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Architecture

Motivation​

csi-driver-ipfs brings IPFS-backed storage into standard Kubernetes CSI flows. Applications use normal PVC/PV semantics, while content is persisted in IPFS.

Components​

  • CSI Controller (pkg/driver/controller.go)
    • Create/Delete/Expand volume operations,
    • snapshot source handling in CreateVolume.
  • CSI Node (pkg/driver/node.go)
    • stage/publish operations,
    • filesystem operations and content materialization.
  • IPFS Client (pkg/ipfs/client.go)
    • wraps Kubo API interactions.
  • Kubernetes informers (pkg/kubernetes)
    • watches PV and snapshot content resources for state correlation.

Control-plane integration​

Driver relies on Kubernetes CSI sidecars and snapshot ecosystem:

  • external-provisioner
  • external-resizer
  • csi-snapshotter
  • snapshot-controller (cluster-level)

Data model concepts​

  • Volume ID: CSI identity for provisioned volume.
  • CID: immutable content identifier in IPFS.
  • MFS path: mutable path used by controller/node workflows.
  • Snapshot source: CSI VolumeContentSource with snapshot_id.

Request lifecycle (high-level)​

  1. PVC appears.
  2. Provisioner invokes CreateVolume.
  3. Controller allocates/links content path in IPFS.
  4. Node stages/publishes content to pod path.
  5. Optional expand/snapshot/restore flows update content lifecycle.