PowerFlex Attach a Volume to Multiple Hosts in OpenStack (--multi-attach)
Summary: Attempts to create a multiattach-able OpenStack Cinder volume (using the --multi-attach switch), using ScaleIO as a backend, fails.
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Symptoms
Scenario
A user is attempting to create a ScaleIO volume via OpenStack Cinder, using the the --multi-attach switch. For example:
openstack volume create --size 16 --multi-attach testvol
Symptoms
Messages similar to the following are logged by OpenStack Cinder in cinder-scheduler.log:
DEBUG cinder.scheduler.filters.capabilities_filter [req-1f20b775-4ce2-4f97-a0cf-7326aed3e6674a018cd43cde479e8f18bb7e11c157ee d0ad4f70bec34caa8900bac2fceb6b7d - - -] Host doesn't provide capability 'multiattach' _satisfies_extra_specs /usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/cinder/scheduler/filters/capabilities_filter.py:54
DEBUG cinder.scheduler.filters.capabilities_filter [req-1f20b775-4ce2-4f97-a0cf-7326aed3e6674a018cd43cde479e8f18bb7e11c157ee d0ad4f70bec34caa8900bac2fceb6b7d - - -] host 'hyper-converged001@scaleio#default:default': free_capacity_gb: 24531, pools: None fails resource_type extra_specs requirements host_passes /usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/cinder/scheduler/filters/capabilities_filter.py:72
Impact
In an OpenStack environment, it is not possible to attach the same ScaleIO volume to multiple hosts.
Cause
The ScaleIO OpenStack driver does not currently support the Cinder --multi-attach option, as OpenStack, specifically Nova, does not yet fully support the feature.
Support may be provided in a future version of the driver.
Resolution
Create separate volumes and attach each to a host.
Article Properties
Article Number: 000158996
Article Type: Solution
Last Modified: 14 Aug 2025
Version: 5
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