Azure Files volume driver for Service Fabric

Article
09/09/2024

The Azure Files volume driver is a Docker volume plugin that provides Azure Files based volumes for Docker containers. It is packaged as a Service Fabric application that can be deployed to a Service Fabric cluster to provide volumes for other Service Fabric container applications within the cluster.

Note

Version 6.5.661.9590 of the Azure Files volume plugin has been released for general availability.

Prerequisites

The Windows version of the Azure Files volume plugin works on Windows Server version 1709, Windows 10 version 1709 or later operating systems only.
The Linux version of the Azure Files volume plugin works on all operating system versions supported by Service Fabric.
The Azure Files volume plugin only works on Service Fabric version 6.2 and newer.
Follow the instructions in the Azure Files documentation to create a file share for the Service Fabric container application to use as volume.
You will need PowerShell with the Service Fabric module or SFCTL installed.
If you are using Hyper-V containers, the following snippets need to be added in the ClusterManifest (local cluster) or fabricSettings section in your Azure Resource Manager template (Azure cluster) or ClusterConfig.json (standalone cluster).

In the ClusterManifest, the following needs to be added in the Hosting section. In this example, the volume name is sfazurefile and the port it listens to on the cluster is 19100. Replace them with the correct values for your cluster.

<Section Name="Hosting">
  <Parameter Name="VolumePluginPorts" Value="sfazurefile:19100" />
</Section>

In the fabricSettings section in your Azure Resource Manager template (for Azure deployments) or ClusterConfig.json (for standalone deployments), the following snippet needs to be added. Again, replace the volume name and port values with your own.

"fabricSettings": [
  {
    "name": "Hosting",
    "parameters": [
      {
          "name": "VolumePluginPorts",
          "value": "sfazurefile:19100"
      }
    ]
  }
]

Deploy a sample application using Service Fabric Azure Files volume driver

Using Azure Resource Manager via the provided PowerShell script (recommended)

If your cluster is based in Azure, we recommend deploying applications to it using the Azure Resource Manager application resource model for ease of use and to help move towards the model of maintaining infrastructure as code. This approach eliminates the need to keep track of the app version for the Azure Files volume driver. It also enables you to maintain separate Azure Resource Manager templates for each supported OS. The script assumes you are deploying the latest version of the Azure Files application and takes parameters for OS type, cluster subscription ID, and resource group. You can download the script from the Service Fabric download site. Note that this automatically sets the ListenPort, which is the port on which the Azure Files volume plugin listens for requests from the Docker daemon, to 19100. You can change it by adding parameter named "listenPort". Ensure that the port does not conflict with any other port that the cluster or your applications uses.

Azure Resource Manager deployment command for Windows:

.\DeployAzureFilesVolumeDriver.ps1 -subscriptionId [subscriptionId] -resourceGroupName [resourceGroupName] -clusterName [clusterName] -windows

Azure Resource Manager deployment command for Linux:

.\DeployAzureFilesVolumeDriver.ps1 -subscriptionId [subscriptionId] -resourceGroupName [resourceGroupName] -clusterName [clusterName] -linux

Once you've successfully run the script, you can skip to the configuring your application section.

Manual deployment for standalone clusters

The Service Fabric application that provides the volumes for your containers can be downloaded from the Service Fabric download site. The application can be deployed to the cluster via PowerShell, CLI or FabricClient APIs.

Using the command line, change directory to the root directory of the downloaded application package.
```
cd .\AzureFilesVolume\
```
```
cd ~/AzureFilesVolume
```

Next, copy the application package to the image store with the appropriate values for [ApplicationPackagePath] and [ImageStoreConnectionString]:

Copy-ServiceFabricApplicationPackage -ApplicationPackagePath [ApplicationPackagePath] -ImageStoreConnectionString [ImageStoreConnectionString] -ApplicationPackagePathInImageStore AzureFilesVolumePlugin

sfctl cluster select --endpoint https://testcluster.chinanorth.cloudapp.chinacloudapi.cn:19080 --pem test.pem --no-verify
sfctl application upload --path [ApplicationPackagePath] --show-progress

Register-ServiceFabricApplicationType -ApplicationPathInImageStore AzureFilesVolumePlugin

sfctl application provision --application-type-build-path [ApplicationPackagePath]

Create the application, paying close attention to the ListenPort application parameter value. This value is the port on which the Azure Files volume plugin listens for requests from the Docker daemon. Ensure that the port provided to the application matches the VolumePluginPorts in the ClusterManifest and does not conflict with any other port that the cluster or your applications uses.

New-ServiceFabricApplication -ApplicationName fabric:/AzureFilesVolumePluginApp -ApplicationTypeName AzureFilesVolumePluginType -ApplicationTypeVersion 6.5.661.9590   -ApplicationParameter @{ListenPort='19100'}

sfctl application create --app-name fabric:/AzureFilesVolumePluginApp --app-type AzureFilesVolumePluginType --app-version 6.5.661.9590  --parameter '{"ListenPort":"19100"}'

Note

Windows Server 2016 Datacenter does not support mapping SMB mounts to containers (That is only supported on Windows Server version 1709). This constraint prevents network volume mapping and Azure Files volume drivers on versions older than 1709.

Deploy the application on a local development cluster

Follow steps 1-3 from the above.

The default service instance count for the Azure Files volume plugin application is -1, which means that there is an instance of the service deployed to each node in the cluster. However, when deploying the Azure Files volume plugin application on a local development cluster, the service instance count should be specified as 1. This can be done via the InstanceCount application parameter. Therefore, the command for creating the Azure Files volume plugin application on a local development cluster is:

New-ServiceFabricApplication -ApplicationName fabric:/AzureFilesVolumePluginApp -ApplicationTypeName AzureFilesVolumePluginType -ApplicationTypeVersion 6.5.661.9590  -ApplicationParameter @{ListenPort='19100';InstanceCount='1'}

sfctl application create --app-name fabric:/AzureFilesVolumePluginApp --app-type AzureFilesVolumePluginType --app-version 6.5.661.9590  --parameter '{"ListenPort": "19100","InstanceCount": "1"}'

Configure your applications to use the volume

The following snippet shows how an Azure Files based volume can be specified in the application manifest file of your application. The specific element of interest is the Volume tag:

?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<ApplicationManifest ApplicationTypeName="WinNodeJsApp" ApplicationTypeVersion="1.0" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/2011/01/fabric" xmlns:xsi="https://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
    <Description>Calculator Application</Description>
    <Parameters>
      <Parameter Name="ServiceInstanceCount" DefaultValue="3"></Parameter>
      <Parameter Name="MyCpuShares" DefaultValue="3"></Parameter>
      <Parameter Name="MyStorageVar" DefaultValue="c:\tmp"></Parameter>
    </Parameters>
    <ServiceManifestImport>
        <ServiceManifestRef ServiceManifestName="NodeServicePackage" ServiceManifestVersion="1.0"/>
     <Policies>
       <ContainerHostPolicies CodePackageRef="NodeService.Code" Isolation="hyperv">
            <PortBinding ContainerPort="8905" EndpointRef="Endpoint1"/>
            <RepositoryCredentials PasswordEncrypted="false" Password="****" AccountName="test"/>
            <Volume Source="azfiles" Destination="c:\VolumeTest\Data" Driver="sfazurefile">
                <DriverOption Name="shareName" Value="" />
                <DriverOption Name="storageAccountName" Value="" />
                <DriverOption Name="storageAccountKey" Value="" />
                <DriverOption Name="storageAccountFQDN" Value="" />
            </Volume>
       </ContainerHostPolicies>
   </Policies>
    </ServiceManifestImport>
    <ServiceTemplates>
        <StatelessService ServiceTypeName="StatelessNodeService" InstanceCount="5">
            <SingletonPartition></SingletonPartition>
        </StatelessService>
    </ServiceTemplates>
</ApplicationManifest>

The driver name for the Azure Files volume plugin is sfazurefile. This value is set for the Driver attribute of the Volume tag element in the application manifest.

In the Volume tag in the snippet above, the Azure Files volume plugin requires the following attributes:

Source - This is the name of the volume. The user can pick any name for their volume.
Destination - This attribute is the location that the volume is mapped to within the running container. Thus, your destination can't be a location that already exists within your container

As shown in the DriverOption elements in the snippet above, the Azure Files volume plugin supports the following driver options:

shareName - Name of the Azure Files file share that provides the volume for the container.
storageAccountName - Name of the Azure storage account that contains the Azure Files file share.
storageAccountKey - Access key for the Azure storage account that contains the Azure Files file share.

storageAccountFQDN - Domain name associated with the storage account. If storageAccountFQDN is not specified, domain name will be formed by using the default suffix(.file.core.chinacloudapi.cn) with the storageAccountName.

- Example1: 
    <DriverOption Name="shareName" Value="myshare1" />
    <DriverOption Name="storageAccountName" Value="myaccount1" />
    <DriverOption Name="storageAccountKey" Value="mykey1" />
    <!-- storageAccountFQDN will be "myaccount1.file.core.chinacloudapi.cn" -->

- Example2: 
    <DriverOption Name="shareName" Value="myshare2" />
    <DriverOption Name="storageAccountName" Value="myaccount2" />
    <DriverOption Name="storageAccountKey" Value="mykey2" />
    <DriverOption Name="storageAccountFQDN" Value="myaccount2.file.core.chinacloudapi.cn" />

Using your own volume or logging driver

Service Fabric also allows the usage of your own custom volume or logging drivers. If the Docker volume/logging driver is not installed on the cluster, you can install it manually by using the RDP/SSH protocols. You can perform the install with these protocols through a virtual machine scale set start-up script or an SetupEntryPoint script.

An example of the script to install the Docker volume driver for Azure is as follows:

docker plugin install --alias azure --grant-all-permissions docker4x/cloudstor:17.09.0-ce-azure1  \
    CLOUD_PLATFORM=AZURE \
    AZURE_STORAGE_ACCOUNT="[MY-STORAGE-ACCOUNT-NAME]" \
    AZURE_STORAGE_ACCOUNT_KEY="[MY-STORAGE-ACCOUNT-KEY]" \
    DEBUG=1

In your applications, to use the volume or logging driver you installed, you would have to specify the appropriate values in the Volume and LogConfig elements under ContainerHostPolicies in your application manifest.

<ContainerHostPolicies CodePackageRef="NodeService.Code" Isolation="hyperv">
    <PortBinding ContainerPort="8905" EndpointRef="Endpoint1"/>
    <RepositoryCredentials PasswordEncrypted="false" Password="****" AccountName="test"/>
    <LogConfig Driver="[YOUR_LOG_DRIVER]" >
        <DriverOption Name="test" Value="vale"/>
    </LogConfig>
    <Volume Source="c:\workspace" Destination="c:\testmountlocation1" IsReadOnly="false"></Volume>
    <Volume Source="[MyStorageVar]" Destination="c:\testmountlocation2" IsReadOnly="true"> </Volume>
    <Volume Source="myvolume1" Destination="c:\testmountlocation2" Driver="[YOUR_VOLUME_DRIVER]" IsReadOnly="true">
        <DriverOption Name="[name]" Value="[value]"/>
    </Volume>
</ContainerHostPolicies>

When specifying a volume plug-in, Service Fabric automatically creates the volume by using the specified parameters. The Source tag for the Volume element is the name of the volume and the Driver tag specifies the volume driver plug-in. The Destination tag is the location that the Source is mapped to within the running container. Thus, your destination can't be a location that already exists within your container. Options can be specified by using the DriverOption tag as follows:

<Volume Source="myvolume1" Destination="c:\testmountlocation4" Driver="azure" IsReadOnly="true">
           <DriverOption Name="share" Value="models"/>
</Volume>

Application parameters are supported for volumes as shown in the preceding manifest snippet (look for MyStorageVar for an example use).

If a Docker log driver is specified, you have to deploy agents (or containers) to handle the logs in the cluster. The DriverOption tag can be used to specify options for the log driver.

Next steps

To see container samples, including the volume driver, please visit the Service Fabric container samples
To deploy containers to a Service Fabric cluster, refer the article Deploy a container on Service Fabric