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documentation.suse.com / Introduction to SLE Micro deployment

Introduction to SLE Micro deployment

Publication Date: 28 Sep 2024
WHAT?

Basic information about available SLE Micro installation images and hardware requirements.

WHY?

To better understand all types of installation images for SLE Micro.

EFFORT

Less than 15 minutes of reading and a basic knowledge of Linux deployment.

GOAL

To choose the right SLE Micro installation image for a specific target environment and verify that the minimum hardware requirements are satisfied.

1 Installation images

 

SLE Micro is distributed as downloadable installation images. There are multiple types of installation images and each of them is suitable for a specific deployment scenario. This article helps you decide what installation image or images apply for your installation environment based on several criteria.

1.1 Image type

 

The following types of installation images are available for SLE Micro based on the installation type. Keep in mind that not all types of installers are available for each installation environment.

Raw disk image

Raw disk image is not a bootable image with an installer but the actual image of an installed SLE Micro itself. It is not “installed” but rather copied to a hard disk device. On its first boot, you can configure basic system options using an ncurses user interface. Using a raw disk image, you can fine-tune the deployment setup with Combustion and Ignition tools.

Self-install image

Self-install image is a bootable raw disk image that takes care of copying its content to a hard disk device.

Virtual machine image

Instead of installing SLE Micro in a virtual machine, you can use pre-built disk images for supported hypervisors. The .qcow or .qcow2 are available for the QEMU emulator. The VMware images are intended for deployment on the VMware virtualization technology.

Cloud image

Use this image to run SLE Micro in a supported cloud environment.

All the above mentioned images are delivered as either a base or default subtype. In addition to the core OS, subtypes contain the following tools:

base

  • Podman

default

  • Podman

  • virtualization stack

  • Cockpit

  • salt-minion

1.2 Kernel type

 

On AMD64/Intel 64, SLE Micro can be installed either with a default kernel or a real-time kernel. While default kernels focus on throughput-oriented operations and fair scheduling of tasks, real-time kernels are designed to maintain low latency and consistent response time. The default kernel is available in all types of installation images listed in Section 1.1, “Image type”. The real-time kernel is available in the following installation images:

  • Raw disk image

  • Self-install image

Tip
Tip

You can identify the real-time kernel images by the string rt in their file name.

1.3 Disk encryption

 

If your deployment requires running SLE Micro on an encrypted disk, use an installation image with the disk encryption support.

Tip
Tip

You can identify images with the disk encryption support by the string encrypted in their file name.

1.4 Installation environment

 

The choice of the installation image heavily depends on the environment where you intend to install SLE Micro.

Bare metal installation

When installing SLE Micro directly on a physical host without virtualization or cloud services layers, you have several options depending on the type of the target hardware.

  • If the target host supports a bootable drive in addition to the main installation disk, use the self-install image.

  • If the target host provides only the main installation disk, use the raw disk image.

Virtualized installation

To run virtualized SLE Micro, you have the following options:

  • Use a raw disk image as the main disk of the virtual machine.

  • Use a self-install image as a bootable drive and use it to transfer the disk image to the main disk of the virtual machine.

  • Use a pre-built virtual machine image of SLE Micro designed for a supported hypervisor.

Cloud deployment

To run SLE Micro in a supported cloud environment, use a pre-built image designed for a supported cloud services provider.

2 Requirements

 

This article lists requirements for deploying SLE Micro.

2.1 Hardware requirements

 

SLE Micro deployment is supported on the following hardware:

BIOS

Installing SLE Micro is supported on hosts with UEFI BIOS only. Hosts with legacy BIOS are not supported.

CPU

AMD64/Intel 64 v2, AArch64 and IBM Z CPU architectures are supported.

Maximum number of CPUs

The maximum number of CPUs supported by software design is 8192.

Memory

SLE Micro requires at least 1 GB RAM. Remember that this is a minimal value for the operating system, the actual memory size depends on the workload.

Hard disk

The minimum hard disk space is 12 GB, while the recommended value is 20 GB of hard disk space. However, the qcow2 images require at least 32 GB of hard disk space. When planning the HDD space, consider also the amount of space used by the workloads of your containers.

2.2 Virtualized deployment

 

When deploying SLE Micro as a virtual machine guest, you need to have a VM Host Server running one of the supported hypervisors and prepare a virtual machine for SLE Micro deployment.

Supported hypervisors
 

  • KVM in libvirt environment

  • VMware

  • Harvester