Architecture & Components¶
Tier5 Cloud runs on OpenStack 2025.1 and utilizes a highly available architecture. Below is a breakdown of the key components available to users.
Management Interfaces (Dashboards)¶
Horizon¶
The canonical web-based user interface for OpenStack services. It provides a comprehensive view for managing instances, networks, and access control.
Skyline¶
A modern, lightweight, and faster dashboard alternative available in Tier5. It offers a streamlined UX for common cloud operations.
Core Infrastructure¶
Identity (Keystone)¶
Keystone provides authentication and authorization for all OpenStack services. It creates the catalog of services and endpoints.
Compute (Nova)¶
Nova is the fabric controller, managing the lifecycle of compute instances (Virtual Machines).
Networking (Neutron)¶
Neutron provides "Network Connectivity as a Service".
- Architecture: Tier5 utilizes OVS (Open vSwitch) with Neutron Agents to provide high-performance L2/L3 networking.
- Features: Security Groups, Load Balancers, Private Networks, and Floating IPs.
Image Service (Glance)¶
Glance discovers, registers, and retrieves virtual machine images. It allows you to upload your own ISOs or QCOW2 images.
Storage¶
Block Storage (Cinder) & Blackstor¶
Cinder provides persistent block storage to running instances.
Backend: Blackstor SDS
Tier5 utilizes Blackstor, a high-performance Software Defined Storage solution developed by PRO-ZETA. Blackstor ensures:
- High IOPS and low latency.
- Data redundancy and self-healing capabilities.
- Seamless integration with Cinder for volume management.
Info
For more details on Blackstor technology, visit www.prozeta.eu.
Advanced Services¶
Orchestration & Containers¶
- Magnum: An API service to make container orchestration engines (like Kubernetes) available as first-class resources in OpenStack.
Security¶
- Barbican: The Key Manager service. It stores and provisions secrets (passwords, encryption keys, X.509 certificates).
Load Balancing¶
- Octavia: An Operator-grade Load Balancing solution. It allows you to create load balancers to distribute traffic across your instances.
Note on Object Storage
Swift is not deployed in this environment. For object storage requirements, please contact support for S3-compatible alternatives or Blackstor integrations.