Step-by-Step Guide to Deploying an OpenStack Cloud with Kolla (All‑in‑One)

1 Introduction

We set up an OpenStack cloud platform for a friend using the Kolla project to deploy the Stein release.

Kolla automates OpenStack deployment with Docker and Ansible; Docker handles image building and container management, while Ansible manages environment provisioning.

2 Experiment Environment

Because of limited laptop resources, we use an all‑in‑one mode where all services run on a single host.

Mastering the all‑in‑one deployment makes multi‑node setups much easier.

2.1 System Preparation

2.2 Logical Topology Diagram

3 Deployment Steps

3.1 Linux System Configuration

Configure host network interfaces

Disable firewalld, SELinux and libvirtd services

[root@qll251 ~]# systemctl stop firewalld
[root@qll251 ~]# systemctl disable firewalld

[root@qll251 ~]# vim /etc/selinux/config
# change SELINUX=enforcing to SELINUX=disabled

[root@qll251 ~]# systemctl stop libvirtd.service
[root@qll251 ~]# systemctl disable libvirtd.service

[root@qll251 ~]# reboot # apply changes

Install EPEL repository yum -y install epel-release Install common CentOS utilities

yum install -y vim net-tools bash-completion-extras git

Question: What does the bash-completion-extras package provide?

Set hostname and /etc/hosts

[root@qll251 ~]# hostname qll251
[root@qll251 ~]# echo "qll251" > /etc/hostname
[root@qll251 ~]# echo "192.168.1.251  qll251" >> /etc/hosts

Synchronize time

[root@qll251 ~]# yum -y install ntp
[root@qll251 ~]# systemctl start ntpd
[root@qll251 ~]# systemctl enable ntpd

Configure pip mirror for faster Python package downloads

[root@qll251 ~]# mkdir ~/.pip
[root@qll251 ~]# vim ~/.pip/pip.conf
[global]
index-url = http://mirrors.aliyun.com/pypi/simple/
[install]
trusted-host=mirrors.aliyun.com

3.2 Install Base Packages and Docker

Install development tools

yum -y install python-devel libffi-devel gcc openssl-devel python-pip

Upgrade pip to avoid later warnings

Install Docker CE

Install dependencies

yum -y install yum-utils device-mapper-persistent-data lvm2

Add Docker CE repository

yum-config-manager --add-repo http://mirrors.aliyun.com/docker-ce/linux/centos/docker-ce.repo

Install Docker CE yum -y install docker-ce Start Docker service

systemctl start docker
systemctl enable docker

Configure Docker image registry mirror

[root@qll251 ~]# vim /etc/docker/daemon.json
# add:
{
  "registry-mirrors": ["https://0i6rnnzu.mirror.aliyuncs.com"]
}

This mirror address was obtained from Alibaba Cloud and can be used directly.

Set Docker volume mount mode

[root@qll251 ~]# mkdir /etc/systemd/system/docker.service.d
[root@qll251 ~]# vim /etc/systemd/system/docker.service.d/kolla.conf
# add:
[Service]
MountFlags=shared

MountFlags=shared allows Docker to recognize new host partitions without restarting, which is convenient when using Cinder storage later.

Reload systemd and restart Docker

systemctl daemon-reload
systemctl restart docker
systemctl enable docker

3.3 Get Kolla and Kolla‑Ansible from GitHub

Install Ansible yum -y install ansible Clone the repositories

git clone https://github.com/openstack/kolla -b stable/stein
git clone https://github.com/openstack/kolla-ansible -b stable/stein
# If images already exist, only the second step is needed

Manually install kolla‑ansible python ~/kolla-ansible/setup.py install Install kolla‑ansible dependencies

[root@qll251 ~]# pip install -r /root/kolla-ansible/requirements.txt

If the above fails, force‑install the required package:

[root@qll251 ~]# pip install --ignore-installed PyYAML

Install Kolla dependencies

[root@qll251 ~]# pip install -r /root/kolla/requirements.txt

If you encounter version conflicts (e.g., requests 2.20.0 requires idna<2.8,>=2.5), force‑upgrade:

[root@qll251 ~]# pip install --ignore-installed requests

Copy configuration files

[root@qll251 ~]# cd ~/kolla-ansible/
[root@qll251 kolla-ansible]# cp -r ./etc/kolla/* /etc/kolla/
[root@qll251 kolla-ansible]# cp ./ansible/inventory/* /etc/kolla/
# List copied files
[root@qll251 ~]# ls /etc/kolla/
all-in-one  globals.yml  multinode  passwords.yml

Explanation of the files:

all-in-one : Ansible playbook for single‑node OpenStack deployment

multinode : Playbook for multi‑node deployment

globals.yml : Custom OpenStack configuration

passwords.yml : Service passwords

Generate random passwords

[root@qll251 ~]# kolla-genpwd

Kolla’s password generator creates passwords for all OpenStack services; missing passwords will cause later checks to fail.

Modify the generated passwords file

[root@qll251 ~]# vim /etc/kolla/passwords.yml
# For easier Dashboard login, change the admin password to 123123
keystone_admin_password: 123123

Edit globals.yml to match the environment

[root@qll251 ~]# vim /etc/kolla/globals.yml
kolla_base_distro: "centos"
kolla_install_type: "binary"
openstack_release: "stein"
# All‑in‑one mode, no HA; set host IP
kolla_internal_vip_address: "192.168.1.251"
network_interface: "eth0"
neutron_external_interface: "eth1"
enable_haproxy: "no"

3.4 Deploy OpenStack

Generate SSH key and authorize the node

ssh-keygen
ssh-copy-id [email protected]

Adjust the all‑in‑one inventory file

[root@qll251 ~]# vim /etc/kolla/all-in-one
# Replace all occurrences of localhost with qll251
:1,$s/localhost/qll251/
# Remove lines containing ansible_connection=local
:1,$s/ansible_connection=local//

This step is optional for single‑node deployment, but we walk through it for completeness.

Bootstrap the Kolla server

[root@qll251 ~]# kolla-ansible -i /etc/kolla/all-in-one bootstrap-servers

Result screenshot omitted for brevity.

Run pre‑deployment checks

[root@qll251 ~]# kolla-ansible -i /etc/kolla/all-in-one prechecks

If this succeeds, the rest of the deployment should proceed without major issues.

Congratulations if you reach this point!

Pull OpenStack Docker images

[root@qll251 ~]# kolla-ansible -i /etc/kolla/all-in-one pull

Images are downloaded from the official repositories.

Deploy OpenStack kolla-ansible -i /etc/kolla/all-in-one deploy Post‑deployment verification

kolla-ansible -i /etc/kolla/all-in-one post-deploy

If the command finishes successfully, the OpenStack environment is ready.

The admin credentials are stored in /etc/kolla/admin-openrc.sh and look like this:

4 Access the OpenStack Dashboard

Open a browser and navigate to http://192.168.1.251.

Username: admin

Password: 123123 (change this in production environments).

The password was set in passwords.yml ; using a simple password is only for demonstration.

Deployment is complete; the next article will cover basic OpenStack usage and creating a test VM via the CLI.

5 Final Remarks

Even though the deployment went smoothly for us, you may encounter errors; careful attention to configuration details (extra spaces, mixed character sets, etc.) is essential.

Most errors are caused by small oversights; with patience and diligence you can successfully deploy OpenStack.