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Create and use FlashArray PVCs

After installing Portworx CSI to work with your FlashArray, you need to create PVCs to make storage available to your application.

The process begins with creating a StorageClass, which acts as a reference for any PVCs you create.

Create a StorageClass​

Create a StorageClass with storage type and performance settings specified. For FlashArray, the backend type is pure_block. You can also configure parameters like IOPS and bandwidth.

important

If you need the mount path to have 777 permissions, set the parameters.allow_others field to true in your StorageClass. This setting ensures that all users have read, write, and execute access to the mount point. Use this setting carefully to avoid granting unintended access.

Example StorageClass specification:

The following spec is created by default when you deploy Portworx CSI:

kind: StorageClass
apiVersion: storage.k8s.io/v1
metadata:
  name: sc-portworx-fa-direct-access
provisioner: pxd.portworx.com
allowVolumeExpansion: true

  1. Create a new StorageClass to add parameters such as IOPS and bandwidth, as shown below:

    • The bandwidth limit must range between 1 MB/s and 512 GB/s.
    • The IOPS limit must range between 100 and 100 million.
    parameters:
      backend: "pure_block"
      #pure_fa_pod_name: "<fa-pod-name>"  Use this parameter to specify the Pure FlashArray pod within the realm defined in pure.json when using the secure multi-tenancy feature of FlashArray.
      max_iops: "1000"
      max_bandwidth: "1G"
      #allow_others: true     # uncomment this line if you need the mount path to have 777 permissions.
  1. Apply this YAML to your cluster to create the StorageClass: 
    kubectl apply -f sc.yaml 
    storageclass.storage.k8s.io/sc-portworx-fa-direct-access created

Create a PVC​

  1. To create a PVC, define the specifications and reference the StorageClass you previously created by specifying its name in the spec.storageClassName field.

    Example PVC specification:

    kind: PersistentVolumeClaim
    apiVersion: v1
    metadata:
      name: pure-claim-block
      labels:
        app: nginx
    spec:
      accessModes:
        - ReadWriteOnce
      resources:
        requests:
          storage: 20Gi
      storageClassName: sc-portworx-fa-direct-access

    Save this YAML in a file pvc.yaml

  2. Apply this YAML to your cluster:

    kubectl apply -f pvc.yaml 
    persistentvolumeclaim/pure-claim-block created

Mount a PVC to a pod​

After creating PVCs, the storage becomes available for your application. You can use the storage by mounting and attaching the PVC to the application pod.

  1. Create a Pod and specify the PVC name in the persistentVolumeClaim.claimName field. Here is an example pod specification:

    kind: Pod
    apiVersion: v1
    metadata:
      name: nginx-pod
      labels:
        app: nginx
    spec:
      volumes:
      - name: pure-vol
        persistentVolumeClaim:
          claimName: pure-claim-block
      containers:
      - name: nginx
        image: nginx
        volumeMounts:
        - name: pure-vol
          mountPath: /data
        ports:
        - containerPort: 80

  2. To control pod scheduling based on node labels, add the nodeAffinity field to the Pod specification. For example:

    spec:
      affinity:
        nodeAffinity:
          requiredDuringSchedulingIgnoredDuringExecution:
            nodeSelectorTerms:
            - matchExpressions:
              - key: topology.portworx.io/zone
                operator: In
                values:
                - zone-0
              - key: topology.portworx.io/region
                operator: In
                values:
                - region-0

Verify pod status​

Once the pod configuration is applied, monitor the pod’s status with:

watch kubectl get pods

Wait for the STATUS to show as Running for a pod. Once the pod is running, you can verify that it is connected as a host for the volume.

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