Block storage subsystems are provisioned on the cluster as views. To create a subsystem, you create a view on an empty directory path and enable Block as an access protocol for the view. Views that are block-enabled are configured on dedicated paths that are not accessible to other protocols.
In order to make volumes available to block hosts, the volumes must be assigned, or mapped, to the hosts.
Configuration Components
The components of block storage configuration are:
Subsystems. A subsystem is an NVMe container for volumes, or namespaces. It is configured with a unique NVMe identifier, an NQN, which makes it discoverable by hosts as a remote block storage device. A subsystem on VAST Cluster is configured as a block-enabled view on a dedicated path.
Volumes. Volumes are units of capacity that can be provisioned on a subsystem. Each volume has a path relative to the subsystem path. The path can be backed up with snapshots. Snapshots of volumes can also be presented as volumes to hosts.
Hosts. NVMe/TCP hosts must be defined on the cluster with their NQN, a unique identifier created on each host by the NVMe/TCP client host configuration.
Configuration Workflow
Follow this workflow to create a subsystem, provision volumes and make them available to hosts:
Create subsystem(s) by creating a view and enabling only the Block protocol on that view. See Creating a Block Storage Subsystem (View).
Note
Avoid nesting the view under views that are accessible to other client protocols such as NFS or SMB, since clients will see the volume as a directory without being able to access it.
Create volume(s) on a subsystem.
Add the hosts to the cluster.
Map hosts to volumes. You can map multiple hosts to a volume or map multiple volumes to a host.