View source for KVM Virtualization Partition-Based Storage Pool Configuration

=External=

* [https://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/7/html/Virtualization_Deployment_and_Administration_Guide/sect-Partition_based_storage_pools.html RHEL 7 Virtualization Administration - Partition-based Storage Pools]

=Internal=

* [[Linux_Virtualization_Operations#Storage_Pool_Configuration|Linux Virtualization Operations]]

=Overview=

This article explains how to expose a pre-formatted block device partition as storage pool, using [[virsh]].

{{Warn|Do not use this procedure to configure an entire disk as storage pool. Follow this procedure for that [[KVM_Virtualization_Disk-Based_Storage_Pool_Configuration|Disk-based Storage Pool Configuration]].}}

=Procedure=

Create a new partition to be exposed as the local storage pool. Use [[fdisk]]. For this example, the partition will be referred to as /dev/sda7.

Create a file system on the newly allocated partition, as described in [[mkfs.xfs]] or [[mkfs.ext4]]:

<pre>
mkfs.xfs /dev/sda7
</pre>

Create a new storage pool definition:

<pre>
virsh pool-define-as main-storage-pool fs --source-dev /dev/sda7 --target /main-storage-pool
</pre>

More details on the pool-define-as command in [[Virsh pool-define-as|virsh pool-define-as]].

Verify the new pool:

<pre>
virsh pool-list --all

 Name                 State      Autostart
-------------------------------------------
 main-storage-pool    inactive   no
</pre>

More details on the pool-list command in [[Virsh pool-list|virsh pool-list]].

Build the pool and create the mount point. More details here [[virsh pool-build]].

<pre>
virsh pool-build main-storage-pool
</pre>

Start the storage pool. This command mounts the filesystem onto the mount point created during the previous step. More details here: [[virsh pool-start]].

<pre>
virsh pool-start main-storage-pool
</pre>

Configure the storage pool to start at boot. More details here: [[virsh pool-autostart]].

<pre>
virsh pool-autostart main-storage-pool
</pre>

Restart the virtualization host and make sure the filesystem is mounted after the restart and the storage pool is active, with [[virsh pool-info|pool-info]]:

<pre>
virsh pool-info main-storage-pool
</pre>