This repository stores the collection of packages installed on Google supported Compute Engine images.
Table of Contents
- Background
- Guest Overview
- Common Libraries
- Daemons
- Instance Setup
- Metadata Scripts
- Configuration
- Packaging
- Troubleshooting
- Contributing
- License
The Linux guest environment denotes the Google provided configuration and tooling inside of a Google Compute Engine (GCE) virtual machine. The metadata server is a communication channel for transferring information from a client into the guest. The Linux guest environment includes a set of scripts and daemons (long-running processes) that read the content of the metadata server to make a virtual machine run properly on our platform.
The guest environment is made up of the following components:
- Accounts daemon to setup and manage user accounts, and to enable SSH key based authentication.
- Clock skew daemon to keep the system clock in sync after VM start and stop events.
- Disk expand scripts to expand the VM root partition for CentOS 6, CentOS 7, RHEL 6, and RHEL 7 images.
- Instance setup scripts to execute VM configuration scripts during boot.
- Network daemon that handles network setup for multiple network interfaces on boot and integrates network load balancing with forwarding rule changes into the guest.
- Metadata scripts to run user-provided scripts at VM startup and shutdown.
The Linux guest environment is written in Python and is version agnostic between Python 2.6 and 3.5. There is complete unittest coverage for every Python library and script. The design of various guest libraries, daemons, and scripts, are detailed in the sections below.
The Python libraries are shared with each of the daemons and the instance setup tools.
The guest environment relies upon retrieving content from the metadata server to configure the VM environment. A metadata watching library handles all communication with the metadata server.
The library exposes two functions:
- GetMetadata immediately retrieves the contents of the metadata server for a given metadata key. The function catches and logs any connection related exceptions. The metadata server content is returned as a deserialized JSON object.
- WatchMetadata continuously makes a hanging GET, watching for changes to the specified contents of the metadata server. When the request closes, the watcher verifies the etag was updated. In case of an update, the etag is updated and a provided handler function is called with the deserialized JSON metadata content. The WatchMetadata function should never terminate; it catches and logs any connection related exceptions, and catches and logs any exception generated from calling the handler.
Metadata server requests have custom retry logic for metadata server unavailability; by default, any request has one minute to complete before the request is cancelled. In case of a brief network outage where the metadata server is unavailable, there is a short delay between retries.
The Google added daemons and scripts write to the serial port for added transparency. A common logging library is a thin wrapper around the Python logging module. The library configures appropriate SysLog handlers, sets the logging formatter, and provides a debug options for added logging and console output.
A configuration file allows users to disable daemons and modify instance setup behaviors from a single location. Guest environment daemons and scripts need a mechanism to integrate user settings into the guest. A configuration management library retrieves and modifies these settings.
The library exposes the following functions:
- GetOptionString retrieves the value for a configuration option. The type of the value is a string if set.
- GetOptionBool retrieves the value for a configuration option. The type of the value is a boolean if set.
- SetOption sets the value of an option in the config file. An overwrite flag specifies whether to replace an existing value.
- WriteConfig writes the configuration values to a file. The function is responsible for locking the file, preventing concurrent writes, and writing a file header if one is provided.
Guest environment daemons and scripts use a common library for file management. The library provides the following functions:
- SetPermissions unifies the logic to set permissions and simplify file creation across the various Linux distributions. The function sets the mode, UID, and GID, of a provided path. On supported OS configurations that user SELinux, the SELinux context is automatically set.
- LockFile is a context manager that simplifies the process of file
locking in Python. The function sets up an
flockand releases the lock on exit.
A network-utilities library retrieves information about a network interface. The
library is used for IP forwarding and for setting up an Ethernet interface on
boot. The library exposes a GetNetworkInterface function that retrieves the
network interface name associated with a MAC address.
The guest environment daemons import and use the common libraries described above. Each daemon reads the configuration file before execution. This allows a user to easily disable undesired functionality. Additional daemon behaviors are detailed below.
The accounts daemon is responsible for provisioning and deprovisioning user accounts. The daemon grants permissions to user accounts, and updates the list of authorized keys that have access to accounts based on metadata SSH key updates. User account creation is based on adding and remove SSH Keys stored in metadata.
The accounts management daemon has the following behaviors.
- Administrator permissions are managed with a
google-sudoersLinux group. - All users provisioned by the account daemon are added to the
google-sudoersgroup. - The daemon stores a file in the guest to preserve state for the user accounts managed by Google.
- The authorized keys file for a Google managed user is deleted when all SSH keys for the user are removed from metadata.
- User accounts not managed by Google are not modified by the accounts daemon.
The clock skew daemon is responsible for syncing the software clock with the
hypervisor clock after a stop/start event or after a migration. Preventing clock
skew may result in system time has changed messages in VM logs.
The network daemon uses network interface metadata to manage the network interfaces in the guest by performing the following tasks:
- Enabled all associated network interfaces on boot. Network interfaces are specified by MAC address in instance metadata.
- Uses IP forwarding metadata to setup or remove IP routes in the guest.
- Only IPv4 IP addresses are currently supported.
- Routes are set on the default Ethernet interface determined dynamically.
- Google routes are configured, by default, with the routing protocol ID
66. This ID is a namespace for daemon configured IP addresses.
Instance setup runs during VM boot. The script configures the Linux guest environment by performing the following tasks.
- Optimize for local SSD.
- Enable multi-queue on all the virtionet devices.
- Wait for network availability.
- Set SSH host keys the first time the instance is booted.
- Set the
botoconfig for using Google Cloud Storage. - Create the defaults configuration file.
The defaults configuration file incorporates any user provided setting in
/etc/default/instance_configs.cfg.template and does not override other
conflicting settings. This allows package updates without overriding user
configuration.
Metadata scripts implement support for running user provided startup scripts and shutdown scripts. The guest support for metadata scripts is implemented in Python with the following design details.
- Metadata scripts are executed in a shell.
- If multiple metadata keys are specified (e.g.
startup-scriptandstartup-script-url) both are executed. - If multiple metadata keys are specified (e.g.
startup-scriptandstartup-script-url) a URL is executed first. - The exit status of a metadata script is logged after completed execution.
Users of Google provided images may configure the guest environment behaviors
using a configuration file. To make configuration changes, add settings to
/etc/default/instance_configs.cfg.template. If you are attempting to change
the behavior of a running instance, run /usr/bin/google_instance_setup before
reloading the affected daemons.
Linux distributions looking to include their own defaults can specify settings
in /etc/default/instance_configs.cfg.distro. These settings will not override
/etc/default/instance_configs.cfg.template. This enables distribution settings
that do not override user configuration during package update.
The following are valid user configuration options.
| Section | Option | Value |
|---|---|---|
| Accounts | deprovision_remove | true makes deprovisioning a user destructive. |
| Accounts | groups | Comma separated list of groups for newly provisioned users. |
| Accounts | useradd_cmd | Command string to create a new user. |
| Accounts | userdel_cmd | Command string to delete a user. |
| Accounts | usermod_cmd | Command string to modify a user's groups. |
| Accounts | groupadd_cmd | Command string to create a new group. |
| Daemons | accounts_daemon | false disables the accounts daemon. |
| Daemons | clock_skew_daemon | false disables the clock skew daemon. |
| Daemons | ip_forwarding_daemon | false (deprecated) skips IP forwarding. |
| Daemons | network_daemon | false disables the network daemon. |
| InstanceSetup | host_key_types | Comma separated list of host key types to generate. |
| InstanceSetup | optimize_local_ssd | false prevents optimizing for local SSD. |
| InstanceSetup | network_enabled | false skips instance setup functions that require metadata. |
| InstanceSetup | set_boto_config | false skips setting up a boto config. |
| InstanceSetup | set_host_keys | false skips generating host keys on first boot. |
| InstanceSetup | set_multiqueue | false skips multiqueue driver support. |
| IpForwarding | ethernet_proto_id | Protocol ID string for daemon added routes. |
| IpForwarding | ip_aliases | false disables setting up alias IP routes. |
| IpForwarding | target_instance_ips | false disables internal IP address load balancing. |
| MetadataScripts | default_shell | String with the default shell to execute scripts. |
| MetadataScripts | run_dir | String base directory where metadata scripts are executed. |
| MetadataScripts | startup | false disables startup script execution. |
| MetadataScripts | shutdown | false disables shutdown script execution. |
| NetworkInterfaces | setup | false skips network interface setup. |
| NetworkInterfaces | ip_forwarding | false skips IP forwarding. |
| NetworkInterfaces | dhclient_script | String path to a dhclient script used by dhclient. |
| NetworkInterfaces | dhcp_command | String to execute to enable network interfaces. |
Setting network_enabled to false will skip setting up host keys and the
boto config in the guest. The setting may also prevent startup and shutdown
script execution.
The guest Python code is packaged as a compliant PyPI Python package that can be used as a library or run independently. In addition to the Python package, deb and rpm packages are created with appropriate init configuration for supported GCE distros. The packages are targeted towards distribution provided Python versions.
| Distro | Package Type | Python Version | Init System |
|---|---|---|---|
| Debian 8 | deb | 2.7 | systemd |
| Debian 9 | deb | 3.5 or 2.7 | systemd |
| CentOS 6 | rpm | 2.6 | upstart |
| CentOS 7 | rpm | 2.7 | systemd |
| RHEL 6 | rpm | 2.6 | upstart |
| RHEL 7 | rpm | 2.7 | systemd |
| Ubuntu 14.04 | deb | 2.7 | upstart |
| Ubuntu 16.04 | deb | 3.5 or 2.7 | systemd |
| SLES 11 | rpm | 2.6 | sysvinit |
| SLES 12 | rpm | 2.7 | systemd |
We build the following packages for the Linux guest environment.
google-compute-engine- System init scripts (systemd, upstart, or sysvinit).
- Includes udev rules, sysctl rules, rsyslog configs, dhcp configs for hostname setting.
- Entry point scripts created by the Python package located in
/usr/bin. - Includes bash scripts used by
instance_setup.
python-google-compute-engine- The Python 2 package for Linux daemons and libraries.
python3-google-compute-engine- The Python 3 package for Linux daemons and libraries.
The package source for Debian and RPM specs for Enterprise Linux 6 and 7 are included in this project. There are also Daisy workflows for spinning up GCE VM's to automatically build the packages for Debian, Red Hat, and CentOS. See the README in the packaging directory for more details.
There are several places where package versions have to be updated and must match to successfully release an update.
setup.pyUpdate the version string with the Python package version. Used for entry points through the Python egg and PyPI.specs/google-compute-engine.specUpdate the version of thegoogle-compute-enginepackage for EL6 and EL7.specs/python-google-compute-engine.specUpdate the version string of thepython-google-compute-enginepackage for EL6 and EL7.debian/changelogUpdategoogle-compute-image-packages (VERSION) stable, the version of the Debian packages.- Update the variable
package_versionwhen invoking the package build workflows.
The deb and rpm packages used in some GCE images are published to Google Cloud
repositories. Debian 8 and 9, CentOS 6 and 7, and RHEL 6 and 7 use these
repositories to install and update the google-compute-engine, and
python-google-compute-engine (and python3-google-compute-engine for Python 3)
packages. If you are creating a custom image, you can also use these repositories
in your image.
For Debian 8, run the following commands as root:
Add the public repo key to your system:
curl https://packages.cloud.google.com/apt/doc/apt-key.gpg | apt-key add -
Add a source list file /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-cloud.list:
tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-cloud.list << EOM
deb http://packages.cloud.google.com/apt google-compute-engine-jessie-stable main
deb http://packages.cloud.google.com/apt google-cloud-packages-archive-keyring-jessie main
EOM
Install the packages to maintain the public key over time:
apt-get update; apt-get install google-cloud-packages-archive-keyring
Install the google-compute-engine and python-google-compute-engine packages:
apt-get update; apt-get install -y google-compute-engine python-google-compute-engine
For Debian 9, run the following commands as root:
Add the public repo key to your system:
curl https://packages.cloud.google.com/apt/doc/apt-key.gpg | apt-key add -
Add a source list file /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-cloud.list:
tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-cloud.list << EOM
deb http://packages.cloud.google.com/apt google-compute-engine-stretch-stable main
deb http://packages.cloud.google.com/apt google-cloud-packages-archive-keyring-stretch main
EOM
Install the packages to maintain the public key over time:
apt-get update; apt-get install google-cloud-packages-archive-keyring
Install the google-compute-engine and python-google-compute-engine packages:
apt-get update; apt-get install -y google-compute-engine python-google-compute-engine
For EL6 and EL7 based distributions, run the following commands as root:
Add the yum repo to a repo file /etc/yum.repos.d/google-cloud.repo for either
EL6 or EL7. Change DIST to either 6 or 7 respectively:
DIST=7
tee /etc/yum.repos.d/google-cloud.repo << EOM
[google-cloud-compute]
name=Google Cloud Compute
baseurl=https://packages.cloud.google.com/yum/repos/google-cloud-compute-el${DIST}-x86_64
enabled=1
gpgcheck=1
repo_gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=https://packages.cloud.google.com/yum/doc/yum-key.gpg
https://packages.cloud.google.com/yum/doc/rpm-package-key.gpg
EOM
Install the google-compute-engine, python-google-compute-engine packages:
yum install -y google-compute-engine python-google-compute-engine
Deprecated Packages
| Deprecated Package | Replacement |
|---|---|
google-compute-engine-jessie |
google-compute-engine and python-google-compute-engine |
google-compute-engine-stretch |
google-compute-engine and python-google-compute-engine |
google-compute-engine-init |
google-compute-engine |
google-compute-engine-init-jessie |
google-compute-engine |
google-compute-engine-init-stretch |
google-compute-engine |
google-config |
google-compute-engine |
google-config-jessie |
google-compute-engine |
google-config-stretch |
google-compute-engine |
google-compute-daemon |
python-google-compute-engine |
google-startup-scripts |
google-compute-engine |
An old CentOS 6 image fails to install the packages with an error on SCL
CentOS 6 images prior to v20160526 may fail to install the package with
the error:
http://mirror.centos.org/centos/6/SCL/x86_64/repodata/repomd.xml: [Errno 14] PYCURL ERROR 22 - "The requested URL returned error: 404 Not Found"
Remove the stale repository file:
sudo rm -f /etc/yum.repos.d/CentOS-SCL.repo
On some CentOS or RHEL 6 systems, extraneous python egg directories can cause the python daemons to fail.
In /usr/lib/python2.6/site-packages look for
google_compute_engine-2.4.1-py27.egg-info directories and
google_compute_engine-2.5.2.egg-info directories and delete them if you run
into this problem.
Using boto with virtualenv
Specific to running boto inside of a Python
virtualenv,
virtual environments are isolated from system site-packages. This includes the
installed Linux guest environment libraries that are used to configure boto
credentials. There are two recommended solutions:
- Create a virtual environment with
virtualenv venv --system-site-packages. - Install
botovia the Linux guest environment PyPI package usingpip install google-compute-engine.
Have a patch that will benefit this project? Awesome! Follow these steps to have it accepted.
- Please sign our Contributor License Agreement.
- Fork this Git repository and make your changes.
- Create a Pull Request against the development branch.
- Incorporate review feedback to your changes.
- Accepted!
All files in this repository are under the Apache License, Version 2.0 unless noted otherwise.