Getting Started#

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The Rackspace Cloud contains the following networks:

  • PublicNet (public)

    PublicNet connects a cloud server to the Internet. When you create cloud servers with PublicNet, your servers get an IPv4 address and an IPv6 address. Rackspace bills outbound public traffic according to published rates. You can create a server without a public network. However, you might not be able to access to operating system updates, and Cloud Monitoring remote checks and so on might not work. For more information about the limitations of not having a public network, see Removing Networks from a Cloud Server.

    Note: RackConnect and Managed Operations service level customers must use PublicNet.

  • ServiceNet (Private)

    ServiceNet is an internal, multi-tenant network within each Rackspace Cloud region. It provides cloud servers access to regional services, such as Cloud Files, Cloud Load Balancers, Cloud Databases, and Cloud Backup, at no cost. ServiceNet is currently IPv4 only. Historically, ServiceNet was used for server-to-server communication, but we now recommend Cloud Networks for this purpose. We also requires ServiceNet for Windows cloud server activation. We recommend that you connect cloud servers to ServiceNet and that you configure a software firewall, such as iptables or Windows Firewall, to deny all new inbound connections to the server. For more information, see Removing Networks from a Cloud Server.

    Note: RackConnect and Managed Operations service level customers must use ServiceNet.

  • Cloud networks (isolated)

    Cloud networks are isolated networks that you can use for secure communication between your cloud servers. Cloud networks are completely private and single tenant and can be either IPv4 or IPv6. We recommend cloud networks for all communication between cloud servers. Like ServiceNet, we provide all bandwidth on cloud networks at no charge.
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The Rackspace Cloud has two networking APIs - Neutron and Nova-Network.

Rackspace first introduced networking services based on the OpenStack Nova-Network API. This version of the service is now superseded by the current networking API, based on OpenStack Neutron, which offers a richer suite of networking services. Both APIs continue to function, but the Neutron API is the base for all new networking services that Rackspace offers. For more information, see Networking: Neutron versus Nova-Network in the Cloud Networks Developer Guide. {{}} {{}}

Every Rackspace Managed Infrastructure account has a default limit of 10 cloud networks per region. To request an increase, submit a ticket in the Cloud Control Panel with details about how you intend to use the additional networks. {{}} {{}}

Yes. You can attach a maximum of 250 servers to a single cloud network. {{}} {{}}

The following list shows all the limits defined for the service:

  • Cloud networks per region: 10

  • Subnets per network: 2 (one IPv4 and one IPv6)

  • DNS name servers per subnet: 2

  • Host routes per subnet: 3

  • Allocation pools per subnet: 5

  • Number of fixed IP addresses per port: 4

  • Ports (hosts) per network: 250

  • Security groups per port: 5

  • Security group rules per security group: 20

  • Security group rules per user: 100 {{}} {{}}

Yes. You can add or remove any network (PublicNet, ServiceNet, or cloud network) from a server that is in a Managed Infrastructure service level account. However, Managed Operations service level and RackConnect customers are required to have PublicNet and ServiceNet interfaces. This capability means that you can freely make networking changes to your existing deployments without having to rebuild Cloud Servers.

For more information, see the Virtual Interfaces extension in the Cloud Servers Developer Guide (using the nova-network API) or Boot a new server with your cloud network in the Cloud Networks Getting Started Guide (using the neutron API).

Note: Be aware that removing PublicNet or ServiceNet interfaces might impact certain Rackspace services and capabilities. {{}} {{}}

Yes. Any other cloud server on that network can use IP addresses on Cloud Networks. {{}} {{}}

No. At this time, you cannot transfer a PublicNet or ServiceNet IP address between cloud servers. {{}} {{}}

The amount of network throughput varies based on the Cloud Server flavor. For more details, see the Cloud Servers pricing information. {{}} {{}}

Cloud networks are regional in scope, and you can attach them to any of your cloud servers in a given region. {{}}

Security groups#

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Security groups are containers for a set of inbound and outbound traffic rules that you directly apply to a Neutron port (PublicNet, ServiceNet or Cloud Network). After you launch an instance, you can assign one or more security groups to ports on that instance. Security groups act as a stateful firewall for your Cloud Server instances. {{}} {{}}

Security groups act as a distributed firewall for your Cloud Server instances. After you launch an instance, you can assign one or more security groups to ports on that instance. {{}} {{}}

Cloud Networks Developer Guide

Cloud Networks API Reference {{}} {{}}

Security groups enable users to manage the flow of traffic across a group of instances without manually configuring firewall settings. Security groups provide a whitelist style of allowing traffic. After you apply a security rule, such as restricting IPv4 addresses, port 8080, or all IP addresses, the only traffic allowed to reach the instance must comply with the security rule. The security groups stop all other traffic. {{}} {{}}

Yes, the security groups feature is available to all customers. {{}} {{}}

You can’t add a security group as a child of another security group. You also can’t edit a security group rule—you must add a new security group to replace the old one.

You can only create outbound security group rules by using the API. You can use the following cURL command, but be sure to substitute the variables with the appropriate values for your account:

curl -XPOST https://<region>.networks.api.rackspacecloud.com/v2.0/security-group-rules <br>
  -H "Content-type: application/json" <br>
  -H "X-Auth-Token: <yourAuthToken>" <br>
  -H "User-Agent: python-novaclient" <br>
  -H "Accept: application/json" <br>
  -d '{"security_group_rule":{"direction":"egress","port_range_min":"<portNumber or null>","port_range_max":"<portNumber or null>","ethertype":"<IPv4 or IPv6>","protocol":"<desiredProtocol>","security_group_id":"<yourSGID>"}}' 
  | python -m json.tool

The following list provides descriptions of the variables in the command:

  • region: The region in which you are working such as DFW.

  • X-Auth-Token: The authentication token for your user account. For more information, see How cURL commands work.

  • direction: The traffic direction for the rule. In this case, use egress for outbound traffic.

  • port_range_min: The minimum port number for the range of ports you want to add to the rule to, such as 22, 80, or 443. This can be the same as the maximum value.

  • port_range_max: The maximum port number for the range of ports you want to add to the rule to, such as 22, 80, or 443. This can be the same as the minimum value.

  • IPv4 or IPv6: The IP version you want to use.

  • protocol: The protocol you want to use, such as tcp, icmp, udp, or null.

  • security_grouo_id: The security group UUID that you want to apply the tule to. Find this on the Control Panel Security Group Details page next to Group ID.

After you run the cURL command, you get output that outlines the rule that you just added in a JSON block. Take note of the securityGroupRuleID field in the output because you use this value if you delete the rule. {{}} {{}}

Yes. Users can provision security groups through the neutron client. {{}} {{}}

Yes, but only inbound PublicNet and ServiceNet security groups are currently available in the Control Panel. To access additional features, you can use either the neutron client or the API. {{}} {{}}

No. We currently support security groups only for virtual cloud servers. {{}} {{}}

Cloud Networks does not apply a default security group. Users must create a security group themselves and apply it to ports on an instance. {{}} {{}}

No. You can apply security groups only after you start the instance. {{}} {{}}

When you add a rule, it allows traffic that matches the new security group rule to go through. {{}} {{}}

Traffic that matches a rule is permitted. Any traffic that is not part of the ruleset for that security group is denied or blocked. There is no way to specify that traffic matching a rule should be denied. OpenStack designed their security groups API as a whitelist. The system automatically blacklists any traffic that doesn’t match any of the rules in the whitelist. {{}} {{}}

Rules that match very basic network operations, such as DNS responses from Rackspace Provider DNS servers (UDP source port 53), can pass by default even if a security group does not explicitly allow them. Security groups also permit the TCP flags ACK and RST by default. {{}} {{}}

Rules can match the following types of traffic (for both IPv4 and IPv6 addresses):

  • TCP traffic

  • UDP traffic

  • ICMP traffic

  • Traffic from a Source IP address

  • Traffic from a CIDR {{}} {{}}

Yes. Such a security group denies or blocks all traffic. {{}} {{}}

Yes, you apply security groups to instances. You can associate a security group with one or more instances, and those instances automatically inherit all security group rules associated with that security group. {{}} {{}}

  • You can apply up to 5 security groups per port.

  • You can have up to 20 security group rules per security group

  • You can have up to 100 security group rules (aggregate) per user during the limited availability release. {{}}

Shared IP#

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A shared IP allows for active/passive high availability platforms to share a single IP address between two instances in our cloud. The IP then moves between the two instances based on instance state (up or down) through the configuration of a high availability protocol, such as heartbeat or corosync. Active-standby applications can then achieve full redundancy in our cloud. {{}} {{}}

Cloud Networks API Guide

The Shared IP sections are:

Shared IP supports the ability to create, associate, disassociate, and delete shared IP addresses. {{}} {{}}

This feature is supported for all customers except RackConnect customers. {{}} {{}}

No, this feature is not yet available in the Cloud Control Panel. {{}} {{}}

The default limit is ten shared IP addresses per tenant. We currently do not support requests to increase the quota per tenant. {{}} {{}}

Some high availability protocols depend on an interface floating MAC address to move with the shared IP during an impacting event, such as activating the standby instance in a passive state. Our cloud does not support hese protocols because our underlying data plane implementation doesn’t support MACs moving between instances. Therefore, our cloud favors high availability protocols such as heartbeat, corosync, and other similar protocols over protocols requiring a floating MAC address. {{}} {{}}

You would use a shared IP address for active/passive high availability (HA), where one IP address is needed between two or more servers for redundancy (active-standby). One server owns the IP address at any given time, and clients or other servers use this IP address for communication with the HA pair.

Although you can use a floating IP address to solve the active/passive HA problem, the solution would require monitoring and API calls to achieve the same result. Thus, a shared IP address is the preferred method to solve the active or passive HA problem. {{}} {{}}

No, the shared IP address is an additional public IP assigned to an instance port. The existing public IP must also reside on each instance for active-standby detection from high availability protocols such as heartbeat and corosync. {{}} {{}}

No, we currently support shared IP addresses for only virtual cloud servers. {{}} {{}}

No, shared IP addresses do not work with a RackConnect v3.0 cloud network. {{}}