Basics operations using pxctl
In this document, we are going to explore the basic operations available through the Portworx command-line tool- pxctl.
By default, the CLI displays the information in human readable form. For example, to learn more about the available commands, type pxctl --help:
pxctl --help
px cli
Usage:
pxctl [command]
Available Commands:
alerts px alerts
auth pxctl auth
clouddrive Manage cloud drives
cloudmigrate Migrate volumes across clusters
cloudsnap Backup and restore snapshots to/from cloud
cluster Manage the cluster
context pxctl context
credentials Manage credentials for cloud providers
eula Show license agreement
help Help about any command
license Manage licenses
role pxctl role
sched-policy Manage schedule policies
secrets Manage Secrets. Supported secret stores AWS KMS | Vault | DCOS Secrets | IBM Key Protect | Kubernetes Secrets | Google Cloud KMS
service Service mode utilities
status Show status summary
storage-policy Manage storage policies for creating volumes
upgrade Upgrade PX
volume Manage volumes
Flags:
--ca string path to root certificate for ssl usage
--cert string path to client certificate for ssl usage
--color output with color coding
--config string config file (default is $HOME/.pxctl.yaml)
--context string context name that overrides the current auth context
-h, --help help for pxctl
-j, --json output in json
--key string path to client key for ssl usage
--output-type string use "wide" to show more details
--raw raw CLI output for instrumentation
--ssl ssl enabled for portworx
-v, --version print version and exit
Use "pxctl [command] --help" for more information about a command.
As seen above, pxctl provides the capability to perform fine-grained control of the Portworx resources cluster-wide. Also, it lets the user manage volumes, snapshots, cluster resources, hosts in the cluster and software upgrade in the cluster.
In addition, every command takes in a --json flag which converts the output to a machine-parsable JSON format. You can do something like the following to save the output in JSON format:
pxctl status --json > status.json
In most production deployments, you will provision volumes directly using Docker or your scheduler (such as a Kubernetes pod spec). However, pxctl also lets you directly provision and manage storage. In addition, pxctl has a rich set of cluster-wide management features which are explained in this document.
All operations available through pxctl are reflected back into the containers that use Portworx storage. In addition to what is exposed in Docker volumes, pxctl:
- Gives access to Portworx storage-specific features, such as cloning a running container’s storage.
- Shows the connection between containers and their storage volumes.
- Lets you control the Portworx storage cluster, such as adding nodes to the cluster. (The Portworx tools refer to servers managed by Portworx storage as nodes.)
The scope of the pxctl command is global to the cluster. Running pxctl on any node within the cluster, therefore, shows the same global details. But pxctl also identifies details specific to that node.
The current release of pxctl is located in the /opt/pwx/bin/ directory of every worker node and requires that you run it as a privileged user.
Let's look at some simple commands.
Version
Here's how to find out the current version:
pxctl --version
pxctl version 2.7.0.0-886586d
Status
This section has been moved to the status page.
Upgrade related operations
pxctl provides access to several upgrade related operations. You can get details on how to use it and of the available flags by running:
pxctl upgrade --help
Usage:
pxctl upgrade [flags]
Flags:
-l, --tag string Specify a PX Docker image tag
-h, --help help for upgrade
Global Flags:
--ca string path to root certificate for ssl usage
--cert string path to client certificate for ssl usage
--color output with color coding
--config string config file (default is $HOME/.pxctl.yaml)
--context string context name that overrides the current auth context
-j, --json output in json
--key string path to client key for ssl usage
--raw raw CLI output for instrumentation
--ssl ssl enabled for portworx
Running pxctl upgrade
pxctl upgrade upgrades the Portworx version on a node. Let's suppose you want to upgrade Portworx to version 1.1.16. If so, you would then type the following command:
pxctl upgrade --tag 1.1.6 my-px-enterprise
Upgrading my-px-enterprise to version: portworx/px-enterprise:1.1.6
Downloading PX portworx/px-enterprise:1.1.6 layers...
<Output truncated>
It is recommended to upgrade the nodes in a staggered manner. This way, the quorum and the continuity of IOs will be maintained.
Related topics
- For information about upgrading Portworx through Kubernetes, refer to the Upgrade on Kubernetes page.
- If you’re using the Portworx Operator, refer to the Upgrade Portworx using the Operator page.
Login/Authentication
You must make Portworx login to the secrets endpoint when using encrypted volumes and ACLs.
pxctl secrets can be used to configure authentication credentials and endpoints.
Currently, Vault, Amazon KMS, and KVDB are supported.
Vault example
Here's an example of configuring Portworx with Vault:
pxctl secrets vault login --vault-address http://myvault.myorg.com --vault-token myvaulttoken
Successfully authenticated with Vault.
To install and configure Vault, peruse this link
AWS KMS example
To configure Portworx with Amazon KMS, type the following command:
pxctl secrets aws login
Then, you will be asked a few questions:
Enter AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID [Hit Enter to ignore]: ***
Enter AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY [Hit Enter to ignore]: ***
Enter AWS_SECRET_TOKEN_KEY [Hit Enter to ignore]: ***
Enter AWS_CMK [Hit Enter to ignore]: mykey
Enter AWS_REGION [Hit Enter to ignore]: us-east-1b
Finally, a success message will be displayed:
Successfully authenticated with AWS.
EULA
You can get a link to our EULA by running:
pxctl eula
https://portworx.com/end-user-license-agreement