Exercise: Provision LVM Storage and Export via NFS on RHEL 10

Task

You are required to attach new storage, configure volume management, configure local and remote mounts, and provide an NFS export on a RHEL 10 virtual machine running under Proxmox VE. Complete the following objectives:

Storage Provisioning & Hardware Scan:
- In Proxmox VE, allocate and attach a new virtual SCSI hard drive to the RHEL 10 VM.
- On the RHEL 10 VM, scan the SCSI bus without rebooting so the new disk (assumed /dev/sdb) is visible to lsblk.
LVM Storage Layer:
- Create a GPT partition /dev/sdb1 taking 100% of the disk and flagged for LVM.
- Initialize a Physical Volume (PV) on /dev/sdb1.
- Create a Volume Group (VG) named vg_data.
- Create a Logical Volume (LV) named lv_manu utilizing 100% of the free space in vg_data.
- Format lv_manu with an XFS filesystem.
Persistent Local Mount:
- Create the directory /manu.
- Configure persistent mounting at /manu using the filesystem UUID (via /etc/fstab or native systemd mount unit).
NFS Server Setup & Hardening:
- Install the required NFS utilities and enable the nfs-server service across reboots.
- Export the directory /manu to your local subnet (e.g., 192.168.1.0/24) with rw and sync options.
- Permit NFS traffic persistently through firewalld.
- Adjust SELinux boolean settings so NFS can export read/write filesystems.
Client Configuration:
- On a remote Linux client, install necessary NFS client utilities.
- Ensure /manu is persistently mounted at /mnt/manu using _netdev and x-systemd.automount (or dedicated systemd .mount and .automount units) to ensure boots do not hang if the server is offline.

Verify

Execute these commands to validate every stage of your setup.

1. Verify Storage & LVM on Server

# Check block devices and partition tables
lsblk -f /dev/sdb

# Check LVM entities
pvs /dev/sdb1
vgs vg_data
lvs vg_data/lv_manu

2. Verify Server Local Mount (`/manu`)

# Check current mount and filesystem capacity
findmnt /manu
df -hT /manu

# Validate fstab syntax without unmounting
mount -fav

3. Verify NFS Service, Exports, and Security

# Verify NFS service status
systemctl is-enabled nfs-server
systemctl is-active nfs-server

# Check export table
exportfs -v

# Verify firewall rules
firewall-cmd --list-services | grep -E 'nfs|rpc-bind|mountd'

# Check SELinux boolean configuration
getsebool nfs_export_all_rw

4. Verify from Client System

# Verify export visibility from client
showmount -e <NFS_SERVER_IP>

# Verify active or automount trigger
ls -la /mnt/manu
findmnt /mnt/manu

# Test read/write privileges
touch /mnt/manu/test_rw_check
ls -l /mnt/manu/test_rw_check
rm -f /mnt/manu/test_rw_check

Solution

1. Proxmox VE Hardware Allocation & Bus Scan

In the Proxmox VE Web UI:
- Navigate to: VM > Hardware > Add > Hard Disk.
- Set Bus/Device to SCSI (VirtIO SCSI).
- Specify size (e.g., 50 GiB) and click Add.

On the RHEL 10 VM, rescan the SCSI buses:

for host in /sys/class/scsi_host/host*/scan; do
    echo "- - -" > "$host"
done

# Confirm the drive is present (assumed /dev/sdb)
lsblk

2. Partitioning, LVM, and Filesystem Creation

# 1. Partition with GPT and label for LVM
parted -s /dev/sdb mklabel gpt mkpart primary 2048s 100%
parted -s /dev/sdb set 1 lvm on

# 2. Create Physical Volume (PV)
pvcreate /dev/sdb1

# 3. Create Volume Group (VG)
vgcreate vg_data /dev/sdb1

# 4. Create Logical Volume (LV) using all available space
lvcreate -l 100%FREE -n lv_manu vg_data

# 5. Format with XFS
mkfs.xfs /dev/vg_data/lv_manu

3. Configure Local Mount Point (`/manu`)

# Create mount point
mkdir -p /manu

# Fetch filesystem UUID
FS_UUID=$(blkid -s UUID -o value /dev/vg_data/lv_manu)

# Configure persistent mount in /etc/fstab
echo "UUID=${FS_UUID}  /manu  xfs  defaults  0  0" >> /etc/fstab

# Mount without rebooting
systemctl daemon-reload
mount -a

(Alternative: Native Systemd Mount Unit)

cat << 'EOF' > /etc/systemd/system/manu.mount
[Unit]
Description=Local Mount for /manu
After=lvm2-monitor.service

[Mount]
What=/dev/vg_data/lv_manu
Where=/manu
Type=xfs
Options=defaults

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
EOF

systemctl daemon-reload
systemctl enable --now manu.mount

4. NFS Server Configuration & Security Setup

# 1. Install NFS packages and enable service
dnf install -y nfs-utils
systemctl enable --now nfs-server

# 2. Configure export in /etc/exports (replace 192.168.1.0/24 with your network)
echo "/manu 192.168.1.0/24(rw,sync,no_root_squash,no_subtree_check)" >> /etc/exports

# 3. Refresh exports
exportfs -rav

# 4. Open firewall ports
firewall-cmd --permanent --add-service=nfs
firewall-cmd --permanent --add-service=rpc-bind
firewall-cmd --permanent --add-service=mountd
firewall-cmd --reload

# 5. Configure SELinux
setsebool -P nfs_export_all_rw 1
semanage fcontext -a -t public_content_rw_t "/manu(/.*)?" 2>/dev/null || true
restorecon -Rv /manu

5. Client-Side Persistent Mount

On the client machine:

Step A: Install Client Tools & Prepare Directory

RHEL/CentOS/Fedora:
```
dnf install -y nfs-utils
```

Ubuntu/Debian:

apt-get update && apt-get install -y nfs-common

Create the directory:

mkdir -p /mnt/manu

Step B: Persistence Method 1 — `/etc/fstab` with Automount (Recommended)

Add the following line to /etc/fstab:

<NFS_SERVER_IP>:/manu  /mnt/manu  nfs  defaults,_netdev,nofail,x-systemd.automount,timeo=14,intr  0  0

Apply changes:

systemctl daemon-reload
mount -a

Step B: Persistence Method 2 — Native Systemd Units

Create the mount and automount units:

Mount unit: /etc/systemd/system/mnt-manu.mount

[Unit]
Description=NFS Share Mount (/mnt/manu)
After=network-online.target
Wants=network-online.target

[Mount]
What=<NFS_SERVER_IP>:/manu
Where=/mnt/manu
Type=nfs
Options=defaults,_netdev,timeo=14,intr
TimeoutSec=30

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Automount unit: /etc/systemd/system/mnt-manu.automount

[Unit]
Description=Automount for NFS Share (/mnt/manu)
ConditionPathExists=/mnt/manu

[Automount]
Where=/mnt/manu
TimeoutIdleSec=600

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Enable and start automount:

systemctl daemon-reload
systemctl enable --now mnt-manu.automount

Exercice: NFS and LVM