The nova.conf configuration file is an INI file format file that specifies options as key=value pairs, which are grouped into sections. The DEFAULT section contains most of the configuration options. For example: [DEFAULT] debug=true verbose=true [trusted_computing] server=10.3.4.2 You can use a particular configuration option file by using the option (nova.conf) parameter when you run one of the nova-* services. This parameter inserts configuration option definitions from the specified configuration file name, which might be useful for debugging or performance tuning. To place comments in the nova.conf file, start a new line that begins with the pound (#) character. For a list of configuration options, see the tables in this guide. To learn more about the nova.conf configuration file, review the general purpose configuration options documented in . Each configuration option has an associated data type. The supported data types for configuration options are: BoolOpt Boolean option. Value must be either true or false . Example:debug=false StrOpt String option. Value is an arbitrary string. Example:my_ip=10.0.0.1 IntOption Integer option. Value must be an integer. Example: glance_port=9292 MultiStrOpt String option. Same as StrOpt, except that it can be declared multiple times to indicate multiple values. Example: ldap_dns_servers=dns1.example.org ldap_dns_servers=dns2.example.org ListOpt List option. Value is a list of arbitrary strings separated by commas. Example: enabled_apis=ec2,osapi_compute,metadata FloatOpt Floating-point option. Value must be a floating-point number. Example: ram_allocation_ratio=1.5 Do not specify quotes around Nova options. Configuration options are grouped by section. The Compute configuration file supports the following sections: [DEFAULT] Contains most configuration options. If the documentation for a configuration option does not specify its section, assume that it appears in this section. [cells] Configures cells functionality. For details, see the Cells section (). [baremetal] Configures the baremetal hypervisor driver. [conductor] Configures the nova-conductor service. [trusted_computing] Configures the trusted computing pools functionality and how to connect to a remote attestation service. The configuration file supports variable substitution. After you set a configuration option, it can be referenced in later configuration values when you precede it with $. This example defines my_ip and then uses $my_ip as a variable:my_ip=10.2.3.4 glance_host=$my_ip metadata_host=$my_ip If a value must contain the $ character, escape it with $$. For example, if your LDAP DNS password is $xkj432, specify it, as follows:ldap_dns_password=$$xkj432 The Compute code uses the Python string.Template.safe_substitute() method to implement variable substitution. For more details on how variable substitution is resolved, see http://docs.python.org/2/library/string.html#template-strings and http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0292/. To include whitespace in a configuration value, use a quoted string. For example: ldap_dns_passsword='a password with spaces' All nova-* services and the nova-manage command-line client load the configuration file. To define an alternate location for the configuration file, pass the --config-file /path/to/nova.conf parameter when you start a nova-* service or call a nova-manage command.