Can PM VE be a NFS server?

[mylesw]

I have a PM VE host that has an external drive attached which I use for backup. It works great. I added a 2nd PM VE host, but it is not clustered as I can't get the PM VE versions to be compatible for corosync. I don't need them clustered though. However there is a 2nd NIC with an interconnect cable that connects the two machines together. This was a challenge since they are colocated in a data center far away from me, but I was able to get both machines in the same rack so the DC would install the interconnect.

I have each machine recognizing each other via its own separate IP subnet on that 2nd NIC. What I now would like to do is to have one of the PM VE machines act like its own NFS server so that the other can be a client to it, and therefore I can share the external drive for backups on the 2nd PM VE host.

I realize this may seem complex, but since I don't have a NAS that they can both share as a backup server, this seems my best option. I thought that maybe I could install a node as a NAS and maybe share that to the other box, but I don't know if that would work.

Can anyone tell me if I can install a NFS server on a PM VE box, or is there a better way to achieve this?

K

 

[Yannick S]

You could install a say TrueNAS (or any os really) as a guest, and have proxmox pass trough the disk? You could then bridge over your 2nd nic and attach that to the NAS guest OS to have them communicate over that link.

 

[akops]

Hello,
Proxmox hosts are running debian Linux. Just install the nfs server package and export the mount point with your external disk.

Note: The above TrueNas solution will work also, but i believe its a waste of computing resources.

 

[Yannick S]

Hello,
Proxmox hosts are running debian Linux. Just install the nfs server package and export the mount point with your external disk.

Note: The above TrueNas solution will work also, but i believe its a waste of computing resources.

Yes that is true, this will work. This is just preference. I prefer to have my hypervisors somewhat independent of the services they provide, if that makes any sense at all.