12.2. Provisioning New Instances¶

Provisioning allows you to generate new Virtuozzo Hybrid Infrastructure instances when the number of desktops in a pool reaches a specified lower threshold.

The Provisioning section of the Edit Pool page allows you to configure when and how the Connection Broker creates new instances in your Virtuozzo Hybrid Infrastructure project. To begin, check the Provisioning enabled checkbox, as shown in the following figure.

The Connection Broker determines when to create new instances by comparing the thresholds specified in the Provisioning Limits section to the current contents of the pool. If you edit an existing pool, the Connection Broker displays the current contents of the pool size to the right of the Edit Pool form, for example:

The number entered into the Start provisioning when unassigned desktops in pool drops below field specifies a lower bound on the number of unassigned desktops in the pool, where the number of unassigned desktops is the total number of desktops minus the number of assigned desktops.

For example, the previous figure shows one assigned desktop and 46 total desktops. Therefore, there are 45 unassigned desktops. An unassigned desktop can have a desktop status of either available or unavailable.

The Connection Broker checks the provisioning limits, and creates new instances, at the following times:

• When the pool is saved

• When a user is assigned to a desktop in this pool

• When any pool_stats or pool_history_stats job runs

The Connection Broker continues to provision new desktops whenever the lower threshold is crossed, until the upper threshold specified in the Stop provisioning when total desktops in pool reaches field is reached, indicated by the Total value in the pool size information.

Use the Provisioning Parameters section to configure how Leostream provisions new instances in your Virtuozzo Hybrid Infrastructure project, as follows.

1. Select the center associated with your Virtuozzo Hybrid Infrastructure project from the Provision in center drop-down menu. The remainder of the form updates based on the contents of your selection. The following figure shows an example of the Provisioning Parameters section.

   

2. Enter a name for the virtual machine in the Virtual Machine Name edit field. If the pool is defined using names that begin with a certain string, ensure that the Virtual Machine Name field starts with that string, as shown in the previous figure for a pool that is composed of all desktops with a name that contains the string desktop.

3. Optionally enter a user-friendly display name into the Display name edit field. You can specify in the user’s policy if the Connection Broker should display the desktop to the user with its display name instead of virtual machine name.

4. If either of the names contains a {SEQUENCE} dynamic tag, enter the starting number for the sequence in the Optional sequence number for virtual machine name edit field. The Connection Broker starts naming virtual machines at this number and increments the number for each machine created.

5. Select the availability zone to provision the new instance into from the Availability zone drop-down menu. When using Virtuozzo Hybrid Infrastructure, set the Availability zone to nova.

6. Select the instance size from the Flavor drop-down menu. This selection determines the resources allocated to the newly created virtual machines in the pool in regards to vCPU, RAM and Swap. Check your Virtuozzo Hybrid Infrastructure project to view your available flavors or create new flavors that suits your needs.

7. Select the master image to use from the Deploy from image drop-down menu. This menu contains all the images available in the Virtuozzo Hybrid Infrastructure project associated with the selected center.

8. By default, the Connection Broker creates an instance with ephemeral storage. When provisioning into Virtuozzo Hybrid Infrastructure, indicate that the Connection Broker should create a new volume from the image by selecting the Create new volume checkbox. The form expands to show the fields in the following figure.

   

   1. If you are provisioning non-persistent virtual machines, select the Delete volume on instance delete checkbox to have the Connection Broker delete the volume along with the instance, when instructed to do so by the user’s Release Plan.

   2. In the Volume size edit field, Indicate the size of the volume to create if different than that of the selected flavor.

   3. Select the default volume type from the Volume type drop-down menu.

9. Select the network for the new instance from the Network drop-down menu. This example adds virtual machines to the VDI-Network.

   This example adds virtual machines to a private network without associating a public IP address. The Leostream Gateway provides connections to the VMs from clients that are outside of the private network.

10. In the Available security groups field, select the security groups to assign to the new instance. Click the Add item button to place them into the Selected security groups field.

11. If you are provisioning non-persistent virtual machines, select the Initialize newly provisioned desktops as deletable option to indicate that the Connection Broker is allowed to delete these instances. When this option selected, the Edit Desktop page for the newly provisioned VM has the Allow this desktop to be deleted from disk option selected. Use release plans to schedule VM deletion.

    For more information on using release plans to terminate virtual machines, see the example on deleting virtual machines see Chapter 11 of the Connection Broker Administrator’s Guide.

12. Click Save.

As soon as you save the pool, the Connection Broker checks the Provisioning Limits and will launch virtual machines as required to meet the minimum threshold. You can see the virtual machines in the Virtuozzo Hybrid Infrastructure self-service portal, as shown in the following figure.