This version of GitHub Enterprise will be discontinued on This version of GitHub Enterprise was discontinued on 2020-08-20. No patch releases will be made, even for critical security issues. For better performance, improved security, and new features, upgrade to the latest version of GitHub Enterprise. For help with the upgrade, contact GitHub Enterprise support.

Article version: Enterprise Server 2.18

Installing GitHub Enterprise Server on OpenStack KVM

To install GitHub Enterprise Server on OpenStack KVM, you must have OpenStack access and download the GitHub Enterprise Server QCOW2 image.

In this article

Prerequisites

Hardware considerations

GitHub Enterprise Server requires a persistent data disk separate from the root disk. For more information, see "System overview." For your storage device, we recommend a high-performance SSD, either directly attached or from a storage area network (SAN). We recommend different hardware configurations based on the number of user licenses used in your GitHub Enterprise Server instance.

User licensesvCPUsMemoryAttached storageRoot storage
Trial, demo, or 10 light users216 GB100 GB200 GB
10-3000432 GB250 GB200 GB
3000-5000864 GB500 GB200 GB
5000-80001296 GB750 GB200 GB
8000-10000+16128 GB1000 GB200 GB

These are minimum recommendations. More resources may be required depending on your usage, such as user activity and selected integrations. When increasing CPU resources, it's recommended to add at least 6.5 GB of memory for each CPU (up to 16 CPUs) added to your GitHub Enterprise Server instance. For more information, see "Increasing CPU or memory resources."

Note: The root disk can be resized by building a new appliance or using an existing appliance. For more information, see "Increasing storage capacity."

Warning: We recommend you use webhooks to fetch repository changes for continuous integration (CI) or similar systems. Regular automatic checks, or polling, will significantly reduce the scalability of your instance. For more information, see "About webhooks"

Downloading the GitHub Enterprise Server image

  1. Navigate to the GitHub Enterprise Server download page.
  2. To download your license file, click Download license.
  3. Click Get the latest release of GitHub Enterprise Server.
  4. Select GitHub On-premises, then click OpenStack KVM (QCOW2).
  5. Click Download for OpenStack KVM (QCOW2).

Creating the GitHub Enterprise Server instance

To create the instance, you'll need to import the GitHub Enterprise Server image to your virtual machine and attach an additional storage volume for your instance data. For more information, see "Hardware considerations."

  1. In OpenStack Horizon, upload the GitHub Enterprise Server image you downloaded. For instructions, see the "Upload an image" section of the OpenStack guide "Upload and manage images."

  2. Create a new virtual disk to use as an attached storage volume for your instance data, and configure the size based on your user license count. For instructions, see the OpenStack guide "Create and manage volumes."

  3. Create a security group, and add a new security group rule for each port in the table below. For instructions, see the OpenStack guide "Configure access and security for instances."

    PortServiceDescription
    22SSHGit over SSH access. Clone, fetch, and push operations to public/private repositories supported.
    25SMTPSMTP with encryption (STARTTLS) support.
    80HTTPWeb application access. All requests are redirected to the HTTPS port when SSL is enabled.
    122SSHInstance shell access. The default SSH port (22) is dedicated to application git+ssh network traffic.
    161/UDPSNMPRequired for network monitoring protocol operation.
    443HTTPSWeb application and Git over HTTPS access.
    1194/UDPVPNSecure replication network tunnel in high availability configuration.
    8080HTTPPlain-text web based Management Console. Not required unless SSL is disabled manually.
    8443HTTPSSecure web based Management Console. Required for basic installation and configuration.
    9418GitSimple Git protocol port. Clone and fetch operations to public repositories only. Unencrypted network communication.
  4. Optionally, associate a floating IP to the instance. Depending on your OpenStack setup, you may need to allocate a floating IP to the project and associate it to the instance. Contact your system administrator to determine if this is the case for you. For more information, see "Allocate a floating IP address to an instance" in the OpenStack documentation.

  5. Launch your GitHub Enterprise Server instance using the image, data volume, and security group created in the previous steps. For instructions, see the OpenStack guide "Launch and manage instances."

Configuring the GitHub Enterprise Server instance

  1. Copy the virtual machine's public DNS name, and paste it into a web browser.
  2. At the prompt, upload your license file and set a management console password. For more information, see "Managing your GitHub Enterprise license."
  3. In the Management Console, configure and save your desired settings. For more information, see "Configuring the GitHub Enterprise Server appliance."
  4. The instance will restart automatically.
  5. Click Visit your instance.

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