Volumes Explained

Volumes allow applications running on Shipa to use external storage volumes mounted on their filesystem. There are three concepts involved in the process: volume plans, volumes, and volume bind. Volumes equate to Persistent Volumes in Kubernetes.

Volume Plans

Volume plans are managed by Shipa operators and can be configured through both the Shipa Dashboard and CLI. Volume plans describe how each provisioner will create each volume associated with this plan.

Supporting information is available through the sections below and on the Shipa Website:

Volumes

Volumes are created by Shipa users using one of the available Volume Plans. These can be created and managed through both the Shipa CLI and Dashboard.

When managing volumes through Shipa, PersistentVolumeClaim bound to the PersistentVolume is automatically created.

Supporting information is available through the sections below:

Volume Binds

Volume bind associates a given application to a previously created volume. This is the moment when the volume is made available to the application by the provisioner. The bind/unbind actions can be triggered using the Shipa client.

Supporting information is available through the sections below:

Creating New Volumes

shipa volume create <volume-name> <plan-name> [-k/--framework <framework>] [-t/--team <team>] [-c/--capacity] [-am/--access-modes] [-o/--opt key=value]...

The command above creates a new persistent volume based on an existing volume plan.

Flag	Description
--m, --access-modes	(= "") access-mode for the volume, such as ReadWriteOnce. (mandatory)
-c, --capacity	(= "") The size of the volume that should be created by Shipa (mandatory)
-o, --opt	(= {}) Any additional options that should be used by Shipa when creating the volume (not mandatory)
-k, --framework	(= "") the framework that owns the service (mandatory if the user has access to more than one framework)
-t, --team	(= "") the team that owns the service (mandatory if the user has access to more than one team)

Updating Existing Volumes

shipa volume update <volume-name> <plan-name> [-k/--framework <framework>] [-t/--team <team>] [-c/--capacity] [-am/--access-modes] [-o/--opt key=value]...

The command above updates an existing persistent volume.

-o, --opt	(= {}) backend specific volume options
-k, --framework	(= "") the framework that owns the service (mandatory if the user has access to more than one framework)
-t, --team	(= "") the team that owns the service (mandatory if the user has access to more than one team)
--am, --access-modes	(= "") access-mode for the volume, such as ReadWriteOnce. (mandatory)
-c, --capacity	(= "") The size of the volume that should be created by Shipa (mandatory)

Deleting Volumes

shipa volume delete <volume-name>

Deletes an existing persistent volume.

Listing Volumes

shipa volume list

Lists existing persistent volumes.

Creating Volume Plans

shipa volume plan create <name> [--storage-class class]

Creates a volume plan that will be used by Shipa and users when managing volumes. A volume plan is a logical grouping of Volumes. To find the storage class, can check the Kubernetes Storage Class Documentation or run a kubectl command. E.g under name "gp2" would be the Storage Class.

kubectl get storageclass
NAME            PROVISIONER             RECLAIMPOLICY   VOLUMEBINDINGMODE      ALLOWVOLUMEEXPANSION   AGE
gp2 (default)   kubernetes.io/aws-ebs   Delete          WaitForFirstConsumer   false                  4h38m

Flags:

Flag	Description
--storage-class	(= "") Storage class name configured on Kubernetes for the chosen CSI provider (mandatory)

Listing Volume Plans

shipa volume plan list

Lists existing volume plans.

Binding Volumes to Applications

shipa volume bind <volume-name> <mount point> [-a/--app <appname>] [-r/--readonly] [--no-restart]

Binds an existing volume to an application.

Flags:

Flag	Description
-a, --app	(= "") The name of the application
--no-restart	(= false) prevents restarting the application
-r, --readonly	(= false) the volume will be available only for reading

Unbinding Volumes from Applications

shipa volume unbind <volume-name> <mount point> [-a/--app <appname>]

Unbinds a volume from an application.

Flags:

Flag	Description
-a, --app	(= "") The name of the application
--no-restart	(= false) prevents restarting the application

Validating Shipa Volume

You can Shell into the running container and validate the Volume is presented to the container. If a volume was bound at "var/shiparocks" for example.

shipa app list
shipa app shell -a portal
ls -l /var/shiparocks