--- title: "Installing CTERA Portal Instances" slug: "installing-ctera-portal-instances-41" tags: ["8.2", "Portal"] updated: 2026-10-21T12:02:28Z published: 2026-10-21T12:02:28Z canonical: "kb.ctera.com/installing-ctera-portal-instances-41" --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://kb.ctera.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Installing CTERA Portal Instances Use the following workflow to install CTERA Portal. 1. [Creating a Portal Instance](/v1/docs/installing-ctera-portal-instances-41#creating-a-portal-instance) using a CTERA Portal image from [CTERA support](https://www.ctera.com/support/). 2. [Configuring Network Settings](/v1/docs/configuring-network-settings-29). 3. Optionally, [configure a default gateway](/v1/docs/configuring-a-default-gateway-60). 4. [Additional Installation Instructions for Customers Without Internet Access](/v1/docs/additional-installation-instructions-for-customers-without-internet-access-10). 5. For the first server you install, follow the steps in [Configuring the Primary Server](/v1/docs/configuring-the-primary-server-5). 6. For any additional servers beside the primary server, install the server as described below and configure it as an additional server, as described in [Installing and Configuring Additional CTERA Portal Servers](/v1/docs/installing-and-configuring-additional-ctera-portal-servers-5). 7. Make sure that you replicate the database, as described in [Configuring the CTERA Portal Database for Backup](/v1/docs/configuring-ctera-portal-database-for-backup-and-restore-1). 8. Backup the server as described in [Backing Up the CTERA Portal Servers and Storage](/v1/docs/backing-up-the-ctera-portal-servers-and-storage-3). **Note** You can use block-storage-level snapshots for backup, but snapshots are periodical in nature, configured to run every few hours. Therefore, you cannot recover the metadata to any point-in-time, and can lose a significant amount of data on failure. Also, many storage systems do not support block-level snapshots and replication, or do not do so efficiently. ## Creating a Portal Instance You install the CTERA Portal on Nutanix AHV using the qcow2 image from CTERA. **Note** The following procedure uses Nutanix Prism Central. The procedure using Nutanix Prism Element is similar. **To install the CTERA Portal Server in a Nutanix AHV environment:** 1. Log in to the Nutanix Prism Central console. The dashboard is displayed. 2. Optionally, create a project to store the CTERA resources for the portal : 1. Select the **Admin Center** application from **Application Switcher**, and navigate to **Projects** in the navigation pane. 2. Click **Create Project**. 3. Enter the following: **Project Name** – Type a unique name for the project. **Description** – Enter a brief purpose for the project. 4. Click **Save**. 3. Select the **Infrastructure** application from **Application Switcher**, and navigate to **Compute > Images** in the navigation pane. 4. Click **Add Image**. 5. Enter the name of the project you use for the portal resources. 6. Make sure the **Select Source** option is **Image File** and click **Upload File**. 7. Browse to the location of the QCOW2 image file, and then click **Open**. 8. Specify the details for the portal image. **Name** – A unique name to identify the image. **Description** – An optional description of the image. **Type** – Select **Disk**. 9. Choose the **Upload a file** option and browse to the qcow2 image file from CTERA support. 10. Click **Next** and then **Save**. The progress of the image upload is displayed in the page under the top bar. 11. Navigate to **Compute > VMs** in the navigation pane 12. Click **Create VM**. 13. Specify the details for the VM. **Name** – A unique name to identify the portal. **Description** – An optional description of the portal. **Project** – Enter the name of the project you use for the portal resources. **Cluster** – Leave the default value. **Number of VMs** – Leave the default value. **CPUs** – The number of vCPUs as specified in [Requirements](/v1/docs/planning-general-and-port-requirements-2#general-requirements). **Cores Per CPU** – The number of cores per vCPU. **Memory** – The RAM requirement as specified in [Requirements](/v1/docs/planning-general-and-port-requirements-2#general-requirements).. 14. Click **Next**. 15. Click **Attach Disk**. 16. Leave all the values with the defaults, except for the following: **Operation** – Select **Clone from Image** to add a disk for the CTERA Portal software. **Image** – Select the CTERA Portal image from the drop-down list. **Capacity** – The minimum recommended disk size is 32GB. 17. Click **Save**. 18. Click **Attach Disk**. 19. Leave all the values with the defaults, except for the following: **Operation** – Select **Allocate on Storage Container** to add a data pool disk for the portal. **Storage Container** – Select the storage container from the drop-down list. **Capacity** – The data disk size. The minimum capacity is 200GB. Prior to going to production, contact [CTERA support](https://www.ctera.com/support/) to evaluate whether the attached drive's performance meets CTERA's main database performance requirements. 20. Click **Save**. 21. Click **Attach to Subnet** to specify the network subnet. 22. Click **Next**. 23. Optionally, follow your site best practices to ensure optimal performance of the VM. For example, set the **Timezone** for the VM. The default is the local timezone.. 24. Click **Next**. 25. Review the settings and click **Create VM**. The VM is created. 26. From the list of virtual machines (**Table** view), select the new virtual machine and scroll down to display details of the VM. 27. Click **Power On**. The VM is powered on and the **Launch Console** option is enabled. 28. Click **Launch Console** to open the console to get the IP address for the CTERA Portal. **Note** If the script to create the data pool does not successfully run, it will start on every boot until it completes. The script has a timeout which means it will exit if the data pool is not created within the timeout after boot time. If the data pool is not created, dockers required by the portal are not loaded to the data pool. To make sure that the script completed successfully, **before continuing**, run `docker images` to check that the docker images are available, including *zookeeper*, which is the last docker to load to the data pool. If all the dockers do not load you need to run the script `/usr/bin/ctera_firstboot.sh` Also, refer to [Troubleshooting the Installation](/v1/docs/installing-ctera-portal-instances-41#troubleshooting-the-installation) if the script does not complete successfully. 29. Continue with [Logging in to the Server and Creating the Storage](/v1/docs/installing-ctera-portal-instances-41#logging-in-to-the-server-and-creating-the-storage). 30. If an IP is not assigned, [configure network settings](/v1/docs/configuring-network-settings-29) before starting the CTERA Portal services in the next step. 31. Start CTERA Portal services, by running the following command: `portal-manage.sh start` **Note** Do not start the portal until both the **sdconv** and **envoy** dockers have been loaded to the data pool. You can check that these dockers have loaded in `/var/log/ctera_firstboot.log` or by running `docker images` ## Logging in to the Server and Creating the Storage You need a data pool on every server. The data pool is created automatically when you first start the virtual machine and dockers loaded on to it. You need to create a data pool on every server and on the primary database server, and when PostgreSQL streaming replication is required, also on the secondary, replication, server, an archive pool. See [Using PostgreSQL Streaming Replication](/v1/docs/using-postgresql-streaming-replication-3) for details about PostgreSQL streaming replication. **To log in to the portal server:** - Log in as the `root` user using SSH. The default password is `ctera321` You are prompted to change the password on your first login. **To create the archive pool:** 1. For the CTERA Portal primary database server and the secondary, replication, server, add a disk to the virtual machine to use as the archive pool. **Note** The minimum archive pool should be 200GB but it should be sized around 2% of the expected global file system size. For more details, see [General Requirements](/v1/docs/planning-general-and-port-requirements-2#general-requirements). 1. Log in as the `root` user using SSH. 2. Run `lsblk` or `fdisk -l` to identify the disks to use for the data and archive pools. 3. Run the following command to create the archive pool: `portal-storage-util.sh create_db_archive_pool Device` Where *Device* is the **Device name** of the disk to use for the archive pool. ## Troubleshooting the Installation You can check on the progress of the docker loads in one of the following ways to ensure that all the dockers are loaded: The last docker to load is called *zookeeper*: - In `/var/log/ctera_firstboot.log` - By running `docker images` to check that the docker images are available. - By checking if `/var/lib/ctera_firstboot_completed` is present with the date and time when the installation was performed. If all the dockers do not load you need to run the script `/usr/bin/ctera_firstboot.sh`