Deploy the ASAv on OpenStack

You can deploy the ASAv on OpenStack.

Overview

You can deploy the ASAv in an OpenStack environment. OpenStack is a set of software tools for building and managing cloud computing platforms for public and private clouds, and is tightly integrated with the KVM hypervisor.

Enabling OpenStack platform support for ASAv allows you to run ASAv on open source cloud platforms. OpenStack uses a KVM hypervisor to manage virtual resources. ASAv devices are already supported on KVM hypervisor. Therefore, there is no extra addition of kernel packages or drivers to enable OpenStack support.

Prerequisites for the ASAv and OpenStack

Download the ASAv qcow2 file from software.cisco.com and put it on your Linux host:

http://www.cisco.com/go/asa-software
ASAv supports deployment on opensource OpenStack environment and Cisco VIM managed OpenStack environment.

Set up the OpenStack environment according to the OpenStack guidelines.
- See the opensource OpenStack document:
  
  Stein Release - https://docs.openstack.org/project-deploy-guide/openstack-ansible/stein/overview.html
  
  Queens Release - https://docs.openstack.org/project-deploy-guide/openstack-ansible/queens/overview.html
- See the Cisco Virtualized Infrastructure Manager (VIM) OpenStack document: Cisco Virtualized Infrastructure Manager Documentation, 3.4.3 to 3.4.5
License the ASAv. Until you license the ASAv, it will run in degraded mode, which allows only 100 connections and throughput of 100 Kbps. See Licenses: Smart Software Licensing.
Interface requirements:
- Management interface
- Inside and outside interfaces
Communications paths:
- Management interface—Used to connect the ASAv to the ASDM; can’t be used for traffic.
- Inside interface (required)—Used to connect the ASAv to inside hosts.
- Outside interface (required)—Used to connect the ASAv to the public network.
Communications paths:
- Floating IPs for access into the ASAv.
Minimum supported ASAv version:
- ASA 9.16.1
For OpenStack requirements, see OpenStack Requirements.
For ASAv system requirements, see Cisco ASA Compatibility.

Guidelines and Limitations

Supported Features

The ASAv on OpenStack supports the following features:

Deployment of ASAv on the KVM hypervisor running on a compute node in your OpenStack environment.
OpenStack CLI
Heat template-based deployment
OpenStack Horizon dashboard
Routed mode (default)
Licensing – Only BYOL is supported
ASAv management using the CLI and ASDM
Drivers - VIRTIO, VPP, and SRIOV
IPv6 (version 9.19 and later)

Unsupported Features

The ASAv on OpenStack does not support the following:

Autoscale
OpenStack releases other than the OpenStack Stein and Queens releases
Operating systems other than the Ubuntu 18.04 version and Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 7.6

System Requirements

The OpenStack environment must conform to the following supported hardware and software requirements.

Table 1. Hardware and Software Requirements
Category	Supported Versions	Notes
Server	UCS C240 M5	2 UCS servers are recommended, one each for os-controller and os-compute nodes.
Driver	VIRTIO, IXGBE, I40E	These are the supported drivers.
Operating System	Ubuntu Server 18.04	This is the recommended OS on UCS servers.
OpenStack Version	Stein release	Details of the various OpenStack releases are available at: https://releases.openstack.org/

Table 2. Hardware and Software Requirements for Cisco VIM Managed OpenStack
Category	Supported Versions	Notes
Server Hardware	UCS C220-M5/UCS C240-M4	5 UCS servers are recommended, three each for os-controller and Two or more for os-compute nodes.
Drivers	VIRTIO, SRIOV, and VPP	These are the supported drivers.
Cisco VIM Version	Cisco VIM 3.4.4 Supported on: Operating System - Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.6 OpenStack version - OpenStack 13.0 (Queens Release)	See Cisco Virtualized Infrastructure Manager Documentation, 3.4.3 to 3.4.5 for more information. Details of the various OpenStack releases are available at https://releases.openstack.org/.
Cisco VIM Version	Cisco VIM 4.2.1 Supported on: Operating System - Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.2 OpenStack version - OpenStack 16.1 (Train Release)	See Cisco Virtualized Infrastructure Manager Documentation, 4.2.1 for more information. Details of the various OpenStack releases are available at https://releases.openstack.org/.

Sample Network Topology

The following figure shows the recommended network topology for the ASAv in Routed Firewall Mode with 3 subnets configured in OpenStack for the ASAv (management, inside, and outside).

Figure 2. Sample ASAv on OpenStack Deployment

Deploy the ASAv

Cisco provides sample heat templates for deploying the ASAv. Steps for creating the OpenStack infrastructure resources are combined in a heat template (deploy_os_infra.yaml) file to create networks, subnets, and router interfaces. At a high-level, the ASAv deployment steps are categorized into the following sections.

Upload the ASAv qcow2 image to the OpenStack Glance service.
Create the network infrastructure.
- Network
- Subnet
- Router interface
Create the ASAv instance.
- Flavor
- Security Groups
- Floating IP
- Instance

You can deploy the ASAv on OpenStack using the following steps.

Upload the ASAv Image to OpenStack

Copy the qcow2 image (asav-<version>.qcow2) to the OpenStack controller node, and then upload the image to the OpenStack Glance service.

Before you begin

Download the ASAv qcow2 file from Cisco.com and put it on your Linux host:

http://www.cisco.com/go/asa-software

Note

A Cisco.com login and Cisco service contract are required.

Procedure

Step 1

Copy the qcow2 image file to the OpenStack controller node.

Step 2

Upload the ASAv image to the OpenStack Glance service.

root@ucs-os-controller:$ openstack image create <image_name> --public --disk-
format qcow2 --container-format bare --file ./<asav_qcow2_file>

Step 3

Verify if the ASAv image upload is successful.

root@ucs-os-controller:$ openstack image list

Example:

root@ucs-os-controller:$ openstack image list+--------------------------------------+-------------------+--------+
| ID                                   | Name              | Status |+--------------------------------------+-------------------+--------+
| 06dd7975-0b6e-45b8-810a-4ff98546a39d | asav-<version>-image | active |+--------------------------------------+-------------------+--------+

The uploaded image and its status is displayed.

What to do next

Create the network infrastructure using the deploy_os_infra.yaml template.

Create the Network Infrastructure for OpenStack and ASAv

Before you begin

Heat template files are required to create the network infrastructure and the required components for ASAv, such as flavor, networks, subnets, router interfaces, and security group rules:

deploy_os_infra.yaml
env.yaml

Templates for your ASAv version are available from the GitHub repository at:

https://github.com/CiscoDevNet/cisco-asav

Important

Note that Cisco-provided templates are provided as open source examples, and are not covered within the regular Cisco TAC support scope. Check GitHub regularly for updates and ReadMe instructions.

Procedure

Step 1

Deploy the infrastructure heat template file.

root@ucs-os-controller:$ openstack stack create <stack-name> -e <environment files name> -t <deployment file name>

Example:

root@ucs-os-controller:$ openstack stack create infra-stack -e env.yaml -t deploy_os_infra.yaml

Step 2

Verify if the infrastructure stack is created successfully.

root@ucs-os-controller:$ openstack stack list

What to do next

Create the ASAv instance on OpenStack.

Create the ASAv Instance on OpenStack

Use the sample ASAv heat template to deploy ASAv on OpenStack.

Before you begin

A heat template is required to deploy the ASAv on OpenStack:

deploy_asav.yaml

Templates for your ASAv version are available from the GitHub repository at:

https://github.com/CiscoDevNet/cisco-asav

Important

Note that Cisco-provided templates are provided as open source examples, and are not covered within the regular Cisco TAC support scope. Check GitHub regularly for updates and ReadMe instructions.

Procedure

Step 1

Deploy the ASAv heat template file (deploy_asav.yaml) to create the ASAv instance.

root@ucs-os-controller:$ openstack stack create asav-stack -e env.yaml-t deploy_asav.yaml

Example:

+---------------------+--------------------------------------+
| Field               | Value                                |
+---------------------+--------------------------------------+
| id                  | 14624af1-e5fa-4096-bd86-c453bc2928ae |
| stack_name          | asav-stack                           |
| description         | ASAvtemplate                         |
| creation_time       | 2020-12-07T14:55:05Z                 |
| updated_time        | None                                 |
| stack_status        | CREATE_IN_PROGRESS                   |
| stack_status_reason | Stack CREATE started                 |
+---------------------+--------------------------------------+

Step 2

Verify that your ASAv stack is created successfully.

root@ucs-os-controller:$ openstack stack list

Example:

+--------------------------------------+-------------+----------------------------------+-----------------+----------------------+------+
| ID                                   | Stack Name  | Project                          | Stack Status    | Creation Time    | Updated Time |
+--------------------------------------+-------------+----------------------------------+-----------------+----------------------+--------------+
| 14624af1-e5fa-4096-bd86-c453bc2928ae | asav-stack  | 13206e49b48740fdafca83796c6f4ad5 | CREATE_COMPLETE | 2020-12-07T14:55:05Z | None         |
| 198336cb-1186-45ab-858f-15ccd3b909c8 | infra-stack | 13206e49b48740fdafca83796c6f4ad5 | CREATE_COMPLETE | 2020-12-03T10:46:50Z | None         |
+--------------------------------------+-------------+----------------------------------+-----------------+----------------------+--------------+

Cisco Adaptive Security Virtual Appliance (ASAv) Getting Started Guide, 9.16

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Cisco Adaptive Security Virtual Appliance (ASAv) Getting Started Guide, 9.16

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