How to set up pNFS on CentOS

Question

I'm looking into different ways to create a petabyte storage array. One option that looked interesting is pNFS; however, I'm having trouble finding details on how to set it up.

How can I set up pNFS on CentOS 6.6 servers? How do I specify which servers act as metadata servers and which act as data servers?

Solution

You can't create a pNFS server using stock kernels for CentOS 6.x/7.x

The pNFS server support is added in 4.0 kernel and available for block layout type only (pNFS defineds BLOCK, OBJECT and FILE layouts types). CentOS 6.x clients support FILE layout type only (7.x supports all three types).

There are two open source user space NFS servers which you can use: nfs-ganesha or dCache.

If your servers and client can run up-to-date kernel (mainline kernel from elrepo.org), then you can try to use new block layout. This will involve iSCSI or FC setup in addition.

Comments

[onlyanegg]

Thanks. Did you mean to say the 3.0 kernel? The CentOS machines are running some 2.6 kernel; however, they do include the nfs_layout_nfsv41_files kernel module. Is this just for the client side?

[kofemann]

4.0 . There are custom builds available from elrepo repository.