Cluster Reroute

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The reroute command allows to explicitly execute a cluster reroute allocation command including specific commands. For example, a shard can be moved from one node to another explicitly, an allocation can be canceled, or an unassigned shard can be explicitly allocated on a specific node.

Here is a short example of how a simple reroute API call:

curl -XPOST 'localhost:9200/_cluster/reroute' -d '{
    "commands" : [ {
        "move" :
            {
              "index" : "test", "shard" : 0,
              "from_node" : "node1", "to_node" : "node2"
            }
        },
        {
          "allocate" : {
              "index" : "test", "shard" : 1, "node" : "node3"
          }
        }
    ]
}'

An important aspect to remember is the fact that once when an allocation occurs, the cluster will aim at re-balancing its state back to an even state. For example, if the allocation includes moving a shard from node1 to node2, in an even state, then another shard will be moved from node2 to node1 to even things out.

The cluster can be set to disable allocations, which means that only the explicitly allocations will be performed. Obviously, only once all commands has been applied, the cluster will aim to be re-balance its state.

Another option is to run the commands in dry_run (as a URI flag, or in the request body). This will cause the commands to apply to the current cluster state, and return the resulting cluster after the commands (and re-balancing) has been applied.

If the explain parameter is specified, a detailed explanation of why the commands could or could not be executed is returned.

The commands supported are:

move
Move a started shard from one node to another node. Accepts index and shard for index name and shard number, from_node for the node to move the shard from, and to_node for the node to move the shard to.
cancel
Cancel allocation of a shard (or recovery). Accepts index and shard for index name and shard number, and node for the node to cancel the shard allocation on. It also accepts allow_primary flag to explicitly specify that it is allowed to cancel allocation for a primary shard.
allocate
Allocate an unassigned shard to a node. Accepts the index and shard for index name and shard number, and node to allocate the shard to. It also accepts allow_primary flag to explicitly specify that it is allowed to explicitly allocate a primary shard (might result in data loss).

The allow_primary parameter will force a new empty primary shard to be allocated without any data. If a node which has a copy of the original primary shard (including data) rejoins the cluster later on, that data will be deleted: the old shard copy will be replaced by the new live shard copy.