Asset Management

Overview

Assets are physical machines managed by Colony. They progress through a lifecycle from discovery to provisioning, and can be reused by wiping and reprovisioning as needed.

Asset Lifecycle

Assets move through these statuses:

         Initial Discovery
                ↓
         [discovering]
                ↓
          [available] ←──────┐
                ↓            │
        [provisioning]       │
                ↓            │
         [provisioned]       │
                ↓            │
        [deprovisioning] ────┘

Status Descriptions

Status	Description	Duration	Actions Available
discovering	Initial hardware detection and inventory	3-8 min	Wait
available	Ready for provisioning	Stable	Provision OS, Create cluster
provisioning	OS installation in progress	7-40 min	Monitor, View logs
provisioned	OS installed, ready for use	Stable	SSH access, Create K3s cluster
deprovisioning	Disk wipe in progress	5-10 min	Wait

Asset Operations

Discovery

Register new hardware with IPMI credentials:

Discover Assets →

Provisioning

Install operating systems on assets:

Ubuntu 22.04:

• Use for K3s clusters or standalone servers
• Provides SSH access
• Provision Ubuntu Guide →

Talos Linux:

• Used automatically by Civo Stack and Talos Linux clusters
• No manual provisioning needed
• Civo Stack → | Talos Linux →

Deprovisioning

Wipe assets to return them to "available" status:

1. Navigate to Assets in Colony UI
2. Select provisioned asset
3. Click Wipe Disk
4. Confirm action
5. Wait for completion (5-10 minutes)

danger

Disk wipe is destructive and irreversible. All data will be permanently deleted.

Asset Information

Hardware Inventory

Colony automatically detects:

• CPUs: Model, count, cores per CPU
• Memory: Total RAM, speed, configuration
• Storage: Disks, capacity, type (SSD, HDD, NVMe)
• Network: NICs, MAC addresses, speeds
• BMC/IPMI: Management interface details

View in Colony UI under Assets → Select asset → Hardware Details.

Network Configuration

Assets can be configured with:

• Static IP: Assigned during cluster creation
• DHCP: Temporary IP during discovery
• VLANs: Tagged networks (advanced)
• Bonding: Link aggregation (advanced)

See Networking Guide for advanced configuration.

Use Cases

Kubernetes Clusters

Create production clusters on bare metal:

• Civo Stack: Enterprise private cloud (create →)
• K3s: Lightweight Kubernetes on Ubuntu (create →)
• Talos Linux: Standard Kubernetes (create →)

Standalone Servers

Provision Ubuntu for non-cluster workloads:

• Application servers (Node.js, Python, Go apps)
• Database servers (PostgreSQL, MySQL, MongoDB)
• Development machines
• Jump boxes and bastions
• CI/CD runners

Testing and Development

Use assets for experimentation:

• Provision → Test → Wipe → Repeat
• Try different cluster configurations
• Benchmark hardware performance
• Validate deployment workflows

Asset Requirements by Cluster Type

Cluster Type	Min Assets	OS Required	Pre-Provision	Credentials
Civo Stack	2	Talos (auto)	No	Yes (tokens)
K3s	2	Ubuntu 22.04	Yes	No (SSH only)
Talos Linux	2	Talos (auto)	No	No

Asset Tagging and Organization

Organize assets with metadata:

• Location: Datacenter, rack, U position
• Purpose: Compute, storage, GPU, etc.
• Generation: Hardware version or age
• Owner: Team or project
• Maintenance: Next service date

This helps with:

• Resource allocation
• Capacity planning
• Troubleshooting
• Compliance tracking

Monitoring Assets

Via Colony UI

Real-time status of all assets:

1. Navigate to Assets
2. View list with status indicators
3. Click asset for detailed information
4. Monitor provisioning progress

Via kubectl

From management cluster:

# List all hardware
kubectl get hardware -A

# Watch for status changes
kubectl get hardware -A -w

# Get detailed info
kubectl describe hardware -n <namespace> <hardware-name>

Troubleshooting

Asset Won't Discover

Symptoms: Asset doesn't appear after add-ipmi.

Solutions:

• Verify IPMI connectivity: ping <ipmi-ip>
• Check credentials in IPMI web interface
• Ensure PXE boot is enabled
• Review colony-agent logs: kubectl logs -n colony -l app=colony-agent

Asset Stuck in Status

Symptoms: Asset remains in same status for extended period.

Solutions:

• discovering: Check PXE boot, DHCP, TFTP server
• provisioning: Review Tinkerbell workflow logs
• deprovisioning: May be slow for large disks, wait longer or power cycle

Can't Wipe Asset

Symptoms: Wipe operation fails or doesn't start.

Solutions:

• Ensure asset is in "provisioned" status
• Check IPMI connectivity
• Verify management cluster can reach asset
• Try power cycling asset first

What's Next

Choose your path:

• Discover Assets → - Register hardware
• Provision Ubuntu → - Install Ubuntu 22.04
• Create Clusters → - Deploy Kubernetes
• Networking Configuration → - Advanced network setup

Need help? Join our Slack community for support!