Getting Started with OpenSAF

Prerequisities

What kind of hardware is required to run OpenSAF?

OpenSAF accomodates a variety of hardware architectures and form factors that include carrier & enterprise grade bladed servers, ATCA, rack mount servers, PC based clusters etc.

The recommended configuration that demonstrates OpenSAF's diverse HA capabilities consists of at least four nodes, two controller nodes and at least two payload nodes. When hardware redundancy is not required, it is possible to run just one controller node. Control and Payload node functionality is mutually exclusive per node. In other words a node can either be a controller or a payload at one time. Only two OpenSAF controller nodes are needed per OpenSAF cluster. All other nodes are configured as payload nodes. The minimum configuration needed to insure hardware redundancy are two controllers which run in active-standby mode.

For development and debugging purposes, OpenSAF can be run in a variety of virtualized environments. You can easily run OpenSAF on multiple virtual machines using virtualization software like VMWare Workstation,Sun's xVM and Xen where multiple OpenSAF nodes (VMs) can be simulated in a single computer thus creating a virtual OpenSAF cluster.

What processor architectures are supported by OpenSAF?

OpenSAF is known to work on PowerPC, Intel/AMD x86 and x86_64 architectures.

Which version of Linux kernel is recommended for OpenSAF?

The recommended Linux kernel version is 2.6.9 or above.

Which Linux distributions are recommended for installing OpenSAF?

OpenSAF 3.0 (latest GA release available) is known to run on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3, OpenSUSE 11.0, Suse Linux Enterprsie Server 10.3, Fedore Core 10.0, Monta Vista CGE 5.1 and WR Linux 2.0. In general OpenSAF should work on any LSB compliant Linux distribution.

Does OpenSAF run on other operating systems like Windows or Solaris?

OpenSAF does not run on Windows. An older version of OpenSAF (2.0) is known to run on Solaris. However the OpenSAF port to Solaris is not available at OpenSAF.org.

Building and installing

How do I get OpenSAF to run?

The first step is to download the source code. Information on other required open source software packages and kernel version are in the “README” file in the software package. The file also explains how to build, install, configure and run the OpenSAF services and sample applications

How can I verify that OpenSAF is working correctly on my system? What can OpenSAF do?

OpenSAF comes with a number of sample applications – look at the directory “samples” in the source distribution. Instructions on how to build and run them are also in the “README” file. The sample applications illustrate the use of the different services that OpenSAF provides.

What do I do if something goes wrong with the build/install/run process?

The “README” file contains some basic troubleshooting steps. If this fails, you can search the the “Users” mailing list archive on the OpenSAF web page. You can also post your question directly to the OpenSAF users mailing list.

How do I build and install OpenSAF?

Build and Installation instructions are available in the OpenSAF source package in "README" file.

What other open source packages are mandatory pre-requisites for OpenSAF?

The other pre-requisite open source packages for running OpenSAF along with their specific versions are described in README file in the OpenSAF tarball.

How do I obtain other open source packages on which OpenSAF depends on?

You can download the files by following instructions found on the OpenSAF.org Download page

OpenSAF complains about missing dependencies although I have downloaded, compiled and installed the missing files

The OpenSAF rpms include as dependencies the listed packages. If you have downloaded, compiled and installed Xerces, tipc or net-snmp yourself (and not used rpm), the rpm system has no way of knowing about it. A way to circumvent this is to use the option —nodeps when installing the OpenSAF rpms (so use # rpm -Uvh —nodeps <package name>).

Who should I contact if I have issues while building & installing OpenSAF?

Send your questions and queries to OpenSAF users mailing list.

Running & Using OpenSAF

How do I run sample programs that are provide with OpenSAF?

Instructions on how to run sample programs demonstrating sample usages of the various functions provided by OpenSAF can be found in the README file.

What configuration setups are provided to verify OpenSAF functionality?

The best way to get started with OpenSAF is to simulate one or more OpenSAF nodes using virtualization software like VMWare Workstation, Sun's xVM or XEN and then install OpenSAF in these machines. The initial configuration to test would be two controllers running in active-standby HA mode. Later you can add one or more payload nodes as needed. By default OpenSAF configuration as supplied with the OpenSAF tarball supports a 5 node cluster which includes 2 controllers and 3 payloads. If you want a bigger cluster please edit NCSSystemConfig.XML in "/etc/config" to add additional nodes. Once you're comfortable running OpenSAF on virtual machines you can install and run OpenSAF on real hardware targets.

How do I get the latest version of the OpenSAF source code?

OpenSAF uses Mercurial for source code control. Instructions on how to obatin the source code are in the OpenSAF Developer’s Guide. It also contains instructions on how to run, advertise and share your code contributions. Since Mercurial is a distributed source code control system, you can publish your repository with your own code modifications on your own web site, so that other users can pull from your version of OpenSAF.

How can I contribute to the project?

See the Technical Frequently Asked Questions document here.