtualization using KVM on a bare metal server on AWS

This type of EC2 Instances offer the best of both worlds, allowing the operacional system to be executed directly on the underlying hardware, at the same time that it provides acess to all of the benefits of the cloud.

Amazon EC2 Bare Metal Instances

Sumary

• Prerequisites
• Creating our Amazon EC2
• Installing KVM
• Creating the first Ubuntu VM
• Defining an static IP using the Default network Nat-based networking
  • Defining an static IP for our VM
• Exposing our VM to external access via IP Tables
• Creating our first Windows server
  • Prerequisites
  • Creating a Windows VM
• References

Prerequisites

• Configured Amazon VPC with at least one public subnet
• If you are going to test Windows, download Windows ISO

Creating our Amazon EC2

For this demonstration we will use an EC2 of type: i3.metal:

i3.metal

Login to AWS console and select EC2 > instances > Launch Instance

Obs: We will use Ubuntu 18.04 as the operational system

Select the instance type i3.metal > Configure Instance Details

Select the VPC and subnet where you want to do the launch of your instance

Obs: It will be necessary to accomplish SSH on your instance, therefore realize the launch on a public subnet or have mechanisms to access your instance (VPN/Bastion)

Select the amount of GB for the Root Volume (We will use this virtual machine to do virtualization, therefore select a proper ammount)

Define a Name Tag for your EC2

Obs: I will use the name kvm-virtualization-lab

Click on Configure Security Group

Create a specific Security Group for your EC2 or select one that already exists.

Obs: Remember to check the necessary ports on the Security Group to do the remote access to our virtual machines

Click on Review and Launch

Validate the informations and click on Launch

Create a private key .pem in case you don´t have or utilize one that already exists

Click on Launch Instance

Wait a few minutes for your EC2 Instance be ready to be accessed

Installing KVM

In this repository there are some scripts that will help us to accomplish all of the configuration steps.

ssh -i bare-metal-demo.pem ubuntu@XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX

Realize SSH on the server and follow the following steps:

sudo su - 

cd /opt/ && apt-get update && apt-get install git -y

git clone https://github.com/aws-samples/aws-bare-metal-kvm-demo.git

Do the KVM and the necessary components installation

cd aws-bare-metal-kvm-demo && ./install-kvm-ubuntu.sh

Creating the first Ubuntu VM

For this demonstration we will create a Ubuntu 18.04 server with 1GB of RAM and 2 vCpu

./create-ubuntu-vm.sh

Wait for the creation completion, it can take some time. After completion it will be necessary to login again in the server

A Logon screen will be shown, use the default user and password.

User: ubuntu

Pass: ubuntu

Go back to the Host OS and list the VM'ms

sudo virsh -c qemu:///system list

Defining an static IP using the Default network Nat-based networking

We will use the default network crated on the KVM instalation process

Using virsh

You can create, exclude, execute, stop and manage your virtual machines from the command line, using a tool called virsh. Virsh is mostly useful for advanced Linux administrators, interested ​​in scripts or automating some aspects of managing their virtual machines

virsh net-list

virsh net-info default

The NAT based network is commonly provided and enabled by default fot the majority of the principal linux distributions that supports KVM virtualization.

This network configuration uses a Linux brigde combined with Network Address Translation (NAT) to allow that a guest operational system gets output conectivity , independent of the network type (with wire, wireless, dial-up and goes on) used on KVM host with no need of any specific administrator configuration.

Defining an static IP for our VM

Execute the script define-static-networking-kvm.sh

./define-static-networking-kvm.sh

Put the name of the virtual machine that you want to define the IP, on our case is ubuntu-01

Copy the line that starts with <host mac='

Edit the file of network definition

sudo virsh net-edit default

Add the line that we copied above under <range

Save the file and execute the following commands

sudo virsh net-destroy default

sudo virsh net-start default

sudo virsh shutdown ubuntu-01

sudo systemctl stop libvirtd && sudo systemctl start libvirtd

sudo virsh start ubuntu-01

Test the SSH for our VM

ssh ubuntu@XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX

Exposing our VM to external access via IP Tables

Since we are using the configuration of a default network of type NAT we don´t have a network interface addded on our virtual machine, we will use a rule of IP Tables based on a port to accomplish the external access to our virtual server.

We will use the Hooks of QEMU

Crieate the following file /etc/libvirt/hooks/qemu

sudo vim /etc/libvirt/hooks/qemu

Add the following content

#!/bin/bash

# Script that add iptables rule to forward traffic to VM's

if [ "${1}" = "VM NAME" ]; then

   # Update the following variables to fit your setup
   GUEST_IP=
   GUEST_PORT=
   HOST_PORT=

   if [ "${2}" = "stopped" ] || [ "${2}" = "reconnect" ]; then
	/sbin/iptables -D FORWARD -o virbr0 -p tcp -d $GUEST_IP --dport $GUEST_PORT -j ACCEPT
	/sbin/iptables -t nat -D PREROUTING -p tcp --dport $HOST_PORT -j DNAT --to $GUEST_IP:$GUEST_PORT
   fi
   if [ "${2}" = "start" ] || [ "${2}" = "reconnect" ]; then
	/sbin/iptables -I FORWARD -o virbr0 -p tcp -d $GUEST_IP --dport $GUEST_PORT -j ACCEPT
	/sbin/iptables -t nat -I PREROUTING -p tcp --dport $HOST_PORT -j DNAT --to $GUEST_IP:$GUEST_PORT
   fi
fi

Replacing the following variables for ours, in my case it was like this:

#!/bin/bash

# Script that add iptables rule to forward traffic to VM's

if [ "${1}" = "ubuntu-01" ]; then

   # Update the following variables to fit your setup
   GUEST_IP=192.168.122.3
   GUEST_PORT=22
   HOST_PORT=2222

   if [ "${2}" = "stopped" ] || [ "${2}" = "reconnect" ]; then
	/sbin/iptables -D FORWARD -o virbr0 -p tcp -d $GUEST_IP --dport $GUEST_PORT -j ACCEPT
	/sbin/iptables -t nat -D PREROUTING -p tcp --dport $HOST_PORT -j DNAT --to $GUEST_IP:$GUEST_PORT
   fi
   if [ "${2}" = "start" ] || [ "${2}" = "reconnect" ]; then
	/sbin/iptables -I FORWARD -o virbr0 -p tcp -d $GUEST_IP --dport $GUEST_PORT -j ACCEPT
	/sbin/iptables -t nat -I PREROUTING -p tcp --dport $HOST_PORT -j DNAT --to $GUEST_IP:$GUEST_PORT
   fi
fi

Where GUEST_IP is the IP of our VM, GUEST_PORT is the port that we will do the redirect of the traffic, in this case SSH port, HOST_PORT the port that we will map from the host to the guest

sudo chmod +x /etc/libvirt/hooks/qemu

sudo virsh shutdown ubuntu-01

sudo systemctl stop libvirtd && sudo systemctl start libvirtd

sudo virsh start ubuntu-01

Testing the SSH, log-off from our EC2 and do the ssh pointing for the port that we will do the forward via IP Tables.

Obs: Don´t forget to open the Security Group on our EC2 on the port 2222

ssh ubuntu@EC2_IP -p 2222

The result should be the same of loging in from inside the Host OS

References

Networking with KVM https://aboullaite.me/kvm-qemo-forward-ports-with-iptables/

Setup KVM on Ubuntu 18.04 https://blog.programster.org/set-up-ubuntu-18-04-KVM-server https://ostechnix.com/setup-headless-virtualization-server-using-kvm-ubuntu/

Helper Script to create VM https://blog.programster.org/ubuntu-18-04-getting-started-with-kvm-using-php-helper-script

Forwarding connection https://wiki.libvirt.org/page/Networking#Forwarding_Incoming_Connections

Libvirt Default Networking https://wiki.libvirt.org/page/Networking

Security

See CONTRIBUTING for more information.

License

This library is licensed under the MIT-0 License. See the LICENSE file.