134 v1.33 Infrastructure & Cloud Documented

OpenStack Skills

GSD skills for OpenStack cloud management — Nova compute, Neutron networking, Cinder storage, Keystone identity, and Glance image skills for cloud operations automation

Structured Data

Capability Metadata

Field	Value
ID	CAP-134
Version	v1.33
Domain	Infrastructure & Cloud
Status	Documented
Related	CAP-085, CAP-135, CAP-090
Source	`skills/openstack/*.yaml`
Services	Nova, Neutron, Cinder, Keystone, Glance

Configuration Reference

OpenStack skill definition (language-yaml):

name: openstack-nova-operations
description: >
  GSD skill for OpenStack Nova compute operations.
  Automates common server lifecycle tasks: boot, snapshot,
  migrate, resize, and evacuate with validation steps.
  Use when: managing OpenStack compute instances.
triggers:
  - pattern: "nova|openstack server|compute instance"
  - pattern: "boot from image|snapshot|live migrate"

Authentication config (clouds.yaml):

clouds:
  mycloud:
    auth:
      auth_url: https://keystone.example.com:5000/v3
      username: admin
      project_name: demo
      user_domain_name: Default
      project_domain_name: Default

Technical Specifications

Nova: server lifecycle — boot, snapshot, migrate, resize, evacuate

Neutron: network configuration — router, subnet, security group, floating IP

Cinder: volume operations — create, attach, detach, snapshot, extend

Keystone: user/project management — user, role, token, endpoint

Glance: image operations — upload, list, set metadata, deactivate

Loop: observe-detect-suggest-apply (same as core GSD skill loop)

Overview

OpenStack skills apply GSD Skill Creator's pattern learning to cloud operations: the same workflows that Nova administrators execute hundreds of times — boot from image, attach volume, configure security group — become observable patterns that condense into reusable skills. Each time an administrator runs a multi-step OpenStack procedure, the observe-detect-suggest-apply loop captures it, identifies the pattern, and promotes it to a skill that triggers automatically when the context recurs.

The five OpenStack services covered by v1.33 skills represent the core management surface: Nova controls compute instances, Neutron controls the network fabric, Cinder manages persistent volumes, Keystone handles identity and access, and Glance maintains the image catalog. Skills exist for each service's most frequent administrator workflows — the procedures that appear in runbooks, get executed under time pressure, and benefit most from automation and validation.

OpenStack skill triggers detect service-specific CLI patterns and action verbs. A session containing "openstack server boot" or "nova live-migrate" activates the Nova skill family. "openstack network create" activates Neutron skills. This specificity prevents false positives while ensuring the right skill appears exactly when needed.

History

OpenStack administration has a steep learning curve — hundreds of CLI commands with complex interdependencies, service-specific authentication, and stateful operations that fail silently when preconditions are not met. A nova live-migrate requires the target host to have sufficient resources, the instance's volumes to be accessible, and the network to be configured correctly — conditions an administrator must verify manually across multiple services before the migration is safe to execute.

Skills reduce this to observable workflows that suggest themselves when context is appropriate. The first time an administrator runs through a live migration checklist, the skill captures it. By the fifth time, the skill suggests the full checklist automatically — with validation steps embedded — before the migration command is issued. By the twentieth time, the administrator trusts the skill and focuses on the exceptional cases rather than the routine.

v1.33 introduced the full OpenStack skill suite alongside the crew and chipset capabilities (CAP-135, CAP-136) that coordinate these skills at scale. The three capabilities are designed to work together: skills define individual workflows, crews orchestrate them across multiple services, and the chipset architecture coordinates the crews.

Key Concepts

For Students & Teachers

Imagine a new chef joining a restaurant kitchen. On their first day, the head chef walks them through every dish on the menu — the ingredients, the steps, the timing. GSD OpenStack skills do the same thing for cloud administration: they watch an expert administrator run a procedure, capture every step, and then teach the next administrator by suggesting those steps at the right moment.

The five OpenStack services are like five stations in a kitchen: compute (Nova) is the grill station, networking (Neutron) is the plating station, storage (Cinder) is the pantry, identity (Keystone) is the door where everyone shows their credentials, and images (Glance) is the recipe book. Each station has its own tools and procedures — and its own skills.

Usage Examples

Example 1: Nova server lifecycle skill trigger

# Triggers openstack-nova-operations skill
openstack server create \
  --image ubuntu-22.04 \
  --flavor m1.medium \
  --network private-net \
  my-instance

# Skill suggests: verify floating IP assignment, attach Cinder volume

Example 2: Cinder volume attach workflow

# Triggers openstack-cinder-operations skill
openstack volume create --size 50 my-data-volume

# Skill suggests pre-attach checklist:
# 1. Verify server is in ACTIVE state
# 2. Check volume is in available state
# 3. Attach volume
# 4. Verify /dev/vdb appears in server
openstack server add volume my-instance my-data-volume