--- title: "Configure storage for logs and reports" description: "Configure persistent storage in Calico Enterprise for flow logs, DNS logs, audit logs, and compliance reports before installation." product: "Calico Enterprise" version: "3.23 (latest)" section: "Operations" canonical_url: "https://docs.tigera.io/calico-enterprise/latest/operations/logstorage/create-storage" --- # Configure storage for logs and reports ## Big picture Before installing Calico Enterprise, you must configure persistent storage for flow logs, DNS logs, audit logs, and compliance reports. ## Concepts Before configuring a storage class for Calico Enterprise, the following terms will help you understand storage interactions. ### Persistent volume Used by pods to persist storage within the cluster. Combined with **persistent volume claims**, pods can persist data across restarts and rescheduling. ### Persistent volume claim Used by pods to request and mount storage volumes. The claim specifies the volume requirements for the request: size, access rights, and storage class. ### Dynamic provisioner Provisions types of persistent volumes on demand. Although most managed public-cloud clusters provide a dynamic provisioner using cloud-specific storage APIs (for example, Amazon EBS or Google persistent disks), not all clusters have a dynamic provisioner. When a pod makes a persistent volume claim from a storage class that uses a dynamic provisioner, the volume is automatically created. If the storage class does not use a dynamic provisioner (for example the local storage class), the volumes must be created in advance. For help, see the [Kubernetes documentation](https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/storage/dynamic-provisioning/). ### Storage class The storage provided by the cluster. Storage classes can be used with dynamic provisioners to automatically provision persistent volumes on demand, or with manually-provisioned persistent volumes. Different storage classes provide different service levels. ## Before you begin... **Review log storage recommendations** Review [Log storage recommendations](https://docs.tigera.io/calico-enterprise/latest/operations/logstorage/log-storage-recommendations.md) for guidance on the number of nodes and resources to configure for your environment. **Determine storage support** Determine the storage types that are available on your cluster. If you are using dynamic provisioning, verify it is supported. If you are using local disks, you may find the [sig-storage local static provisioner](https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/sig-storage-local-static-provisioner) useful. It creates and manages PersistentVolumes by watching for disks mounted in a configured directory. > **WARNING:** Do not use the host path storage provisioner. This provisioner is not suitable for production and results in scalability issues, instability, and data loss. > **WARNING:** Do not use shared network file systems, such as AWS' EFS or Azure's azure-file. These file systems may result in decreases of performance and data loss. ## How to ### Create a storage class Before installing Calico Enterprise, create a storage class named, `tigera-elasticsearch`. **Examples** #### Pre-provisioned local disks In the following example, we create a **StorageClass** to use when explicitly adding **PersistentVolumes** for local disks. This can be performed manually, or using the [sig-storage local static provisioner](https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/sig-storage-local-static-provisioner). ```yaml apiVersion: storage.k8s.io/v1 kind: StorageClass metadata: name: tigera-elasticsearch provisioner: kubernetes.io/no-provisioner volumeBindingMode: WaitForFirstConsumer reclaimPolicy: Retain ``` > **SECONDARY:** If local persistent volumes are provisioned on an SELinux-enabled host, you can use the `/mnt/tigera` host path created by the Calico Enterprise policy package. #### AWS EBS disks In the following example for an AWS cloud provider integration, the **StorageClass** is based on [how your EBS disks are provisioned](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/eks/latest/userguide/ebs-csi.html): **Tab: Amazon EBS CSI** Make sure the CSI plugin is enabled in your cluster and apply the following manifest. ```yaml apiVersion: storage.k8s.io/v1 kind: StorageClass metadata: name: tigera-elasticsearch provisioner: ebs.csi.aws.com reclaimPolicy: Retain allowVolumeExpansion: true volumeBindingMode: WaitForFirstConsumer ``` **Tab: Legacy Kubernetes EBS driver** ```yaml apiVersion: storage.k8s.io/v1 kind: StorageClass metadata: name: tigera-elasticsearch provisioner: ebs.csi.aws.com parameters: type: gp2 fsType: ext4 reclaimPolicy: Retain allowVolumeExpansion: true volumeBindingMode: WaitForFirstConsumer ``` #### AKS Azure Files storage In the following example for an AKS cloud provider integration, the **StorageClass** tells Calico Enterprise to use LRS disks for log storage. > **SECONDARY:** Premium Storage is recommended for databases greater than 100GiB and for production installations. ```yaml apiVersion: storage.k8s.io/v1 kind: StorageClass metadata: name: tigera-elasticsearch provisioner: disk.csi.azure.com parameters: cachingmode: ReadOnly kind: Managed storageaccounttype: StandardSSD_LRS reclaimPolicy: Retain volumeBindingMode: WaitForFirstConsumer allowVolumeExpansion: true ``` #### GCP Persistent Disks In the following example for a GKE cloud provider integration, the **StorageClass** tells Calico Enterprise to use the GCE Persistent Disks for log storage. > **SECONDARY:** There are currently two types available `pd-standard` and `pd-ssd`. For production deployments, we recommend using the `pd-ssd` storage type. ```yaml apiVersion: storage.k8s.io/v1 kind: StorageClass metadata: name: tigera-elasticsearch provisioner: pd.csi.storage.gke.io parameters: type: pd-ssd replication-type: none reclaimPolicy: Retain volumeBindingMode: WaitForFirstConsumer allowVolumeExpansion: true ``` ## Additional resources - [Adjust size of Elasticsearch cluster](https://docs.tigera.io/calico-enterprise/latest/operations/logstorage/adjust-log-storage-size.md)