Ubuntu: Installing MAAS

Installing MAAS from the archive

Installing MAAS from packages is thankfully straightforward. There are actually several packages that go into making up a working MAAS install, but for convenience, many of these have been gathered into a virtual package called ‘maas’ which will install the necessary components for a ‘seed cloud’, that is a single server that will directly control a group of nodes. The main packages are:

• maas - seed cloud setup, which includes both the region controller and the cluster controller below.
• maas-region-controller - includes the web UI, API and database.
• maas-cluster-controller - controls a group (“cluster”) of nodes including DHCP management.
• maas-dhcp/maas-dns - required when managing dhcp/dns.

If you need to separate these services or want to deploy an additional cluster controller, you should install the corresponding packages individually (see the description of a typical setup for more background on how a typical hardware setup might be arranged).

There are two suggested additional packages ‘maas-dhcp’ and ‘maas-dns’. These set up MAAS-controlled DHCP and DNS services which greatly simplify deployment if you are running a typical setup where the MAAS controller can run the network (Note: These must be installed if you later set the options in the web interface to have MAAS manage DHCP/DNS). If you need to integrate your MAAS setup under an existing DHCP setup, see Manual DHCP configuration

Install packages

At the command line, type:

$ sudo apt-get install maas maas-dhcp maas-dns

You will see a list of packages and a confirmation message to proceed. The exact list will obviously depend on what you already have installed on your server, but expect to add about 200MB of files.

The configuration for the MAAS controller will automatically run and pop up this config screen:

Here you will need to enter the hostname for where the region controller can be contacted. In many scenarios, you may be running the region controller (i.e. the web and API interface) from a different network address, for example where a server has several network interfaces.

Once the configuration scripts have run you should see this message telling you that the system is ready to use:

The web server is started last, so you have to accept this message before the service is run and you can access the Web interface. Then there are just a few more setup steps Post-Install tasks