Creating a GigaSpaces Cluster in the Cloud

 

gsctl is a simple CLI tool for creating GigaSpaces clusters. You can create a cluster in minutes with a single command: run java -jar gsctl.jar create.

In this topic, you will learn how to create, provision and install a GigaSpaces cluster on Amazon Web Services (AWS) and then remove it by doing the following:

• Create a GigaSpaces cluster.
• Deploy GigaSpaces services in the cluster.
• Tear down the GigaSpaces cluster.

Prerequisites

Before beginning to work with the gsctl tool, ensure that you have the following:

• Java 8 or higher installed on your local workstation.

• AWS account and appropriate credentials as described in the AWS Command Line Interface documentation.

  To deploy a GigaSpaces cluster in AWS you need the following:

  • Valid AWS account
  • Credentials that include aws_access_key_id and aws_secret_access_key
  • Configuration parameters that include a defined aws_region

Downloading and Running the Utility

The gsctl tool can be downloaded from a dedicated repository. You can start an interactive shell for gsctl and run commands using short notation, or you can run commands from outside the interactive shell (from the OS shell) by adding java -jar gsctl.jar before each command.

To download the gsctl utility and launch the interactive shell:

1. Create an empty directory on your machine. In this example, the drive is C: and the directory name is gsDemo.

2. Download the most current version of the utility (gsctl.jar file) from the dedicated repository to the directory you created (gsDemo).

3. To start the interactive shell, open a command window and type the following:

   java -jar gsctl.jar

   java -jar C:\gsDemo\gsctl.jar

Creating a GigaSpaces Cluster

Follow the steps in the procedure to create a GigaSpaces cluster and deploy the GigaSpaces services. All of the procedures on this page describe the short notation as used from inside the interactive shell.

To create a cluster:

1. Verify that an .aws folder exists in the home directory on your local machine, and that it contains the config and credentials files. The credentials file should include your aws_access_key_id and aws_secret_access_key, and the config files should include your aws_region and output definitions.

   

2. Open a command window and type the following to initialize the utility and define a cluster called gs_demo_cluster:

   init --cluster-name=gs_demo_cluster

   The init command creates a cluster.yaml file, which you can modify to supply your AWS resources, such as VPC, keyName, and securityGroups values. If you edit any parameter in the AWS section, you must provide all the values for the section.

   By default, the utility creates all the resources from the credentials and config files in the .aws folder.

   name: gs_demo_cluster
   gsManagers: 3
   clusterComponents:
   - type: "AWS"
   name: "AWS_1"
   userName: "<auto-generate>"
   keyName: "<auto-generate>"
   vpcId: "<auto-generate>"
   vpcSubnetId: "<auto-generate>"
   securityGroup: "<auto-generate>"
   amiId: "<auto-generate>"
   #iamInstanceProfileArn: "<auto-generate>"      #uncomment the lines below in order to use volumes
   #volumes:
   #  ebs:
   #  - name: "default aws master name"
   #    id: "<required parameter>"
   masters:
   label: "GS Cluster [gs_demo_cluster] Master Group"
   profiles:
   - name: "default aws master name"
   type: "m4.xlarge"
   tags: []
   count: 3       
   workers:
   label: "GS Cluster [gs_demo_cluster] Worker Group"
   profiles:
   - name: "default aws worker name"
   type: "m4.xlarge"
   tags: []
   count: 3

3. To deploy the cluster in the cloud, run the following command:

   create

   The cloud platform begins to create the cluster:

   

   The Nomad token is required to log in to the Nomad UI. The token itself is also used as the password for the default users: gs-admin, gs-mngr and gs-viewer.

   You can monitor the progress of the cluster in your cloud platform dashboard, for example the VPC Dashboard in AWS:

   

   The process of creating the cluster takes only a few minutes until the nodes are up and running. You can see when the Master (server) nodes and Worker (client) nodes are running and have passed the status checks.

   

Deploying the GigaSpaces Services

After your cluster is up and running, you can deploy GigaSpaces services and microservices.

The gsctl tool comes with sample processor (stateful) and feeder (stateless) services in the default artifacts repository. To deploy them, use 'data-processor.jar' and 'data-feeder.jar' in the URL in the deploy screen.

Monitoring the GigaSpaces Services

After you deploy your GigaSpaces services and microservices, you can monitor them using the following built-in web interfaces:

• Ops Manager
• Grafana
• Zipkin

To access the administration and monitoring tools:

1. Run the following command:

   list-services

   This returns all the services with their URLs.

   

2. Copy any of the GigaSpacesManager URLs into your browser to open Ops Manager and view the deployed GigaSpaces services.

   

3. Copy the grafana URL to your browser to open Grafana and navigate to the pre-defined dashboards:

   

4. Select the Telegraf system metrics dashboard in Grafana to view the cluster metrics:

   

Removing a GigaSpaces Cluster

You can delete your cluster when you no longer need it, in order to release the cloud resources.

To remove the GigaSpaces cluster:

In the directory where you created the cluster, run the following command:

gsctl.jar destroy

This tears down the cluster.