The instructions in this guide cover only Vines related issues. Therefore, prior knowledge of the Apache CloudStack platform and NFV concepts and terminology is strongly recommended. The following contents can be consulted to clarify doubts or to revise the previously required content:
At the moment, all Vines functionalities are only accessed through API calls. Then, each instruction in this guide will introduce a certain management operation and indicate which API call should be used to execute it. For more information on using the Vines API, see the API Documentation.
The following instructions are ordered sequentially. So, this guide works as a walkthrough.
When preparing your CloudStack/Vines deployment (following the Installation Guide) you may have run one or more EMS instances. All EMSes must be registered on the platform so that the communication between each EMS and the VNFM is properly established.
Use the registerEms operation to register each EMS instance.
A VNF Package (VNFP) is responsible for storing all artifacts related to a VNF. This can include the VNF Descriptor (VNFD), scripts, binaries files, source code, etc.
Vines supports CSAR (Cloud Service Archive) VNFPs. It is possible to use VNFPs in zip format and Git repositories, as long as the CSAR specification is followed correctly.
Preparing a VNFP involves gathering all the artifacts related to the VNF and registering them correctly in the descriptors of the VNFP itself. Therefore, before assembling the VNFP, each of the items must be prepared. These are some examples of what you will need:
When preparing the VNFP, all descriptors must also be prepared. This includes the manifest file, the TOSCA.meta file and the VNF Descriptor (VNFD). See more details about the content of these files in the VNFP Examples.
Some VNFPs already made are available. You can use them to test your CloudStack/Vines deployment or use them as a model for creating your own VNFPs.
Examples of VNFPs in Git repositories: Examples of VNFPs in Zip format:To use your VNFPs in order to deploy VNF instances from them, you will need to send the VNFPs into your CloudStack/Vines deployment. The set of on-boarding VNFPs compose the Vines VNF Catalog.
When you on-boarding a particular VNFP to Vines, you do not upload the VNFP. You will pass to Vines a address that it can use to download the VNFP. So, if the VNFP is in a zip file format, first you need to make it available on some accessible host (via HTTP or HTTPS) through Vines. If the VNFP is a Git repository, you will simply enter the address of the repository.
To on-board a VNFP to the Vines VNF Catalog use the createVnfp operation. Also, use the listVnfps to get details of one or all VNFPs on-boarded, the updateVnfp to update a given VNFP, and the deleteVnfp operation to remove a VNFP from the VNF Catalog.