[ec2-beta] ec2 & upgrade testing

[Eric Hammond]

Michael:

There are a few ways to get more than 10 GB effectively or actually on a
root file system on a running EC2 instance.

Depending on your needs and the level of complexity you're willing to
deal with, the data can even be persistent and/or can be used as an
image to start multiple instances (though not exactly an AMI).

Can you share more about what goals you are trying to accomplish and the
processes you use?

--
Eric Hammond
ehammond at thinksome.com



Robbie Williamson wrote:
> Great work, Michael!  I'm copying the ec2-beta list, as people on it will be
> interested and can also help you, if needed. ;)
> 
> -Robbie
> 
> On 01/16/2009 08:56 AM, Michael Vogt wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> I worked on the ec2 upgrade testing stuff today and yesterday and I
>> have a working prototype now in the lp:~mvo/update-manager/ec2
>> branch. It can test upgrades in a ec2 instance in a similar fashion as
>> the current kvm backend. I created the base images with vmbuilder
>> (from my lp:~mvo/vmbuilder/mvo branch that contains some fixes against
>> trunk/).
>>
>> I did a successful automatic/unattended-upgrade for the server and the
>> ubuntu-desktop profile. But my code is still prototypish and needs
>> some cleanup love.
>>
>> One pretty anoying limiation currently seems to be that the size of a
>> image (a AMI) seems to be limited to 10Gb [1]. That is not enough for a
>> full blown upgrade test that includes most packages in main (it is
>> sufficient for our various default installs).
>>
>> Its a good addition to the kvm based backend but its still useful to
>> keep the kvm one around. Its nice to be able to boot a kvm upgraded
>> image and login to test stuff manually (or verify upgrade bugs).
>>
>> There is still a lot of room for improvements in the ec2 backend. I
>> just use a single base AMI right now for everything, this should be
>> changed so that each base image becomes its own ami. I also don't make
>> any use of the ec2-volumes yet (but I'm not quite sure yet if they are
>> useful for my use-case). I'm still learning how everything fits
>> together :) 
>>
>> Cheers,
>>  Michael
>>
>>
>>
>> [1] http://developer.amazonwebservices.com/connect/entry.jspa?externalID=1145 
>> (question: "When I try to bundle my AMI, it fails. Why?")
> 
>