Load Balancers — `shark loadbalancer`¶

Manage load balancers, listeners, pools, members & health monitors (Octavia). Load balancers distribute incoming traffic across multiple backend servers to improve availability and scalability.

The Octavia resource hierarchy is: Load Balancer → Listener → Pool → Members, with an optional Health Monitor per pool.

Note

Octavia requires the load balancer to be in ACTIVE provisioning status before most mutations. Wait for the status to settle between operations.

Load Balancers¶

list¶

List all load balancers with their VIP address, provisioning/operating status, and provider.

shark loadbalancer list

show¶

Display detailed properties of a load balancer: VIP address, subnet, port, listeners, pools, status.

shark loadbalancer show <lb-id>

create¶

Create a new load balancer. A VIP (virtual IP) is allocated on the specified subnet and serves as the entry point for traffic.

shark loadbalancer create my-lb --subnet-id <subnet-id>
shark loadbalancer create my-lb --subnet-id <id> --provider amphora
shark loadbalancer create my-lb --subnet-id <id> --description "Production LB"

Option	Required	Default	Description
`--subnet-id`	yes	—	VIP subnet ID
`--description`	no	`""`	Description
`--provider`	no	—	Provider (e.g. `amphora`, `ovn`)

delete¶

Delete a load balancer. Use --cascade to delete all child resources (listeners, pools, members, health monitors) in one operation.

shark loadbalancer delete <lb-id>
shark loadbalancer delete <lb-id> --cascade -y

Option	Description
`--cascade`	Delete LB and all child resources
`-y`	Skip confirmation

Listeners¶

A listener defines a frontend protocol and port on the load balancer.

listener-list¶

List all listeners with their protocol, port, load balancer, and status.

shark loadbalancer listener-list

listener-show¶

Display listener details: protocol, port, default pool, connection limit, status.

shark loadbalancer listener-show <listener-id>

listener-create¶

Create a listener on a load balancer. Each listener listens on a specific protocol and port.

shark loadbalancer listener-create http-listener \
  --lb-id <lb-id> --protocol HTTP --port 80

shark loadbalancer listener-create https-listener \
  --lb-id <lb-id> --protocol HTTPS --port 443

Option	Required	Description
`--lb-id`	yes	Load balancer ID
`--protocol`	yes	`HTTP`, `HTTPS`, `TCP`, `UDP`, `TERMINATED_HTTPS`
`--port`	yes	Listen port number
`--default-pool-id`	no	Default pool ID

listener-delete¶

Delete a listener.

shark loadbalancer listener-delete <listener-id> -y

Pools¶

A pool is a group of backend members that receive traffic from a listener.

pool-list¶

List all pools with their protocol, algorithm, member count, and status.

shark loadbalancer pool-list

pool-show¶

Display pool details: protocol, algorithm, session persistence, health monitor, status.

shark loadbalancer pool-show <pool-id>

pool-create¶

Create a pool and attach it to a listener (or directly to a load balancer).

shark loadbalancer pool-create web-pool \
  --listener-id <listener-id> \
  --protocol HTTP \
  --algorithm ROUND_ROBIN

shark loadbalancer pool-create tcp-pool \
  --lb-id <lb-id> \
  --protocol TCP \
  --algorithm LEAST_CONNECTIONS

Option	Required	Description
`--listener-id`	*	Listener ID to attach to
`--lb-id`	*	Load balancer ID (if no listener)
`--protocol`	yes	`HTTP`, `HTTPS`, `PROXY`, `TCP`, `UDP`
`--algorithm`	yes	`ROUND_ROBIN`, `LEAST_CONNECTIONS`, `SOURCE_IP`

* Provide either --listener-id or --lb-id.

pool-delete¶

Delete a pool.

shark loadbalancer pool-delete <pool-id> -y

Members¶

Members are the backend servers that receive traffic from a pool.

member-list¶

List all members in a pool with their address, port, weight, and operating status.

shark loadbalancer member-list <pool-id>

member-add¶

Add a backend server to a pool. Each member is identified by an IP address and port.

shark loadbalancer member-add <pool-id> \
  --address 10.0.0.10 --port 8080 --name web-1

shark loadbalancer member-add <pool-id> \
  --address 10.0.0.11 --port 8080 \
  --subnet-id <subnet-id> --weight 2

Option	Required	Default	Description
`--address`	yes	—	Member IP address
`--port`	yes	—	Member port
`--subnet-id`	no	—	Member subnet ID
`--weight`	no	`1`	Weight (0-256) for weighted algorithms
`--name`	no	—	Member name

member-remove¶

Remove a member from a pool.

shark loadbalancer member-remove <pool-id> <member-id>
shark loadbalancer member-remove <pool-id> <member-id> -y

Health Monitors¶

Health monitors periodically check backend members and remove unhealthy ones from rotation.

healthmonitor-list¶

List all health monitors with their type, delay, timeout, pool, and status.

shark loadbalancer healthmonitor-list

healthmonitor-create¶

Create a health monitor for a pool. The monitor probes each member and marks it as healthy or unhealthy.

# HTTP health check
shark loadbalancer healthmonitor-create http-check \
  --pool-id <pool-id> --type HTTP \
  --delay 10 --timeout 5 --max-retries 3 \
  --url-path /health --expected-codes 200

# TCP health check
shark loadbalancer healthmonitor-create tcp-check \
  --pool-id <pool-id> --type TCP \
  --delay 5 --timeout 3

Option	Required	Default	Description
`--pool-id`	yes	—	Pool ID
`--type`	yes	—	`HTTP`, `HTTPS`, `PING`, `TCP`, `TLS-HELLO`, `UDP-CONNECT`
`--delay`	yes	—	Probe interval (seconds)
`--timeout`	yes	—	Probe timeout (seconds)
`--max-retries`	no	`3`	Max retries before marking unhealthy
`--url-path`	no	`/`	HTTP URL path to probe (HTTP/HTTPS only)
`--expected-codes`	no	`200`	Expected HTTP status codes (HTTP/HTTPS only)

healthmonitor-delete¶

Delete a health monitor.

shark loadbalancer healthmonitor-delete <hm-id> -y

Full Example: HTTP Load Balancer¶

# 1. Create the load balancer
shark loadbalancer create my-lb --subnet-id <subnet-id>

# 2. Wait for ACTIVE status
shark loadbalancer show <lb-id>

# 3. Create a listener on port 80
shark loadbalancer listener-create http-listener \
  --lb-id <lb-id> --protocol HTTP --port 80

# 4. Create a pool with round-robin
shark loadbalancer pool-create web-pool \
  --listener-id <listener-id> \
  --protocol HTTP --algorithm ROUND_ROBIN

# 5. Add backend servers
shark loadbalancer member-add <pool-id> \
  --address 10.0.0.10 --port 8080 --name web-1
shark loadbalancer member-add <pool-id> \
  --address 10.0.0.11 --port 8080 --name web-2

# 6. Add a health check
shark loadbalancer healthmonitor-create http-check \
  --pool-id <pool-id> --type HTTP \
  --delay 10 --timeout 5 --url-path /health

# 7. Clean up everything at once
shark loadbalancer delete <lb-id> --cascade -y

Load Balancers — shark loadbalancer¶