Notice

This document is for a development version of Ceph.

Configuring Ceph

When Ceph services start, the initialization process activates a set of daemons that run in the background. A Ceph Storage Cluster runs at least three types of daemons:

Any Ceph Storage Cluster that supports the Ceph File System also runs at least one Ceph Metadata Server (ceph-mds). Any Cluster that supports Ceph Object Storage runs Ceph RADOS Gateway daemons (radosgw).

Each daemon has a number of configuration options, and each of those options has a default value. Adjust the behavior of the system by changing these configuration options. Make sure to understand the consequences before overriding the default values, as it is possible to significantly degrade the performance and stability of your cluster. Remember that default values sometimes change between releases. For this reason, it is best to review the version of this documentation that applies to your Ceph release.

Option names

Each of the Ceph configuration options has a unique name that consists of words formed with lowercase characters and connected with underscore characters (_).

When option names are specified on the command line, underscore (_) and dash (-) characters can be used interchangeably (for example, --mon-host is equivalent to --mon_host).

When option names appear in configuration files, spaces can also be used in place of underscores or dashes. However, for the sake of clarity and convenience, we suggest that you consistently use underscores, as we do throughout this documentation.

Config sources

Each Ceph daemon, process, and library pulls its configuration from one or more of the several sources listed below. Sources that occur later in the list override those that occur earlier in the list (when both are present).

  • the compiled-in default value

  • the monitor cluster’s centralized configuration database

  • a configuration file stored on the local host

  • environment variables

  • command-line arguments

  • runtime overrides that are set by an administrator

One of the first things a Ceph process does on startup is parse the configuration options provided via the command line, via the environment, and via the local configuration file. Next, the process contacts the monitor cluster to retrieve centrally-stored configuration for the entire cluster. After a complete view of the configuration is available, the startup of the daemon or process will commence.

Bootstrap options

Bootstrap options are configuration options that affect the process’s ability to contact the monitors, to authenticate, and to retrieve the cluster-stored configuration. For this reason, these options might need to be stored locally on the node, and set by means of a local configuration file. These options include the following:

mon_host

This is a list of IP addresses or hostnames that are separated by commas, whitespace, or semicolons. Hostnames are resolved via DNS. All A and AAAA records are included in the search list.

type

str

mon_host_override

This is the list of monitors that the Ceph process initially contacts when first establishing communication with the Ceph cluster. This overrides the known monitor list that is derived from MonMap updates sent to older Ceph instances (like librados cluster handles). This option is expected to be useful primarily for debugging.

type

str

  • mon_dns_srv_name

  • mon_data, osd_data, mds_data, mgr_data, and similar options that define which local directory the daemon stores its data in.

  • keyring, keyfile, and/or key, which can be used to specify the authentication credential to use to authenticate with the monitor. Note that in most cases the default keyring location is in the data directory specified above.

In most cases, there is no reason to modify the default values of these options. However, there is one exception to this: the mon_host option that identifies the addresses of the cluster’s monitors. But when DNS is used to identify monitors, a local Ceph configuration file can be avoided entirely.

Skipping monitor config

The option --no-mon-config can be passed in any command in order to skip the step that retrieves configuration information from the cluster’s monitors. Skipping this retrieval step can be useful in cases where configuration is managed entirely via configuration files, or when maintenance activity needs to be done but the monitor cluster is down.

Configuration sections

Each of the configuration options associated with a single process or daemon has a single value. However, the values for a configuration option can vary across daemon types, and can vary even across different daemons of the same type. Ceph options that are stored in the monitor configuration database or in local configuration files are grouped into sections — so-called “configuration sections” — to indicate which daemons or clients they apply to.

These sections include the following:

global

Settings under global affect all daemons and clients in a Ceph Storage Cluster.

Example

log_file = /var/log/ceph/$cluster-$type.$id.log

mon

Settings under mon affect all ceph-mon daemons in the Ceph Storage Cluster, and override the same setting in global.

Example

mon_cluster_log_to_syslog = true

mgr

Settings in the mgr section affect all ceph-mgr daemons in the Ceph Storage Cluster, and override the same setting in global.

Example

mgr_stats_period = 10

osd

Settings under osd affect all ceph-osd daemons in the Ceph Storage Cluster, and override the same setting in global.

Example

osd_op_queue = wpq

mds

Settings in the mds section affect all ceph-mds daemons in the Ceph Storage Cluster, and override the same setting in global.

Example

mds_cache_memory_limit = 10G

client

Settings under client affect all Ceph clients (for example, mounted Ceph File Systems, mounted Ceph Block Devices) as well as RADOS Gateway (RGW) daemons.

Example

objecter_inflight_ops = 512

Configuration sections can also specify an individual daemon or client name. For example, mon.foo, osd.123, and client.smith are all valid section names.

Any given daemon will draw its settings from the global section, the daemon- or client-type section, and the section sharing its name. Settings in the most-specific section take precedence so precedence: for example, if the same option is specified in both global, mon, and mon.foo on the same source (i.e. that is, in the same configuration file), the mon.foo setting will be used.

If multiple values of the same configuration option are specified in the same section, the last value specified takes precedence.

Note that values from the local configuration file always take precedence over values from the monitor configuration database, regardless of the section in which they appear.

Metavariables

Metavariables dramatically simplify Ceph storage cluster configuration. When a metavariable is set in a configuration value, Ceph expands the metavariable at the time the configuration value is used. In this way, Ceph metavariables behave similarly to the way that variable expansion works in the Bash shell.

Ceph supports the following metavariables:

$cluster

Expands to the Ceph Storage Cluster name. Useful when running multiple Ceph Storage Clusters on the same hardware.

Example

/etc/ceph/$cluster.keyring

Default

ceph

$type

Expands to a daemon or process type (for example, mds, osd, or mon)

Example

/var/lib/ceph/$type

$id

Expands to the daemon or client identifier. For osd.0, this would be 0; for mds.a, it would be a.

Example

/var/lib/ceph/$type/$cluster-$id

$host

Expands to the host name where the process is running.

$name

Expands to $type.$id.

Example

/var/run/ceph/$cluster-$name.asok

$pid

Expands to daemon pid.

Example

/var/run/ceph/$cluster-$name-$pid.asok

Ceph configuration file

On startup, Ceph processes search for a configuration file in the following locations:

  1. $CEPH_CONF (that is, the path following the $CEPH_CONF environment variable)

  2. -c path/path (that is, the -c command line argument)

  3. /etc/ceph/$cluster.conf

  4. ~/.ceph/$cluster.conf

  5. ./$cluster.conf (that is, in the current working directory)

  6. On FreeBSD systems only, /usr/local/etc/ceph/$cluster.conf

Here $cluster is the cluster’s name (default: ceph).

The Ceph configuration file uses an ini style syntax. You can add “comment text” after a pound sign (#) or a semi-colon semicolon (;). For example:

# <--A number (#) sign number sign (#) precedes a comment.
; A comment may be anything.
# Comments always follow a semi-colon semicolon (;) or a pound sign (#) on each line.
# The end of the line terminates a comment.
# We recommend that you provide comments in your configuration file(s).

Config file section names

The configuration file is divided into sections. Each section must begin with a valid configuration section name (see Configuration sections, above) that is surrounded by square brackets. For example:

[global]
debug_ms = 0

[osd]
debug_ms = 1

[osd.1]
debug_ms = 10

[osd.2]
debug_ms = 10

Config file option values

The value of a configuration option is a string. If the string is too long to fit on a single line, you can put a backslash (\) at the end of the line and the backslash will act as a line continuation marker. In such a case, the value of the option will be the string after = in the current line, combined with the string in the next line. Here is an example:

[global]
foo = long long ago\
long ago

In this example, the value of the “foo” option is “long long ago long ago”.

An option value typically ends with either a newline or a comment. For example:

[global]
obscure_one = difficult to explain # I will try harder in next release
simpler_one = nothing to explain

In this example, the value of the “obscure one” option is “difficult to explain” and the value of the “simpler one options is “nothing to explain”.

When an option value contains spaces, it can be enclosed within single quotes or double quotes in order to make its scope clear and in order to make sure that the first space in the value is not interpreted as the end of the value. For example:

[global]
line = "to be, or not to be"

In option values, there are four characters that are treated as escape characters: =, #, ; and [. They are permitted to occur in an option value only if they are immediately preceded by the backslash character (\). For example:

[global]
secret = "i love \# and \["

Each configuration option falls under one of the following types:

int

64-bit signed integer. Some SI suffixes are supported, such as “K”, “M”, “G”, “T”, “P”, and “E” (meaning, respectively, 103, 106, 109, etc.). “B” is the only supported unit string. Thus “1K”, “1M”, “128B” and “-1” are all valid option values. When a negative value is assigned to a threshold option, this can indicate that the option is “unlimited” -- that is, that there is no threshold or limit in effect.

Example

42, -1

uint

This differs from integer only in that negative values are not permitted.

Example

256, 0

str

A string encoded in UTF-8. Certain characters are not permitted. Reference the above notes for the details.

Example

"hello world", "i love \#", yet-another-name

boolean

Typically either of the two values true or false. However, any integer is permitted: “0” implies false, and any non-zero value implies true.

Example

true, false, 1, 0

addr

A single address, optionally prefixed with v1, v2 or any for the messenger protocol. If no prefix is specified, the v2 protocol is used. For more details, see Address formats.

Example

v1:1.2.3.4:567, v2:1.2.3.4:567, 1.2.3.4:567, 2409:8a1e:8fb6:aa20:1260:4bff:fe92:18f5::567, [::1]:6789

addrvec

A set of addresses separated by “,”. The addresses can be optionally quoted with [ and ].

Example

[v1:1.2.3.4:567,v2:1.2.3.4:568], v1:1.2.3.4:567,v1:1.2.3.14:567 [2409:8a1e:8fb6:aa20:1260:4bff:fe92:18f5::567], [2409:8a1e:8fb6:aa20:1260:4bff:fe92:18f5::568]

uuid

The string format of a uuid defined by RFC4122. Certain variants are also supported: for more details, see Boost document.

Example

f81d4fae-7dec-11d0-a765-00a0c91e6bf6

size

64-bit unsigned integer. Both SI prefixes and IEC prefixes are supported. “B” is the only supported unit string. Negative values are not permitted.

Example

1Ki, 1K, 1KiB and 1B.

secs

Denotes a duration of time. The default unit of time is the second. The following units of time are supported:

  • second: s, sec, second, seconds

  • minute: m, min, minute, minutes

  • hour: hs, hr, hour, hours

  • day: d, day, days

  • week: w, wk, week, weeks

  • month: mo, month, months

  • year: y, yr, year, years

Example

1 m, 1m and 1 week

Monitor configuration database

The monitor cluster manages a database of configuration options that can be consumed by the entire cluster. This allows for streamlined central configuration management of the entire system. For ease of administration and transparency, the vast majority of configuration options can and should be stored in this database.

Some settings might need to be stored in local configuration files because they affect the ability of the process to connect to the monitors, to authenticate, and to fetch configuration information. In most cases this applies only to the mon_host option. This issue can be avoided by using DNS SRV records.

Sections and masks

Configuration options stored by the monitor can be stored in a global section, in a daemon-type section, or in a specific daemon section. In this, they are no different from the options in a configuration file.

In addition, options may have a mask associated with them to further restrict which daemons or clients the option applies to. Masks take two forms:

  1. type:location where type is a CRUSH property like rack or host, and location is a value for that property. For example, host:foo would limit the option only to daemons or clients running on a particular host.

  2. class:device-class where device-class is the name of a CRUSH device class (for example, hdd or ssd). For example, class:ssd would limit the option only to OSDs backed by SSDs. (This mask has no effect on non-OSD daemons or clients.)

In commands that specify a configuration option, the argument of the option (in the following examples, this is the “who” string) may be a section name, a mask, or a combination of both separated by a slash character (/). For example, osd/rack:foo would refer to all OSD daemons in the foo rack.

When configuration options are shown, the section name and mask are presented in separate fields or columns to make them more readable.

Commands

The following CLI commands are used to configure the cluster:

  • ceph config dump dumps the entire monitor configuration database for the cluster.

  • ceph config get <who> dumps the configuration options stored in the monitor configuration database for a specific daemon or client (for example, mds.a).

  • ceph config get <who> <option> shows either a configuration value stored in the monitor configuration database for a specific daemon or client (for example, mds.a), or, if that value is not present in the monitor configuration database, the compiled-in default value.

  • ceph config set <who> <option> <value> specifies a configuration option in the monitor configuration database.

  • ceph config show <who> shows the configuration for a running daemon. These settings might differ from those stored by the monitors if there are also local configuration files in use or if options have been overridden on the command line or at run time. The source of the values of the options is displayed in the output.

  • ceph config assimilate-conf -i <input file> -o <output file> ingests a configuration file from input file and moves any valid options into the monitor configuration database. Any settings that are unrecognized, are invalid, or cannot be controlled by the monitor will be returned in an abbreviated configuration file stored in output file. This command is useful for transitioning from legacy configuration files to centralized monitor-based configuration.

Note that ceph config set <who> <option> <value> and ceph config get <who> <option> will not necessarily return the same values. The latter command will show compiled-in default values. In order to determine whether a configuration option is present in the monitor configuration database, run ceph config dump.

Help

To get help for a particular option, run the following command:

ceph config help <option>

For example:

ceph config help log_file
log_file - path to log file
 (std::string, basic)
 Default (non-daemon):
 Default (daemon): /var/log/ceph/$cluster-$name.log
 Can update at runtime: false
 See also: [log_to_stderr,err_to_stderr,log_to_syslog,err_to_syslog]

or:

ceph config help log_file -f json-pretty
{
    "name": "log_file",
    "type": "std::string",
    "level": "basic",
    "desc": "path to log file",
    "long_desc": "",
    "default": "",
    "daemon_default": "/var/log/ceph/$cluster-$name.log",
    "tags": [],
    "services": [],
    "see_also": [
        "log_to_stderr",
        "err_to_stderr",
        "log_to_syslog",
        "err_to_syslog"
    ],
    "enum_values": [],
    "min": "",
    "max": "",
    "can_update_at_runtime": false
}

The level property can be basic, advanced, or dev. The dev options are intended for use by developers, generally for testing purposes, and are not recommended for use by operators.

Note

This command uses the configuration schema that is compiled into the running monitors. If you have a mixed-version cluster (as might exist, for example, during an upgrade), you might want to query the option schema from a specific running daemon by running a command of the following form:

ceph daemon <name> config help [option]

Runtime Changes

In most cases, Ceph permits changes to the configuration of a daemon at run time. This can be used for increasing or decreasing the amount of logging output, for enabling or disabling debug settings, and for runtime optimization.

Use the ceph config set command to update configuration options. For example, to enable the most verbose debug log level on a specific OSD, run a command of the following form:

ceph config set osd.123 debug_ms 20

Note

If an option has been customized in a local configuration file, the central config setting will be ignored because it has a lower priority than the local configuration file.

Note

Log levels range from 0 to 20.

Override values

Options can be set temporarily by using the Ceph CLI tell or daemon interfaces on the Ceph CLI. These override values are ephemeral, which means that they affect only the current instance of the daemon and revert to persistently configured values when the daemon restarts.

Override values can be set in two ways:

  1. From any host, send a message to a daemon with a command of the following form:

    ceph tell <name> config set <option> <value>
    

    For example:

    ceph tell osd.123 config set debug_osd 20
    

    The tell command can also accept a wildcard as the daemon identifier. For example, to adjust the debug level on all OSD daemons, run a command of the following form:

    ceph tell osd.* config set debug_osd 20
    
  2. On the host where the daemon is running, connect to the daemon via a socket in /var/run/ceph by running a command of the following form:

    ceph daemon <name> config set <option> <value>
    

    For example:

    ceph daemon osd.4 config set debug_osd 20
    

Note

In the output of the ceph config show command, these temporary values are shown to have a source of override.

Viewing runtime settings

You can see the current settings specified for a running daemon with the ceph config show command. For example, to see the (non-default) settings for the daemon osd.0, run the following command:

ceph config show osd.0

To see a specific setting, run the following command:

ceph config show osd.0 debug_osd

To see all settings (including those with default values), run the following command:

ceph config show-with-defaults osd.0

You can see all settings for a daemon that is currently running by connecting to it on the local host via the admin socket. For example, to dump all current settings, run the following command:

ceph daemon osd.0 config show

To see non-default settings and to see where each value came from (for example, a config file, the monitor, or an override), run the following command:

ceph daemon osd.0 config diff

To see the value of a single setting, run the following command:

ceph daemon osd.0 config get debug_osd

Changes introduced in Octopus

The Octopus release changed the way the configuration file is parsed. These changes are as follows:

  • Repeated configuration options are allowed, and no warnings will be displayed. This means that the setting that comes last in the file is the one that takes effect. Prior to this change, Ceph displayed warning messages when lines containing duplicate options were encountered, such as:

    warning line 42: 'foo' in section 'bar' redefined
    
  • Prior to Octopus, options containing invalid UTF-8 characters were ignored with warning messages. But in Octopus, they are treated as fatal errors.

  • The backslash character \ is used as the line-continuation marker that combines the next line with the current one. Prior to Octopus, there was a requirement that any end-of-line backslash be followed by a non-empty line. But in Octopus, an empty line following a backslash is allowed.

  • In the configuration file, each line specifies an individual configuration option. The option’s name and its value are separated with =, and the value may be enclosed within single or double quotes. If an invalid configuration is specified, we will treat it as an invalid configuration file:

    bad option ==== bad value
    
  • Prior to Octopus, if no section name was specified in the configuration file, all options would be set as though they were within the global section. This approach is discouraged. Since Octopus, any configuration file that has no section name must contain only a single option.

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