Starting and managing machines from the CLI is at times useful. It is nice managing your instances from your local machine without the need of a web browser. Here's the basics on how to start a host.
Install
First you must install the Python bindings to the OpenStack Nova API. Once that is installed setup your ~/.novarc file. This will contain the settings to access your OpenStack cluster.
Mine looks something like this:
# ~/.novarc
# COMMON OPENSTACK ENVS
export OS_USERNAME=username
export OS_PASSWORD=password
export OS_TENANT_NAME=dev # This is the Project you are apart of
export OS_AUTH_URL=http://10.0.0.10:5000/v2.0/
Great! Now finally source it with 'source ~/.novarc'
Start an Instance
Now we are ready to get down and dirty
nova list # show your instances
nova list --all-tenants # show all instances
nova flavor-list # list available flavors
+----+-----------+-----------+------+-----------+------+-------+-------------+-----------+-------------+
| ID | Name | Memory_MB | Disk | Ephemeral | Swap | VCPUs | RXTX_Factor | Is_Public | extra_specs |
+----+-----------+-----------+------+-----------+------+-------+-------------+-----------+-------------+
| 1 | m1.tiny | 512 | 0 | 0 | | 1 | 1.0 | True | {} |
| 2 | m1.small | 2048 | 10 | 20 | | 1 | 1.0 | True | {} |
| 3 | m1.medium | 4096 | 10 | 40 | | 2 | 1.0 | True | {} |
| 4 | m1.large | 8192 | 10 | 80 | | 4 | 1.0 | True | {} |
| 5 | m1.xlarge | 16384 | 10 | 160 | | 8 | 1.0 | True | {} |
+----+-----------+-----------+------+-----------+------+-------+-------------+-----------+-------------+
nova image-list # list available images
+--------------------------------------+--------------------------------------+--------+--------+
| ID | Name | Status | Server |
+--------------------------------------+--------------------------------------+--------+--------+
| 3c957e4a-1337-429d-ae61-1a5bec057adb | precise-image | ACTIVE | |
+--------------------------------------+--------------------------------------+--------+--------+
nova keypair-list # list available keypairs
+-----------------+-------------------------------------------------+
| Name | Fingerprint |
+-----------------+-------------------------------------------------+
| test2 | 68:62:c2:2c:45:fb:c1:b7:93:14:59:72:41:c9:b7:c6 |
+-----------------+-------------------------------------------------+
nova boot --flavor 2 --image 3c957e4a-1337-429d-ae61-1a5bec057adb --security-groups default --key-name test2 host123 # boot an instance named host123
nova list
+--------------------------------------+-------------+--------+------------------------------------+
| ID | Name | Status | Networks |
+--------------------------------------+-------------+--------+------------------------------------+
| 58fb9399-9a2b-4afe-6149-b1ac7c6c9f39 | host123 | ACTIVE | public=192.168.1.5 |
+--------------------------------------+-------------+--------+------------------------------------+
Note that it only has an IP from its internal subnet. Now to give it an IP we can access.
nova floating-ip-create
+---------------+-------------+----------+------+
| Ip | Instance Id | Fixed Ip | Pool |
+---------------+-------------+----------+------+
| 10.0.0.134 | None | None | nova |
+---------------+-------------+----------+------+
nova floating-ip-list
+---------------+--------------------------------------+--------------+------+
| Ip | Instance Id | Fixed Ip | Pool |
+---------------+--------------------------------------+--------------+------+
| 10.0.0.134 | None | None | nova |
+---------------+--------------------------------------+--------------+------+
nova add-floating-ip test123 10.0.0.134
nova floating-ip-list
+---------------+--------------------------------------+--------------+------+
| Ip | Instance Id | Fixed Ip | Pool |
+---------------+--------------------------------------+--------------+------+
| 10.0.0.134 | 58fb9399-9a8b-4afe-9149-b2ac7c6c9f39 | 192.168.1.5 | nova |
+---------------+--------------------------------------+--------------+------+
nova list
+--------------------------------------+-------------+--------+------------------------------------+
| ID | Name | Status | Networks |
+--------------------------------------+-------------+--------+------------------------------------+
| 58fb9399-9a8b-4afe-9149-b2ac7c6c9f39 | host123 | ACTIVE | public=192.168.1.5, 10.0.0.134 |
+--------------------------------------+-------------+--------+------------------------------------+
That looks better! Now we can ssh into the machine using our personal keypair we setup previously in your first OpenStack Instance.
If you want to learn more about the CLI, 'nova help' and 'nova help command' are indispensible.