Create a storage pool
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This page provides instructions for creating a storage pool.

Before you begin

Consider the following requirements before you create a storage pool:

You must complete the following steps before you can create a storage pool:
1. Select or create a project in Google Cloud and enable billing.
2. Enable private services access for the VPC you intend to use. You can also enable private services access as part of the storage pool creation if you are using the Google Cloud console.
3. If you want to use customer-managed encryption keys (CMEK), create a CMEK policy first.
4. If you want to use Active Directory, create an Active Directory policy first.
You can only assign a CMEK policy during storage pool creation unless you choose to use the EncryptVolumes function to encrypt all existing volumes with CMEK policy after creation.
You can only change the description, capacity, and labels after creation.
Once an Active Directory policy is attached to a storage pool, it cannot be detached.
Storage pool capacity is subject to a location-based quota. If you need more capacity, request a quota increase for the Storage pool capacity (GiB) per location quota. For more information, see NetApp Volumes quotas.

Create a storage pool

Use the following instructions to create a storage pool using the Google Cloud console or Google Cloud CLI.

Console

Go to the NetApp Volumes page in the Google Cloud console.

Go to NetApp Volumes
Click Storage pools.
Click Create.
Under Storage pool details, complete the following actions:
1. Enter a name for the pool in the Name field. The name must be unique for each project.
2. Optional: Enter a description for the pool in the Description field.
Select a location for the pool.
Select a service level:
- Flex
  
  For the Flex service level, you can choose between zonal or regional availability. For zonal availability, you need to specify the zone to use. For regional availability, you need to specify a primary zone and a replica zone.
- Standard
- Premium
- Extreme
Optional: for Flex zonal pools, you can customize performance in some regions. The creation of non-custom performance Flex zonal pools aren't available in these regions. However, you can still create Flex zonal pools with default performance using Google Cloud CLI or the API. Under Performance, complete the following steps to create a custom-performance zonal pool:
1. Enter the throughput for the storage pool in the Throughput field.
2. Enter the IOPS for the storage pool in the IOPS field.
Enter the capacity for the storage pool in the Capacity field.
Under Set up connections, select the VPC you want to use. If you haven't peered your VPC, click Set up connection and complete the following steps:
1. Enable the Service networking API.
2. Click Use an automatically allocated IP range or to choose a CIDR manually, click Select one or more existing IP ranges or create a new one.
3. Review your selections.
4. Click Create connection.
  
  After peering is complete, a notification appears that indicates VPC peering is successful.
Under Active Directory policy, complete the following steps:
1. Select the Assign an Active Directory policy to the storage pool checkbox to provision a storage pool for volumes that use LDAP, Kerberos, or any SMB protocol variations.
2. Select a policy from the Active Directory policy list.
If you plan to use NFS protocol combinations, select the Enable LDAP checkbox. When you select this option, you can only create LDAP-enabled NFS volumes in the pool. You need to configure Active Directory LDAP to provide UNIX user information. If you want to create NFSv3 or NFSv4 volumes that use regular AUTH_SYS authentication, don't select the Enable LDAP checkbox.

Important: Your selection is permanent.
Under Encryption, complete the following steps:
1. Select Google-managed encryption key or Customer-managed encryption key (CMEK).
2. If you select Customer-managed encryption key (CMEK), select a CMEK policy.
To enable auto-tiering, select the Allow auto-tiering checkbox. Your selection is permanent. This feature is generally available (GA) for Premium and Extreme storage pools, and in Preview for custom-performance Flex zonal pools.
- For Premium and Extreme pools: you can enable auto-tiering on a volume-by-volume basis, if it's already enabled at the storage pool level.
- For custom-performance Flex zonal pools: enabling auto-tiering for a storage pool automatically enforces it to all new volumes created within that pool and requires the following settings:
- Specify the size of the hot tier in the Hot tier threshold field. Note that the hot tier threshold can't be decreased. For more information, see Performance and hot tier sizing.
Optional: under Auto-increase, select the Enable auto-increase checkbox for the pools when the hot tier reaches its capacity. For more information, see Performance and hot tier sizing.
Optional: click Add label to enter relevant labels for reporting and querying purposes from the Labels section.
Click Create.

gcloud

Create a storage pool:

    gcloud netapp storage-pools create POOL_NAME \
       --project=PROJECT_ID \
       --location=LOCATION \
       --capacity=CAPACITY \
       --service-level=SERVICE_LEVEL \
       --network=name=NETWORK_NAME,psa-range=PSA_RANGE

Replace the following information:

POOL_NAME: the name of the pool you want to create. Your pool name must be unique per location.
PROJECT_ID: the name of the project you want to create the storage pool in.
LOCATION: the location of the pool you want to create.
CAPACITY: the capacity of the pool in GiB.
SERVICE_LEVEL: the service level for your storage pool: Flex, Standard, Premium, or Extreme.
NETWORK: the VPC for your pool.
NAME: the name of the VPC.
PSA_RANGE: the name of the allocated range of the Private Services Access connection.

For more information on additional optional flags, see Google Cloud SDK documentation on volume creation.

What's next

Edit or delete a storage pool.