MicroK8s

Kubernetes in a snap that you can run locally.

User Guide

Snaps are frequently updated to match each release of Kubernetes. The quickest way to get started is to install directly from the snap store. You can install MicroK8s and let it update to the latest stable upstream Kubernetes release with:

snap install microk8s --classic

Alternatively, you can select a MicroK8s channel that will follow a specific Kubernetes release series. For example, you install MicroK8s and let it follow the v1.12 series with:

snap install microk8s --classic --channel=1.12/stable

You can read more on the MicroK8s release channels in the Release Channels and Upgrades doc.

At any point you can check MicroK8s' availability with:

microk8s.status

During installation you can use the --wait-ready flag to wait for the kubernetes services to initialise:

microk8s.status --wait-ready

In order to install MicroK8s make sure

• port 8080 is not used and
• if you have AppArmor enabled (check with sudo apparmor_status) you do not have any other dockerd installed. You can use the dockerd coming with MicroK8s.

Accessing Kubernetes

To avoid colliding with a kubectl already installed and to avoid overwriting any existing Kubernetes configuration file, MicroK8s adds a microk8s.kubectl command, configured to exclusively access the new MicroK8s install. When following instructions online, make sure to prefix kubectl with microk8s..

microk8s.kubectl get nodes
microk8s.kubectl get services

If you do not already have a kubectl installed you can alias microk8s.kubectl to kubectl using the following command

snap alias microk8s.kubectl kubectl

This measure can be safely reverted at anytime by doing

snap unalias kubectl

If you already have kubectl installed and you want to use it to access the MicroK8s deployment you can export the cluster's config with:

microk8s.kubectl config view --raw > $HOME/.kube/config

Note: The API server on port 8080 is listening on all network interfaces. In its kubeconfig file MicroK8s is using the loopback interface, as you can see with microk8s.kubectl config view. The microk8s.config command will output a kubeconfig with the host machine's IP (instead of the 127.0.0.1) as the API server endpoint.

Kubernetes Addons

MicroK8s installs a barebones upstream Kubernetes. This means just the api-server, controller-manager, scheduler, kubelet, cni, kube-proxy are installed and run. Additional services like kube-dns and dashboard can be run using the microk8s.enable command

microk8s.enable dns dashboard

These addons can be disabled at anytime using the disable command

microk8s.disable dashboard dns

With microk8s.status you can see the list of available addons and which ones are currently enabled. You can find the addon manifests and/or scripts under ${SNAP}/actions/, with ${SNAP} pointing by default to /snap/microk8s/current.

List of Available Addons

• dns: Deploy kube dns. This addon may be required by others thus we recommend you always enable it.
• dashboard: Deploy kubernetes dashboard as well as grafana and influxdb. To access grafana point your browser to the url reported by microk8s.kubectl cluster-info.
• storage: Create a default storage class. This storage class makes use of the hostpath-provisioner pointing to a directory on the host. Persistent volumes are created under ${SNAP_COMMON}/default-storage. Upon disabling this addon you will be asked if you want to delete the persistent volumes created.
• ingress: Create an ingress controller.
• gpu: Expose GPU(s) to MicroK8s by enabling the nvidia-docker runtime and nvidia-device-plugin-daemonset. Requires NVIDIA drivers to already be installed on the host system.
• istio: Deploy the core Istio services. You can use the microk8s.istioctl command to manage your deployments.
• registry: Deploy a docker private registry and expose it on localhost:32000. The storage addon will be enabled as part of this addon. To use the registry you can use the microk8s.docker command.
• metrics-server: Deploy the Metrics Server.

Stopping and Restarting MicroK8s

You may wish to temporarily shutdown MicroK8s when not in use without un-installing it.

MicroK8s can be shutdown with:

microk8s.stop

MicroK8s can be restarted later with:

microk8s.start

Removing MicroK8s

Before removing MicroK8s, use microk8s.reset to stop all running pods.

microk8s.reset
snap remove microk8s

Configuring MicroK8s Services

The following systemd services will be running in your system:

• snap.microk8s.daemon-apiserver, is the kube-apiserver daemon started using the arguments in ${SNAP_DATA}/args/kube-apiserver
• snap.microk8s.daemon-controller-manager, is the kube-controller-manager daemon started using the arguments in ${SNAP_DATA}/args/kube-controller-manager
• snap.microk8s.daemon-scheduler, is the kube-scheduler daemon started using the arguments in ${SNAP_DATA}/args/kube-scheduler
• snap.microk8s.daemon-kubelet, is the kubelet daemon started using the arguments in ${SNAP_DATA}/args/kubelet
• snap.microk8s.daemon-proxy, is the kube-proxy daemon started using the arguments in ${SNAP_DATA}/args/kube-proxy
• snap.microk8s.daemon-docker, is the docker daemon started using the arguments in ${SNAP_DATA}/args/dockerd
• snap.microk8s.daemon-etcd, is the etcd daemon started using the arguments in ${SNAP_DATA}/args/etcd

Normally, ${SNAP_DATA} points to /var/snap/microk8s/current.

To reconfigure a service you will need to edit the corresponding file and then restart the respective daemon. For example:

echo '--config-file=/path-to-my/daemon.json' | sudo tee -a /var/snap/microk8s/current/args/dockerd
sudo systemctl restart snap.microk8s.daemon-docker.service

Deploy Behind a Proxy

To let MicroK8s use a proxy enter the proxy details in ${SNAP_DATA}/args/dockerd-env and restart the docker daemon service with:

sudo systemctl restart snap.microk8s.daemon-docker.service

Troubleshooting

To troubleshoot a non-functional MicroK8s deployment, start by running the microk8s.inspect command. This command performs a set of tests against MicroK8s and collects traces and logs in a report tarball. In case any of the aforementioned daemons are failing you will be urged to look at the respective logs with journalctl -u snap.microk8s.<daemon>.service. microk8s.inspect may also make suggestions on potential issues it may find. If you do not manage to resolve the issue you are facing please file a bug attaching the inspection report tarball.

Some common problems and solutions are listed below.

My dns and dashboard pods are CrashLooping.

The Kubenet network plugin used by MicroK8s creates a cbr0 interface when the first pod is created. If you have ufw enabled, you'll need to allow traffic on this interface:

sudo ufw allow in on cbr0 && sudo ufw allow out on cbr0

My pods can't reach the internet (but my MicroK8s host machine can).

Make sure packets to/from the pod network interface can be forwarded to/from the default interface on the host:

sudo iptables -P FORWARD ACCEPT

or, if using ufw:

sudo ufw default allow routed

My host machine changed IP and now MicroK8s is not working properly.

The host machine IP may change whenever you switch places with your laptop or you go through a suspend/resume cycle. The kubernetes API server advertises this IP (taken from the default interface) to all kubernetes cluster members. Services such as DNS and the dashboard will lose connectivity to API server in case the host IP changes. You will need to restart MicroK8s whenever this happens:

microk8s.stop
microk8s.start

Building from source

Build the snap with:

snapcraft

Building for specific versions

You can set the following environment variables prior to building:

• KUBE_VERSION: kubernetes release to package. Defaults to latest stable.
• ETCD_VERSION: version of etcd. Defaults to v3.3.4.
• CNI_VERSION: version of CNI tools. Defaults to v0.7.1.
• KUBE_TRACK: kubernetes release series (e.g., 1.10) to package. Defaults to latest stable.
• ISTIO_VERSION: istio release. Defaults to v1.0.0.

For example:

KUBE_VERSION=v1.9.6 snapcraft

Faster builds

To speed-up a build you can reuse the binaries already downloaded from a previous build. Binaries are placed under parts/microk8s/build/build/kube_bins. All you need to do is to make a copy of this directory and have the KUBE_SNAP_BINS environment variable point to it. Try this for example:

> snapcraft
... this build will take a long time and will download all binaries ...
> cp -r parts/microk8s/build/build/kube_bins .
> export KUBE_SNAP_BINS=$PWD/kube_bins/v1.10.3/
> snapcraft
... this build will be much faster and will reuse binaries in KUBE_SNAP_BINS

Installing the snap

snap install microk8s_v1.10.3_amd64.snap --classic --dangerous