Parcels

Accessing the Parcels Page

Use the selectors on the left side of the console to filter the displayed parcels:

• Location selector - View only parcels that are available remotely, only parcels pertaining to a particular cluster, or parcels pertaining to all clusters. When you access the Parcels page, the selector is set to Available Remotely.
• Error Status section of the Filters selector - Limit the list of displayed parcels by error status.
• Parcel Name section of the Filters selector - Limit the list of displayed parcels by parcel name.
• Status section of the Filters selector - Limit the list to parcels that have been distributed, parcels that have not been distributed (Other), or all parcels.

When you download a parcel, it appears in the list for each cluster managed by Cloudera Manager, indicating that the parcel is available for distribution on those clusters. Only one copy of the downloaded parcel resides on the Cloudera Manager Server. After you distribute the parcel, Cloudera Manager copies the parcel to the hosts in that cluster.

For example, if Cloudera Manager is managing two clusters, the rows in the All Clusters page list the information about the parcels on the two clusters. The Status column displays the current status of the parcels. The Version column displays version information about the parcel. Click the icon to view the release notes for the parcel. The Actions column shows actions you can perform on the parcels, such as download, distribute, delete, deactivate, and remove from host.

Downloading a Parcel

1. Go to the Parcels page. In the Location selector, click ClusterName or Available Remotely. Parcels that are available for download display the Available Remotely status and a Download button.

   If the parcel you want is not shown here—for example, you want to upgrade to a version of CDH that is not the most current version—you can make additional remote parcel repositories available. You can also configure the location of the local parcel repository and other settings. See Parcel Configuration Settings.

   If a parcel version is too new to be supported by the Cloudera Manager version, the parcel appears with a red background and error message:
   

   
   
   Such parcels are also listed when you select the Error status in the Error Status section of the Filters selector.

2. Click the Download button of the parcel you want to download to your local repository. The status changes to Downloading.

After a parcel has been downloaded, it is removed from the Available Remotely page.

Distributing a Parcel

Downloaded parcels can be distributed to the hosts in your cluster and made available for activation. Parcels are downloaded to the Cloudera Manager Server, so with multiple clusters, the downloaded parcels are shown as available to all clusters managed by the Cloudera Manager Server. However, you select distribution to a specific cluster's hosts on a cluster-by-cluster basis.

1. From the Parcels page, in the Location selector, select the cluster where you want to distribute the parcel, or select All Clusters. (The first cluster in the list is selected by default when you open the Parcels page.)
2. Click Distribute for the parcel you want to distribute. The status changes to Distributing. During distribution, you can:
   • Click the Details link in the Status column to view the Parcel Distribution Status page.
   • Click Cancel to cancel the distribution. When the Distribute action completes, the button changes to Activate, and you can click the Distributed status link to view the status page.

Distribution does not require Internet access; the Cloudera Manager Agent on each cluster member downloads the parcel from the local parcel repository hosted on the Cloudera Manager Server.

If you have a large number of hosts to which parcels must be distributed, you can control how many concurrent uploads Cloudera Manager performs. See Parcel Configuration Settings.

To delete a parcel that is ready to be distributed, click the triangle at the right end of the Distribute button and select Delete. This deletes the parcel from the local parcel repository.

Distributing parcels to the hosts in the cluster does not affect the current running services.

Activating a Parcel

Parcels that have been distributed to the hosts in a cluster are ready to be activated.

1. From the Parcels page, in the Location selector, choose ClusterName or All Clusters, and click the Activate button for the parcel you want to activate. This updates Cloudera Manager to point to the new software, which is ready to run the next time a service is restarted. A pop-up indicates which services must be restarted to use the new parcel.
2. Choose one of the following:
   • Restart - Activate the parcel and restart services affected by the new parcel.
   • Activate Only - Active the parcel. You can restart services at a time that is convenient. If you do not restart services as part of the activation process, you must restart them at a later time. Until you restart services, the current parcel continues to run.
3. Click OK.

Activating a new parcel also deactivates the previously active parcel for the product you just upgraded. However, until you restart the services, the previously active parcel displays a status of Still in use because the services are using that parcel, and you cannot remove the parcel until it is no longer being used.

If the parcel you activate updates the software for only a subset of services, even if you restart all of that subset, the previously active parcel displays Still in use until you restart the remaining services. For example, if you are running HDFS, YARN, Oozie, Hue, Impala, and Spark services, and you activate a parcel that updates only the Oozie service, the pop-up that displays instructs you to restart only the Oozie and Hue services. Because the older parcel is still in use by the HDFS, YARN, Impala, and Spark services, the parcel page shows that parcel as Still in use until you restart these remaining services.

Sometimes additional upgrade steps may be required. In this case, instead of Activate, the button will say Upgrade. When you click the Upgrade button, the upgrade wizard starts. See Upgrading CDH and Managed Services Using Cloudera Manager.

Deactivating a Parcel

You can deactivate an active parcel; this updates Cloudera Manager to point to the previous software version, which is ready to run the next time a service is restarted. From the Parcels page, choose ClusterName or All Clusters in the Location selector, and click the Deactivate button on an activated parcel.

To use the previous version of the software, restart your services.

Removing a Parcel

From the Parcels page, in the Location selector, choose ClusterName or All Clusters, click the to the right of an Activate button, and select Remove from Hosts.

Deleting a Parcel

From the Parcels page, in the Location selector, choose ClusterName or All Clusters, and click the to the right of a Distribute button, and select Delete.

Changing the Parcel Directory

1. Stop all services.
2. Deactivate all in-use parcels.
3. Shut down the Cloudera Manager Agent on all hosts.
4. Move the existing parcels to the new location.
5. Configure the host parcel directory.
6. Start the Cloudera Manager Agents.
7. Activate the parcels.
8. Start all services.

Troubleshooting

If a parcel is being distributed but never completes, make sure you have enough free space in the parcel download directories, because Cloudera Manager will try to download and unpack parcels even if there is insufficient space.

Configuring Cloudera Manager Server Parcel Settings

1. Use one of the following methods to open the parcel settings page:
   • Navigation bar
     1. Click in the top navigation bar or click Hosts and click the Parcels tab.
     2. Click the Configuration button.
   • Menu
     1. Select Administration > Settings.
     2. Select Category > Parcels .
2. Specify a property:
   • Local Parcel Repository Path defines the path on the Cloudera Manager Server host where downloaded parcels are stored.
   • Remote Parcel Repository URLs is a list of repositories that Cloudera Manager checks for parcels. Initially this points to the latest released CDH 4, CDH 5, Impala, and Solr repositories, but you can add your own repository locations to the list. Use this mechanism to add Cloudera repositories that are not listed by default, such as older versions of CDH, or the Sentry parcel for CDH 4.3. You can also use this to add your own custom repositories. The locations of the Cloudera parcel repositories are https://archive.cloudera.com/product/parcels/version, where product is a product name and version is a specific product version, latest, or the substitution variable {latest_supported}. The substitution variable appears after the parcel for the CDH version with the same major number as the Cloudera Manager version to enable substitution of the latest supported maintenance version of CDH.
     To add a parcel repository:

     1. In the Remote Parcel Repository URLs list, click the addition symbol to open an additional row.
     2. Enter the path to the repository.
3. Click Save Changes.

Configuring a Proxy Server

To configure a proxy server through which parcels are downloaded, follow the instructions in Configuring Network Settings.

Configuring the Host Parcel Directory

Configuring Peer-to-Peer Distribution of Parcels

Cloudera Manager uses a peer-to-peer service to efficiently distribute parcels to cluster hosts. The service is enabled by default and is configured to run on port 7191. You can change this port number, and you can disable peer-to-peer distribution.