Continuing with the volume created in the post Sharing EBS Volumes Among Instances, in this post I show how to create a snapshot, create a new volume from that snapshot, and mount the new volume in an instance. Remember that the volume created in the previous post contained 1 file called “readme”.
Creating the Snapshot
First we look at the available volumes:
$ ec2-describe-volumes VOLUME vol-4001e429 1 us-east-1c available 2008-09-25T09:51:48+0000
Then we make the snapshot:
$ ec2-create-snapshot vol-4001e429 SNAPSHOT snap-cb7493a2 vol-4001e429 pending 2008-09-26T11:48:30+0000
It is “pending”. We check the status until it the snapshot creation has “completed”:
$ ec2-describe-snapshots snap-cb7493a2 SNAPSHOT snap-cb7493a2 vol-4001e429 completed 2008-09-26T11:48:30+0000 100%
Creating a Volume from the Snapshot
Now that the snapshot is ready, we can create a new volume from it. Note that we create it in a different availability zone. The orginal volume resides in “us-east-1c”. The new volume will reside in “us-east-1a”.
$ ec2-create-volume --snapshot snap-cb7493a2 -z us-east-1a VOLUME vol-9f00e5f6 1 snap-cb7493a2 us-east-1a creating 2008-09-26T11:52:37+0000
We wait until the volume is “available”:
$ ec2-describe-volumes VOLUME vol-9f00e5f6 1 snap-cb7493a2 us-east-1a available 2008-09-26T11:52:37+0000 VOLUME vol-4001e429 1 us-east-1c available 2008-09-25T09:51:48+0000
Now we have two available volumes.
Mounting the New Volume in an Instance
Let’s launch an image so that we can verify that the newly created volume can be mounted and has the same contents as the original volume. Note that the instance is launched in the availability zone where the newly created volume resides.
$ ec2-run-instances ami-0757b26e -k gettingstarted-keypair -z us-east-1a
The AMI we use here is a public Ubuntu Desktop image.
$ ec2-describe-instances RESERVATION r-ff4d9e96 190912652296 default INSTANCE i-0fcf6c66 ami-0757b26e ec2-67-202-35-79.compute-1.amazonaws.com domU-12-31-38-00-6C-F6.compute-1.internal running gettingstarted-keypair 0 m1.small 2008-09-26T11:55:16+0000 us-east-1a aki-a71cf9ce ari-a51cf9cc
The instance is ready to be used. In another terminal we connect to the image and start the “user-setup” script. The GUI interaction to set up the user is not shown here.
$ ssh -i id_rsa-gettingstarted-keypair root@ec2-67-202-35-79.compute-1.amazonaws.com The authenticity of host 'ec2-67-202-35-79.compute-1.amazonaws.com (67.202.35.79)' can't be established. RSA key fingerprint is ab:df:4e:78:b7:4d:59:3e:ae:6c:81:32:80:eb:bd:78. Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)? yes Warning: Permanently added 'ec2-67-202-35-79.compute-1.amazonaws.com,67.202.35.79' (RSA) to the list of known hosts. Linux domU-12-31-38-00-6C-F6 2.6.21.7-2.fc8xen #1 SMP Fri Feb 15 12:39:36 EST 2008 i686 The programs included with the Ubuntu system are free software; the exact distribution terms for each program are described in the individual files in /usr/share/doc/*/copyright. Ubuntu comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by applicable law. Amazon EC2 Ubuntu 7.10 gutsy base install AMI built by Eric Hammond For more information: http://ec2gutsy-desktop.notlong.com root@domU-12-31-38-00-6C-F6:~# user-setup Shadow passwords are now on. Using `/usr/share/libgksu/debian/gconf-defaults.libgksu-sudo' to provide `libgksu-gconf-defaults'.
Time to attach the volume (in the orginal terminal):
$ ec2-attach-volume vol-9f00e5f6 -i i-0fcf6c66 -d /dev/sdh ATTACHMENT vol-9f00e5f6 i-0fcf6c66 /dev/sdh attaching 2008-09-26T12:01:15+0000 $ ec2-describe-volumes VOLUME vol-9f00e5f6 1 snap-cb7493a2 us-east-1a in-use 2008-09-26T11:52:37+0000 ATTACHMENT vol-9f00e5f6 i-0fcf6c66 /dev/sdh attached 2008-09-26T12:01:15+0000 VOLUME vol-4001e429 1 us-east-1c available 2008-09-25T09:51:48+0000
Let’s see whether it is available. Connect to the desktop as described in Preparing for Amazon AWS Usage.
In the terminal connected to the instance, we can mount the volume now:
root@domU-12-31-38-00-6C-F6:~# mkdir /mnt/my-volume root@domU-12-31-38-00-6C-F6:~# mount /dev/sdh /mnt/my-volume
Now the volume should be mounted as “my-volume” and accessible. Let’s verify that by opening a file browser on that volume.
Indeed, the “readme” file that was on the original volume is also on the new volume created from the snapshot.