IRC on Freenode #rackspace
  • Sign Up
  • Log In
    • MyRackspace Portal
    • Cloud Control Panel
    • Rackspace Webmail Login
    • Email Admin Login
  • Rackspace Logo
  • Developer Home
  • Documentation & SDKs
  • Blog
SDK Quickstarts
  • Gophercloud Go
  • JClouds Java
  • OpenStack.NET.NET
  • pkgcloud Node.js
  • php-opencloud PHP
  • pyrax Python
  • fog Ruby
Cloud User Guides
  • Core Infrastructure
  • Cloud Servers
  • Cloud Images
  • Orchestration
Developer Community
  • Developer Blog
  • Knowledge Center
  • Developer Forum
  • Outreach & Events
Rackspace Cloud
  • Auto Scale
  • CDN
  • Cloud Block Storage
  • Cloud Databases
  • Cloud DNS
  • Cloud Files
  • Identity
  • Cloud Images
  • Cloud Load Balancers
  • Cloud Monitoring
  • Cloud Networks
  • Cloud Queues
  • Cloud Servers
  • Orchestration
Other Products
  • Airbrake
  • Mailgun
  • ObjectRocket
  • RedisToGo
Developer Community
  • Developer Blog
  • Knowledge Center
  • Developer Forum
  • Outreach & Events

Rackspace Developer Docs


Let’s Build Something Powerful Together!

Submit an issue
  • Cloud Block Storage 1.0
  • Getting started
    • Get your credentials
    • Sending API requests to Cloud Block Storage
      • Convert cURL examples to run on Windows
    • Authenticate to the Rackspace Cloud
      • Send an authentication request
      • Review the authentication response
      • Configure environment variables
    • Cloud Block Storage concepts
      • Instance
      • Instance type
      • Snapshot
      • Volume
      • Volume type
    • Create and manage volumes and snapshots
      • Creating a block storage volume
      • Listing existing block storage volumes
      • Showing volume details
      • Updating a volume
      • Deleting a volume
      • Creating a snapshot
      • Listing snapshots
      • Showing snapshot details
      • Updating a snapshot
      • Deleting a snapshot
      • Other cURL commands
  • General API information
    • Service access endpoints
    • Cloud Block Storage service versions
    • Request and response types
    • Cloud Block Storage quotas
    • Absolute limits
    • Paginated collections
    • Response codes
    • Date and time format
    • Role-based access control (RBAC)
      • Assigning roles to account users
      • Roles available for Rackspace Cloud Block Storage
      • Multiproduct global roles and permissions
      • Resolving conflicts between RBAC multiproduct and product-specific roles
      • RBAC permissions cross-reference to Rackspace Cloud Block Storage API operations
    • Differences between Rackspace Cloud Block Storage v1 methods and OpenStack Block Storage v2 methods
  • API reference
    • Volumes
      • Create a volume
      • Retrieve volumes
      • Retrieve volumes (detailed)
      • Retrieve details for a volume
      • Update a volume
      • Delete a volume
    • Volume types
      • Retrieve volume types
      • Retrieve volume type details
    • Volume transfer
      • Create a volume transfer
      • Retrieve the volume transfers
      • Retrieve the volume transfers (detailed)
      • Retrieve a volume transfer (detailed)
      • Delete a volume transfer
      • Accept a volume transfer
    • Snapshots
      • Create a snapshot
      • Retrieve snapshots
      • Retrieve snapshots (detailed)
      • Retrieve details for a snapshot
      • Update a snapshot
      • Delete a snapshot
      • Retrieve metadata for a snapshot
  • Release notes
    • API 1.0 updates, March 9, 2016
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 updates, January 20, 2016
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 updates, August 27, 2015
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 updates, February 11, 2015
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 updates, December 29, 2014
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 updates, October 9, 2014
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 updates, February 10, 2014
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 updates, February 6, 2014
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 updates, January 28, 2014
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 updates, January 2, 2014
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 updates, October 21, 2013
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 updates, October 3, 2013
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 updates, August 9, 2013
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
    • API 1.0 release, October 23, 2012
      • What's new
      • Resolved issues
      • Known issues
  • Service updates
  • Additional resources
  • Disclaimer

Cloud Block Storage concepts#

To use the Cloud Block Storage API effectively, you should understand the following terms:

Instance#

An instance is a virtual machine that runs inside the cloud.

Instance type#

An instance type describes the compute, memory, and storage capacity of Nova computing instances. In layman's terms, this is the size (in terms of vCPUs, RAM, and so forth) of the virtual server that you will be launching.

Snapshot#

A snapshot is a point-in-time copy of the data contained in a volume.

Volume#

A volume is a detachable block storage device. You can think of it as a USB hard drive. It can only be attached to one instance at a time.

Volume type#

The volume type is the type of a block storage volume. There are two types: SATA for standard performance and SSD for high performance.

Previous Authenticate to the Rackspace Cloud
Next Create and manage volumes and snapshots
Docs
  • Style Guide for Technical Content
  • Cloud Backup
  • Cloud Block Storage
  • Cloud Databases
  • Cloud DNS
  • Cloud Files
  • Identity
  • Cloud Images
  • Cloud Load Balancers
  • Cloud Monitoring
  • Cloud Orchestration
  • Cloud Networks
  • Cloud Queues
  • Cloud Servers
  • Rackspace Auto Scale
  • Rackspace CDN
Sdks
  • Go
  • Java
  • .Net
  • Node
  • PHP
  • Python
  • Ruby
Partner Tools
  • Airbrake
  • Mailgun
  • ObjectRocket
  • RedisToGo
Blog
  • Developer Blog
©2018 Rackspace US, Inc.
  • ©2018 Rackspace US, Inc.
  • About Rackspace
  • Investors
  • Careers
  • Privacy Statement
  • Website Terms
  • Trademarks