Using ceph-volume utility

Use the ceph-volume utility to prepare, list, create, activate, deactivate, batch, trigger, zap, and migrate Ceph OSDs.

The ceph-volume utility is a single-purpose command-line tool to deploy logical volumes as OSDs. It uses a plugin-type framework to deploy OSDs with different device technologies. The ceph-volume utility follows a similar workflow of the ceph-disk utility for deploying OSDs, with a predictable, and robust way of preparing, activating, and starting OSDs. Currently, the ceph-volume utility only supports the lvm plug-in, with the plan to support others technologies in the future.
Important: The ceph-disk command is deprecated.

Running ceph-volume in a cephadm shell

Important: Do not run ceph-volume from a container session that is started with cephadm shell when relying on the shell’s default bind mounts.

By design, cephadm shell omits several host bind mounts that ceph-volume expects, such as /run/udev and /run/lvm. As a result, running ceph-volume in this environment can fail or behave incorrectly.

Running ceph-volume manually, outside operations driven by ceph orch or cephadm, is not the normal operational path. This approach is intended mainly for debugging, testing, or development.

Important: Using ceph-volume directly outside the ceph orch (cephadm) workflow is not encouraged. The utility assumes a host environment with access to device metadata and system services that are normally available on the host when operating under the cephadm-driven workflow.

Although it is possible to extend the cephadm shell container environment by adding host bind mounts, this configuration is not typical. For guidance specific to your environment, contact IBM Support.