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Provisioning a Linux-based user group

When provisioning a bare metal server, Linux settings are critical parameters. This article lists steps, actions, and configuration details, along with suggesting optimal configuration steps. A tenant is an isolated environment with unique users, access parameters, and workloads.

When provisioning a Linux-based resource and opting to have your user created during the provisioning process, the credentials entered in this section will be used to seed that user into the provisioned resource.
 

  • Username: The username that identifies and is used with your Linux user.
  • Password: The password used with your Linux user (optional if specifying key). Users are strongly advised to set a complex password or passphrase containing a combination of uppercase, lowercase, number, and special characters. If your user’s Linux Settings password and/or key are not defined and Create User is enabled during provisioning (this is the default setting), a random password will be generated but not exposed and login will be blocked.
  • Confirm: Confirm your entered password. These must match for the new password value to be saved.
  • SSH Key: Select a pre-existing SSH key pair object in the application. The user’s SSH key must be selected under Linux Settings in the SSH Key selection drop-down before the instance is created. This step is required if not specifying a password and creating your user during provisioning or if the SSH password authentication has been disabled.

Important: When provisioning a Cloud-Init instance, although Linux Settings > Username is not a required parameter in the GUI, the username should be specified to avoid auto-populating the user’s email address as the username credential. Prohibited characters in the email address interrupt and terminate the configuration action without completion.

These parameters must be configured before spinning up a new instance. If a new instance is created without proper configuration in place, the new instance will not be accessible. The user will not be able to log into an instance that has been created before the setup parameters were configured.

To provision a Linux-based user group:

  1. Sign into the Edge Services portal.
  1. Add a key pair.
  1. Before moving forward with configuration, confirm that Linux settings in the user profile have been updated to the latest release.
  1. Under Linux Settings, click the list to select the SSH key pair you want to use for this instance.
  1. Link the SSH key with the SSH Key field.

You can use the same SSH key for multiple instances. Be sure to set the SSH key before provisioning a new instance. Uploading keys and mapping keys to the user profile are two different actions.

  1. Enter the public and private keys into the designated fields. These keys are outputs of the 

"ssh-keygen"

command, generated with the options

"-t rsa -m PEM"

in the command string.

User settings must be configured before spinning up an instance. Unless the key pair is selected before the instance is created, the user cannot access the new instance.

  1. On the Administration tab, click the CREATE USER GROUP button.
  1. Use the Search option to add users with the EDIT USER GROUP dialog.
  1. If needed, mark the SUDO ACCESS checkbox. Linux operating system choice impacts Sudo access requirements: CentOS requires Sudo, Ubuntu does not require Sudo.
  1. If needed, click the X icon at right to remove individual users from the group.
  1. As provisioning moves forward, setup delivers a secure shell (SSH) key for the user (in this case, the user group). After setting Type and then Group configuration, under the User Config section, the USER GROUP option creates a Linux user group.