Upgrading with `tridentctl`¶

When upgrading to the latest release of Trident, there are a few items to consider:

Previous releases of Trident may have supported alpha Volume Snapshots. The 20.01 release moves forward to only support beta Volume Snapshots. Kubernetes admins must take care to safely backup or convert the alpha snapshot objects to the beta feature set if they would like to retain the legacy alpha snapshots.
The beta feature release of Volume Snapshots introduces a modified set of CRDs and a snapshot controller, both of which should be set up before installing Trident.

This blog discusses the steps involved in migrating alpha Volume Snapshots to the beta format. It is purely meant to be a guiding document for users to understand the steps involved should they choose to retain alpha Volume Snapshots.

Upgrading Trident on Kubernetes 1.13¶

On Kubernetes 1.13, there are a couple of options when upgrading Trident:

Install Trident in the desired namespace by executing the tridentctl install command with the --csi flag. This configures Trident to function as an enhanced CSI provisioner. This will require enabling some feature gates.
If for some reason the feature gates required by Trident cannot be enabled, you can install Trident without the --csi flag. This will configure Trident to work in its traditional format without using the CSI specification.

Upgrading Trident on Kubernetes 1.14 and above¶

For Kubernetes 1.14 and greater, simply perform an uninstall followed by a reinstall to upgrade to the latest version of Trident.

Warning

If you are running Kubernetes 1.17 or later, and are looking to upgrade to 20.07.1 or above, it is important you provide parameter.fsType in StorageClasses used by Trident. StorageClasses can be deleted and recreated without disrupting pre-existing volumes. This is a requirement for enforcing Security Contexts for SAN volumes. The sample-input directory contains examples, such as storage-class-basic.yaml.templ, and storage-class-bronze-default.yaml. For more information, take a look at the Known issues tab.

What happens when you upgrade¶

By default the uninstall command will leave all of Trident’s state intact by not deleting the PVC and PV used by the Trident deployment, allowing an uninstall followed by an install to act as an upgrade.

The 19.07 release of Trident will move away from etcd and use CRDs to maintain state. Upgrading Trident from any release prior to 19.07 by running a tridentctl install will:

initiate a one-time process that copies the metadata stored in the Trident PV into CRD objects.
provide periodic updates throughout the upgrade with respect to the migration of Trident’s metadata.

Warning

When upgrading Trident, do not interrupt the upgrade process. Ensure that the installer runs to completion.

PVs that have already been provisioned will remain available while Trident is offline, and Trident will provision volumes for any PVCs that are created in the interim once it is back online.

Next steps¶

When upgrading on Kubernetes versions 1.14 and above, the CSI provisioner will be used by default. For legacy PVs, all features made available by the previous Trident version will be supported. To make use of the rich set of features that will be provided in newer Trident releases (such as On-Demand Volume Snapshots), volumes can be upgraded using the tridentctl upgrade command.

The Upgrading legacy volumes to CSI volumes section explains how legacy non-CSI volumes can be upgraded to the CSI type.

If you encounter any issues, visit the troubleshooting guide for more advice.

Upgrading legacy volumes to CSI volumes¶

When upgrading Trident, there is a possibility of having legacy volumes that need to be ported to the CSI specification to make use of the complete set of features made available by Trident. A legacy PV that has been provisioned by Trident will still support the traditional set of features. For all additional features that Trident will provide (such as On-Demand Volume Snapshots), the Trident volume must be upgraded from a NFS/iSCSI type to the CSI type.

Before proceeding, you must determine if your Trident deployment is capable of upgrading legacy volumes. The version of Trident installed should be at least 19.07 and Trident should be configured as a CSI Provisioner. This can be confirmed by doing a kubectl get pods -n <trident-namespace>. The presence of a trident-csi-<generated-id> indicates that it is running as a CSI provisioner and supports upgrading legacy volumes.

$ tridentctl version

+----------------+----------------+
| SERVER VERSION | CLIENT VERSION |
+----------------+----------------+
| 19.10.0        | 19.10.0        |
+----------------+----------------+

$ kubectl get pods -n <trident-namespace>
NAME                          READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
trident-csi-426nx             2/2     Running   0          20m
trident-csi-b5cf8fd7c-fnq24   4/4     Running   0          20m

Things to consider when upgrading volumes¶

When deciding to upgrade volumes to the CSI type, make sure to consider the following:

It may not be required to upgrade all existing volumes. Previously created volumes will still continue to be accessible and function normally.
A PV can be mounted as part of a Deployment/StatefulSet when upgrading. It is not required to bring down the Deployment/StatefulSet.
A PV cannot be attached to a standalone pod when upgrading. You will have to shut down the pod before upgrading the volume.
To upgrade a volume, it must be bound to a PVC. Volumes that are not bound to PVCs will need to be removed and imported before upgrading.

Example volume upgrade¶

Here is an example that shows how a volume upgrade is performed.

$ kubectl get pv
NAME                         CAPACITY     ACCESS MODES   RECLAIM POLICY   STATUS   CLAIM                  STORAGECLASS    REASON   AGE
default-pvc-1-a8475          1073741824   RWO            Delete           Bound    default/pvc-1          standard                 19h
default-pvc-2-a8486          1073741824   RWO            Delete           Bound    default/pvc-2          standard                 19h
default-pvc-3-a849e          1073741824   RWO            Delete           Bound    default/pvc-3          standard                 19h
default-pvc-4-a84de          1073741824   RWO            Delete           Bound    default/pvc-4          standard                 19h
trident                      2Gi          RWO            Retain           Bound    trident/trident                                 19h

There are currently 4 PVs that have been created by Trident 19.04, using the netapp.io/trident provisioner.

$ kubectl describe pv default-pvc-2-a8486

Name:            default-pvc-2-a8486
Labels:          <none>
Annotations:     pv.kubernetes.io/provisioned-by: netapp.io/trident
                 volume.beta.kubernetes.io/storage-class: standard
Finalizers:      [kubernetes.io/pv-protection]
StorageClass:    standard
Status:          Bound
Claim:           default/pvc-2
Reclaim Policy:  Delete
Access Modes:    RWO
VolumeMode:      Filesystem
Capacity:        1073741824
Node Affinity:   <none>
Message:
Source:
    Type:      NFS (an NFS mount that lasts the lifetime of a pod)
    Server:    10.xx.xx.xx
    Path:      /trid_1907_alpha_default_pvc_2_a8486
    ReadOnly:  false

The PV was created using the netapp.io/trident provisioner and is of type NFS. To support all new features provided by Trident, this PV will need to be upgraded to the CSI type.

To upgrade a legacy Trident volume to the CSI spec, you must execute the tridenctl upgrade volume <name-of-trident-volume> command.

$ ./tridentctl get volumes -n trident
+---------------------+---------+---------------+----------+--------------------------------------+--------+---------+
|            NAME     |  SIZE   | STORAGE CLASS | PROTOCOL |             BACKEND UUID             | STATE  | MANAGED |
+---------------------+---------+---------------+----------+--------------------------------------+--------+---------+
| default-pvc-2-a8486 | 1.0 GiB | standard      | file     | c5a6f6a4-b052-423b-80d4-8fb491a14a22 | online | true    |
| default-pvc-3-a849e | 1.0 GiB | standard      | file     | c5a6f6a4-b052-423b-80d4-8fb491a14a22 | online | true    |
| default-pvc-1-a8475 | 1.0 GiB | standard      | file     | c5a6f6a4-b052-423b-80d4-8fb491a14a22 | online | true    |
| default-pvc-4-a84de | 1.0 GiB | standard      | file     | c5a6f6a4-b052-423b-80d4-8fb491a14a22 | online | true    |
+---------------------+---------+---------------+----------+--------------------------------------+--------+---------+

$ ./tridentctl upgrade volume default-pvc-2-a8486 -n trident
+---------------------+---------+---------------+----------+--------------------------------------+--------+---------+
|            NAME     |  SIZE   | STORAGE CLASS | PROTOCOL |             BACKEND UUID             | STATE  | MANAGED |
+---------------------+---------+---------------+----------+--------------------------------------+--------+---------+
| default-pvc-2-a8486 | 1.0 GiB | standard      | file     | c5a6f6a4-b052-423b-80d4-8fb491a14a22 | online | true    |
+---------------------+---------+---------------+----------+--------------------------------------+--------+---------+

After upgrading the PV, performing a kubectl describe pv will show that the volume is a CSI volume.

$ kubectl describe pv default-pvc-2-a8486
Name:            default-pvc-2-a8486
Labels:          <none>
Annotations:     pv.kubernetes.io/provisioned-by: csi.trident.netapp.io
                 volume.beta.kubernetes.io/storage-class: standard
Finalizers:      [kubernetes.io/pv-protection]
StorageClass:    standard
Status:          Bound
Claim:           default/pvc-2
Reclaim Policy:  Delete
Access Modes:    RWO
VolumeMode:      Filesystem
Capacity:        1073741824
Node Affinity:   <none>
Message:
Source:
    Type:              CSI (a Container Storage Interface (CSI) volume source)
    Driver:            csi.trident.netapp.io
    VolumeHandle:      default-pvc-2-a8486
    ReadOnly:          false
    VolumeAttributes:      backendUUID=c5a6f6a4-b052-423b-80d4-8fb491a14a22
                           internalName=trid_1907_alpha_default_pvc_2_a8486
                           name=default-pvc-2-a8486
                           protocol=file
Events:                <none>

In this manner, volumes of the NFS/iSCSI type that were created by Trident can be upgraded to the CSI type, on a per-volume basis.

Upgrading Trident on Kubernetes?

Upgrading with tridentctl¶