Description

This is a Heat template to deploy Load Balanced Drupal servers with a backend database server.

Requirements

• A Heat provider that supports the following:
  • OS::Heat::ChefSolo
  • OS::Heat::RandomString
  • Rackspace::Cloud::LoadBalancer
  • OS::Heat::ResourceGroup
  • Rackspace::Cloud::Server
  • OS::Nova::KeyPair
• An OpenStack username, password, and tenant id.
• python-heatclient >= v0.2.8:

pip install python-heatclient

We recommend installing the client within a Python virtual environment.

Parameters

Parameters can be replaced with your own values when standing up a stack. Use the -P flag to specify a custom parameter.

• username: Username for the Drupal admin login (Default: admin)
• master_server_hostname: Hostname to use for your Drupal web-master server. (Default: Drupal-Master)
• image: Required: Server image used for all servers that are created as a part of this deployment. (Default: Ubuntu 12.04 LTS (Precise Pangolin))
• child_template: Location of the child template to use for the Drupal web servers (Default: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/rackspace-orchestration-templates/drupal-multi/master/drupal-web-server.yaml)
• web_server_count: Number of web servers to deploy in addition to the web-master (Default: 1)
• load_balancer_hostname: Hostname for the Cloud Load Balancer (Default: Drupal-Load-Balancer)
• domain: Domain to be used with this Drupal site (Default: example.com)
• master_server_flavor: Cloud Server size to use for the web-master node. The size should be at least one size larger than what you use for the web nodes. This server handles all admin calls and will ensure files are synced across all other nodes. (Default: 2 GB Performance)
• database_server_flavor: Cloud Server size to use for the database server. Sizes refer to the amount of RAM allocated to the server. (Default: 4 GB Performance)
• kitchen: URL for the kitchen to use, fetched using git (Default: https://github.com/rackspace-orchestration-templates/drupal-multi)
• web_server_flavor: Cloud Server size to use on all of the additional web nodes. (Default: 2 GB Performance)
• database_name: Drupal database name (Default: drupal)
• web_server_hostnames: Hostname to use for all additional Drupal web nodes (Default: Drupal-Web%index%)
• database_server_hostname: Hostname to use for your Drupal Database Server (Default: Drupal-Database)
• version: Version of Drupal to install (Default: 7.32)
• chef_version: Version of chef client to use (Default: 11.14.6)

Outputs

Once a stack comes online, use heat output-list to see all available outputs. Use heat output-show <OUTPUT NAME> to get the value of a specific output.

• private_key: SSH Private IP
• load_balancer_ip: Load Balancer IP
• drupal_url: Drupal URL
• mysql_root_password: MySQL Root Password
• drupal_password: Drupal Password
• web_ips: Web Server IPs
• database_server_ip: Database Server IP
• web_master_ip: Web-Master IP
• drupal_user: Drupal User

For multi-line values, the response will come in an escaped form. To get rid of the escapes, use echo -e '<STRING>' > file.txt. For vim users, a substitution can be done within a file using %s/\\n/\r/g.

Stack Details

Getting Started

If you're new to Drupal, check out Getting started with Drupal 7 administration. The getting started document will help guide you through the initial steps of checking your site's status, customizing your site's informaion, adding users, and more!

Logging in via SSH

The private key provided in the passwords section can be used to login as root via SSH. We have an article on how to use these keys with Mac OS X and Linux as well as Windows using PuTTY.

Details of Your Setup

This deployment was stood up using chef-solo. Once the deployment is up, chef will not run again, so it is safe to modify configurations.

A system user called 'drupal' has been created as a part of this deployment. There is no password associated with this account. You will need to set a password for this user if you'd like to use the account for transferring content, backups, or other purposes. Since the account has no password, no one will be able to login as this user until a password is set.

Drupal was installed using Drush. Drupal is installed into /var/www/drupal and served by Apache. The Apache configuration is in /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/drupal.conf. Any changes to the configuration would require a restart of Apache.

Lsyncd has been in installed to sync static content across the front end servers. All new content will be published to the master node and then synced across with lsync to the other web nodes. When uploading content while migrating a site, you'll only need to upload the content to the master node. The configuration for lsync can be found in /etc/lsyncd.

MySQL is the database backend used in this deployment. The MySQL root password is included in the password section of this deployment. If you do lose the password, it is also available in /root/.my.cnf on the database server itself. MySQL backups are performed locally by Holland. The backups will be stored in /var/lib/mysqlbackup on the database server.

Updating Drupal

Drupal does provide community documentation on how to upgrade your installation of Drupal. There are several steps involved with the upgrade process. First, make sure to backup your site files and your database prior to taking any steps to replace the core site files. There are number of other tutorials available on places like YouTube that can also step you though the upgrade/update process. There is not currently a way to perform these upgrades automatically through the admin interface. Since you have selected the multi-server option, you will only need to upgrade the master node, and lsync will take care of syncing everything to the other web nodes.

Migrating an Existing Site

Moving a Drupal site can be both difficult and time consuming. Drupal Modules such as the Backup and Migrate module can help you move your database content. We recommend backing everything up on both the source and destination locations before anything is done. The content you want to move over will be in the 'sites' directory. If you're running a single Drupal site, you may just need the content of 'sites/default/files' along with your database. Be careful not to overwrite the settings.php file within your site. It contains the database configuration for your site.

This deployment has all of the core drupal files in place, and their permissions are properly set. Be careful with ownership and permissions as you move things over. If you're unsure, check the original ownership and permissions of the files in this deployment.

Additional Modules

There are over 22,000 modules that have been created by an enaged developer community. The modules section on Drupal's website provides an easy way to search for and research modules.

Scaling out

This single server deployment is not well suited to be scaled out. We recommend leveraging a multi server option. If content needs to be moved, instructions above regarding migrating an existing site may help with that transition.

Contributing

There are substantial changes still happening within the OpenStack Heat project. Template contribution guidelines will be drafted in the near future.

License

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
You may obtain a copy of the License at

    http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
limitations under the License.