Feature Idea: 'Host/Cluster Waiting For Maintenance' Mode
- Dominant language
- Java
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Description
##### ISSUE TYPE
* Improvement Request
##### COMPONENT NAME
~~~
Host? Cluster? Im not sure
~~~
##### CLOUDSTACK VERSION
~~~
NA
~~~
##### CONFIGURATION
##### OS / ENVIRONMENT
##### SUMMARY
### **Current Capability**
CloudStack currently offers a 'Maintenance' Mode, which facilitates the live migration of all VMs from a host and removes the host from the cluster for maintenance.
### **Proposed Feature: "Waiting for Maintenance" Mode**
The proposed "Waiting for Maintenance" Mode introduces a preparatory state that addresses scenarios where live migration is impractical or impossible. This feature would enable gradual decommissioning or maintenance while avoiding service disruption.
### **General Idea of How It Might Work:**
**1. **Operator Responsibilities:****
- Customer communication and notification will be managed entirely by the cloud company, outside of CloudStack. This is to inform customers that they are given a time window to voluntarily restart their VMs before the cut off date.
**2. CloudStack Responsibilities:**
- Block the creation of new VMs to the host/cluster marked as 'Waiting For Maintenance'
- Ensure restarted VMs are relocated to clusters with matching host tags.
_This is actually a similar process as how AWS Cloud does it: https://aws.amazon.com/maintenance-help/_
### **Use Cases**
**Scenario 1: Decommissioning an Old Compute Cluster**
Problem:
- Legacy clusters with outdated CPU architectures cannot perform live migration due to compatibility issues
(e.g., VM freezing during migration causing downtime).
- Existing VMs must restart to migrate to a new cluster with compatible architectures.
- The old cluster remains active, risking the placement of new VMs and hindering decommissioning.
**Scenario 2: Maintenance of GPU Clusters with GPU Passthrough**
Problem:
- GPU passthrough prevents live migration, unlike vGPU setups that allow seamless migration.
- Downtime-free maintenance is not feasible, requiring customer cooperation to restart affected VMs.
##### STEPS TO REPRODUCE
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NA
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##### EXPECTED RESULTS
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Refer to Above
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##### ACTUAL RESULTS
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Not able to facilitate smooth decomissioning of servers for compute where live migration is not possible.
~~~
Contributor guide
Research direction
Start by reading CloudStack’s existing host and cluster maintenance-mode behavior, then trace how VM creation, restart, migration, and host-tag placement are handled. Define the operator-visible state and its effects for both hosts and clusters, including how restarted VMs are placed; done means new VMs avoid marked resources and restarted VMs reach compatible tagged clusters without disrupting existing workloads.
Written by the indexing model from the issue text.
Assessment
- Tech stack
- java
- Domain
- cloud, infrastructure
- Issue type
- Feature
- Difficulty
- 5/5
- Estimated time
- Over a week
- Activity status
- Quiet
- Clarity
- Mostly clear
- Newbie friendliness
- 35/100