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Kind

Important

If you already have Docker-Desktop (Mac, Windows) or Docker Engine (Linux) installed and running, skip this step for the demo and go directly to Deploying applications with kubectl

Kind is an amazing tool for running test clusters locally as it runs in a container which makes it lightweight and easy to run throw-away clusters for testing purposes.

  • It can be used to deploy Local K8s cluster or for CI
  • Support ingress / LB (with some tuning)
  • Support deployment of multiple clusters / versions
  • Supports deployment of single or multi node clusters

For more information, check out https://kind.sigs.k8s.io/.

Install

OsX Install
brew install kind
Linux Install
wget https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/kind/releases/download/v0.15.0/kind-linux-amd64
chmod 755 kind-linux-amd64

mv kind-linux-amd64 /usr/local/bin/kind
Windows Install
# TODO

Usage

To create a K8s cluster with Kind use the command:

kind create cluster --help

Create a first kind cluster dev

In this guide we will run 2 clusters side by side dev and stg.

In order to have consitency over kind cluster configuration, create cluster by specifing a config file. and settings such k8s version and etc,

Here's the config yaml file:

kind-dev.yaml
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kind: Cluster
apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
kubeadmConfigPatches:
- |
  apiVersion: kubeadm.k8s.io/v1beta2
  kind: ClusterConfiguration
  metadata:
    name: config
  apiServer:
    extraArgs:
      "service-account-issuer": "kubernetes.default.svc"
      "service-account-signing-key-file": "/etc/kubernetes/pki/sa.key"
networking:
  # the default CNI will not be installed if you enable it, usefull to install Cilium !
  disableDefaultCNI: false
nodes:
- role: control-plane
  image: kindest/node:v1.24.4@sha256:adfaebada924a26c2c9308edd53c6e33b3d4e453782c0063dc0028bdebaddf98
- role: worker
  image: kindest/node:v1.24.4@sha256:adfaebada924a26c2c9308edd53c6e33b3d4e453782c0063dc0028bdebaddf98
  extraPortMappings:
  - containerPort: 80
    hostPort: 3080
    listenAddress: "0.0.0.0"
  - containerPort: 443
    hostPort: 3443
    listenAddress: "0.0.0.0"

Then create the cluster from this file:

cd ~/demo/


cat > kind-dev.yaml << EOF
kind: Cluster
apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
kubeadmConfigPatches:
- |
  apiVersion: kubeadm.k8s.io/v1beta2
  kind: ClusterConfiguration
  metadata:
    name: config
  apiServer:
    extraArgs:
      "service-account-issuer": "kubernetes.default.svc"
      "service-account-signing-key-file": "/etc/kubernetes/pki/sa.key"
networking:
  # the default CNI will not be installed if you enable it, usefull to install Cilium !
  disableDefaultCNI: false
nodes:
- role: control-plane
  image: kindest/node:v1.24.4@sha256:adfaebada924a26c2c9308edd53c6e33b3d4e453782c0063dc0028bdebaddf98
- role: worker
  image: kindest/node:v1.24.4@sha256:adfaebada924a26c2c9308edd53c6e33b3d4e453782c0063dc0028bdebaddf98
  extraPortMappings:
  - containerPort: 80
    hostPort: 3080
    listenAddress: "0.0.0.0"
  - containerPort: 443
    hostPort: 3443
    listenAddress: "0.0.0.0"
EOF

kind create cluster --name=dev --config kind-dev.yaml -v9 --retain

Here's the regular logs when starting a Kind cluster:

enabling experimental podman provider
Creating cluster "dev" ...
 ✓ Ensuring node image (kindest/node:v1.24.4) đŸ–ŧ
 ✓ Preparing nodes đŸ“Ļ đŸ“Ļ
 ✓ Writing configuration 📜
 ✓ Starting control-plane 🕹ī¸
 ✓ Installing CNI 🔌
 ✓ Installing StorageClass 💾
 ✓ Joining worker nodes 🚜
Set kubectl context to "kind-dev"

You can check that everything is working. Each K8s node is actually a running container:

podman ps

CONTAINER ID  IMAGE                                                                                           COMMAND     CREATED        STATUS            PORTS                                        NAMES
6993dbdbf82b  docker.io/kindest/node@sha256:adfaebada924a26c2c9308edd53c6e33b3d4e453782c0063dc0028bdebaddf98              3 minutes ago  Up 3 minutes ago  127.0.0.1:55210->6443/tcp                    dev-control-plane
dd461d2b9d4a  docker.io/kindest/node@sha256:adfaebada924a26c2c9308edd53c6e33b3d4e453782c0063dc0028bdebaddf98              3 minutes ago  Up 3 minutes ago  0.0.0.0:3080->80/tcp, 0.0.0.0:3443->443/tcp  dev-worker

  • See cluster up and running:

kubectl get nodes
output
NAME                STATUS   ROLES           AGE   VERSION
dev-control-plane   Ready    control-plane   11h   v1.24.4
dev-worker          Ready    <none>          11h   v1.24.4

Note

You can see that our cluster has control-plane node and worker node.

  • Verify k8s cluster status:
kubectl cluster-info

Kubernetes control plane is running at https://127.0.0.1:56141
CoreDNS is running at https://127.0.0.1:56141/api/v1/namespaces/kube-system/services/kube-dns:dns/proxy
  • Check system Pods are up and running: 

kubectl get pods -A

NAMESPACE            NAME                                         READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
kube-system          coredns-6d4b75cb6d-lqcs6                     1/1     Running   0          4m6s
kube-system          coredns-6d4b75cb6d-xgbxk                     1/1     Running   0          4m6s
kube-system          etcd-dev-control-plane                       1/1     Running   0          4m18s
kube-system          kindnet-tjfzj                                1/1     Running   0          4m6s
kube-system          kindnet-vc66d                                1/1     Running   0          4m1s
kube-system          kube-apiserver-dev-control-plane             1/1     Running   0          4m18s
kube-system          kube-controller-manager-dev-control-plane    1/1     Running   0          4m18s
kube-system          kube-proxy-5kp6d                             1/1     Running   0          4m6s
kube-system          kube-proxy-dfczd                             1/1     Running   0          4m1s
kube-system          kube-scheduler-dev-control-plane             1/1     Running   0          4m18s
local-path-storage   local-path-provisioner-6b84c5c67f-csxg6      1/1     Running   0          4m6s

Create a second kind cluster stg

cat > kind-stg.yaml << EOF
kind: Cluster
apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
kubeadmConfigPatches:
- |
  apiVersion: kubeadm.k8s.io/v1beta2
  kind: ClusterConfiguration
  metadata:
    name: config
  apiServer:
    extraArgs:
      "service-account-issuer": "kubernetes.default.svc"
      "service-account-signing-key-file": "/etc/kubernetes/pki/sa.key"
networking:
  # the default CNI will not be installed if you enable it, usefull to install Cilium !
  disableDefaultCNI: false
nodes:
- role: control-plane
  image: kindest/node:v1.25.2@sha256:9be91e9e9cdf116809841fc77ebdb8845443c4c72fe5218f3ae9eb57fdb4bace
  extraPortMappings:
  - containerPort: 80
    hostPort: 4080
    listenAddress: "0.0.0.0"
  - containerPort: 443
    hostPort: 4443
    listenAddress: "0.0.0.0"
EOF

kind create cluster --name=stg --config kind-stg.yaml -v9 --retain

  • List clusters with kind get:

kind get clusters
Output: 
dev
stg

Result

Two K8s clusters dev and stg has been created

Note

After a reboot, podman will be disabled. To recover podman and kind containers re-run following steps:

podman machine start
podman start --all

Next

Now that the Kind clusters are created, continue by deploying some applications.