ovirt-imageio enables uploading and downloading of disks using HTTPS.

The system contains these components:

• Engine - Engine UI starts image I/O operations, communicating with Engine backend and ovirt-imageio-proxy. Engine backend communicate with Vdsm on the host for preparing for I/O operations, monitoring operations, and cleaning up. This part is developed in the ovirt-engine project. See https://github.com/ovirt/ovit-engine

• Vdsm - prepares a host for image I/O operations, provides monitoring APIs for monitoring operations progress, and cleans up when the operation is done. Vdsm communicates with host's ovirt-imageio-daemon. This part is developed in the vdsm project. See https://github.com/ovirt/vdsm

• Proxy - allowing clients without access to the host network to perform I/O disk operations. This part is developed in this project.

• Daemon - expose images over HTTPS, allowing clients to read or write to images. This part is developed in this project.

In this flow, client can be engine UI (webadmin), or user program using the oVirt REST API or oVirt SDK.

• Client asks the backend to start an upload session.
• Engine creates signed ticket with the upload details.
• Engine creates a new disk
• Engine asks Vdsm to prepare the image for this disk.
• Engine asks Vdsm to add a upload ticket
• Vdsm adds the upload ticket to ovirt-imageio-daemon.
• Engine returns signed ticket
• Client authenticates with ovirt-imageio-proxy using the signed ticket.
• Client sends image data to imageio proxy
• ovirt-imageio-proxy relay image data to ovirt-imageio-daemon on the host, using the ticket id.
• ovirt-imageio-daemon writes image data to storage.
• When client is done, it asks the backend to end the session.
• Engine asks vdsm to revoke the upload ticket.
• Vdsm deletes the upload ticket from ovirt-imageio-daemon.
• Engine asks Vdsm to verify the upload.
• Engine asks vdsm to tear down the image.

Pausing an upload only stops the monitoring. The ticket remains in the daemon's cache and its timeout continues to decrease. If the client stops transferring data without pausing the transfer, the monitoring continues.

• The client asks the backend to resume the upload.
• The backend extends the ticket if it's about to expire or has already expired.
• The client continues to send the image data to ovirt-imageio-proxy.

In this flow, client can be engine UI (webadmin), or user program using the oVirt REST API or oVirt SDK.

• Client asks the backend to start a download session.
• Engine creates signed ticket with the download details.
• Engine asks Vdsm to prepare the image for this disk.
• Engine asks Vdsm to add a download ticket.
• Vdsm adds the download ticket to ovirt-imageio-daemon.
• Engine returns signed ticket.
• Client authenticates with ovirt-imageio-proxy sending POST request to /sessions.
• ovirt-imageio-proxy create download session with the signed ticket and return the session id in the session-id header.
• Client open download URL from ovirt-imageio-proxy using GET request to /images/ticket_id?session_id=XXXYYY
• Client ask backend to start monitoring the dowload
• The browser fetches the image data from the ovirt-imageio-proxy and store it to the user selected filename.
• ovirt-imageio-proxy fetch image data from ovirt-imageio-daemon on the host, using the ticket id.
• ovirt-imageio-daemon read image from storage.
• When the download is done, backend stops monitoring the download operation
• The backend deletes the download session from ovirt-imageio-proxy.
• Engine asks vdsm to revoke the download ticket.
• Vdsm deletes the download ticket from ovirt-imageio-daemon.
• Engine asks vdsm to tear down the image.

• To resume a download send a range request (use Range header) specifying the start offset to download and optionaly the last byte requested. This is already implemented in browsers and tools like wget.
• If the download ticket expires, the backend extends it.

• Monitoring a transfer starts when the client begins to transfer data to the proxy.
• The backend monitors the progress of a transfer periodically by sending a Host.get_image_ticket request to Vdsm with the ticket id.
• Vdsm sends a GET request with the URL /tickets/<ticket id> to ovirt-imageio-daemon and returns the json response.
• The backend updates the transfer's progress and state in the DB using the ticket's status.
• The UI updates the progress bar by reading the up to date status from the database.
• When the transfer is over, the monitoring ends.
• The following are responsible for finalizing the transfer:
  • The client when transferring via the SDK.
  • When uploading via the engine's UI, the UI itself.
  • When downloading via the engine's UI, the backend compares between the image size and the amount of bytes the daemon has transferred. If they are equal and no transfer operations exist, the backend finalizes the download itself.

Tickets are not persisted. In case of ovirt-imageio-daemon crash or reboot, Engine will provide a new ticket and possibly point client to another host to continue the operation.