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Deploying Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Workload Cluster to Microsoft Azure

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Following on from my previous blog post;

We will now continue and deploy our first Workload (Guest) Cluster into Azure for us by our developers to deploy their applications into.

For this technical walkthrough, I am assuming you have followed the previous blog post and have the Tanzu CLI and Kubectl CLI installed, and a working management cluster.

As a reminder of the terminology;

  • Tanzu Kubernetes Workload Clusters

Once you have deployed your management cluster, you can deploy additional CNCF conformant Kubernetes clusters and manage their full lifecycle. These clusters are designed to run your application workloads, managed via your management cluster. These clusters canrun different Kubernetes versions as required. These clusters use Antrea networking by default.

These types of clusters are also referred to as “workload” clusters, or “guest” clusters, with the latter typically referring to the Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Service running in vSphere.

Deploying a Guest Cluster

Login to your Tanzu environment Management Cluster with the following:

Tanzu login

Deploy Management cluster to Azure - Tanzu Login

First we need to create a cluster configuration YAML file. You can find a template here for Azure, or view the full available variables here.

Alternatively, we can use the existing YAML file in our ~/.tanzu/tkg/clusterconfigs folder used for the management cluster deployment and change a few settings to make it ready for our workload guest cluster.

This was my preferred method as it contained all my Azure settings already.

#Find existing cluster config file
# Tanzu 1.3 Location
ls -lh ~/.tanzu/tkg/clusterconfigs/

# Tanzu 1.4 location
ls -ls ~/.config/tanzu/tkg/clusterconfigs/

#Copy file to a new config

cp ~/.tanzu/tkg/clusterconfigs/6x4hl1wy8o.yaml tanzu-veducate-guest-azure.yaml

# Edit file = CLUSTER_NAME
# Workload cluster names must be 42 characters or less.

Deploy Tanzu Kubernetes Guest cluster to Azure - create cluster configuration yaml file Continue reading Deploying Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Workload Cluster to Microsoft Azure →

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Deploying Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Management Cluster to Microsoft Azure

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In this blog post, we will detail a full technical run through on how to deploy Tanzu Kubernetes Grid (TKG) into Microsoft Azure,

This will be using the new Tanzu CLI (version 1.3) (Previously TKG CLI) released in March 2021, to deploy  both a new Management Cluster and Guest Cluster.

Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Cluster Types

TKG has two types of clusters, for the full information of TKG Concepts, please read this post.

  • Management Cluster

This is the first architectural components to be deployed for creating a TKG instance. The management cluster is a dedicated cluster for management and operation of your whole TKG instance infrastructure. A management cluster will have Antrea networking enabled by default. This runs cluster API to create the additional clusters for your workloads to run, as well as the shared and in-cluster services for all clusters within the instance to use.

It is not recommended that the management cluster be used as a general-purpose compute environment for your application workloads.

  • Tanzu Kubernetes (Guest) Clusters

Once you have deployed your management cluster, you can deploy additional CNCF conformant Kubernetes clusters and manage their full lifecycle. These clusters are designed to run your application workloads, managed via your management cluster. These clusters can run different Kubernetes versions as required. These clusters use Antrea networking by default.

These clusters are referred to as Workload Clusters when working with the Tanzu CLI.

I sometimes use the term “Guest” for these clusters, as a cross-over with the vSphere with Tanzu architecture, which has similar concepts as above however uses the terms “Supervisor Cluster” and “Guest Cluster”.

Pre-Requisites

For this blog post, I’ll be deploying everything from my local Mac OS X machine. You will need the following:

  • Docker installed with Kubernetes enabled
    • For Windows and macOS Docker clients, you must allocate at least 6 GB of memory in Docker Desktop to accommodate the kind container. See Settings for Docker Desktop in the kind documentation.
  • Install the Tanzu CLI and the Kubectl tool > Instructions here.
    • If you have used the TKG CLI before, then this is now deprecated.
    • You can find a full command line reference for Tanzu CLI and a comparison of the TKG CLI commands in this documentation link.
  • Install the Azure CLI.
  •  Register a Tanzu Kubernetes Grid App on Azure
    • The full details in the VMware docs for deploying TKG to Azure can be found here.
Login to the Azure CLI and accept the VM EULA

Before we get started, we need to log into the Azure CLI and accept the EULA for the images used for TKG in Azure. These images are updated with each release of the Tanzu CLI (TKG CLI).

az login

az vm image terms accept --publisher vmware-inc --offer tkg-capi --plan k8s-1dot20dot4-ubuntu-2004 --subscription {subscription_id}
az loginaz vm image terms accept --publisher vmware-inc --offer tkg-capi --plan k8s-1dot20dot4-ubuntu-2004 --subscription
Deploying a Management Cluster using the UI

From your terminal, run the following command:

tanzu management-cluster create --ui

tanzu management-cluster create --ui Continue reading Deploying Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Management Cluster to Microsoft Azure →

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VMUG Recording – Protecting your Tanzu Kubernetes Workload with Kasten by Veeam

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Below is the recording from my London VMUG session with Michael Cade.

  • Title: Protecting your Tanzu Kubernetes Workload with Kasten by Veeam
  • Recorded: 4th February 2021
  • Abstract:
    • This technical demo led session will take you through how to deploy Kasten in your Tanzu Kubernetes environment to protect your container workloads.

Supporting blog posts;

Regards

Dean Lewis

 

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VCF – SDDC Manager – How to delete bundles

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Just a quick blog post on deleting unnecessary or unneeded bundles from VCF – SDDC Manager.

There is two parts to this.

  • Getting your Bundle ID you want to delete from the API
  • Deleting the Bundle using a script on the SDDC Manager appliance.

In your SDDC Manager:

  1. Click Development Center
  2. Click API Explorer
  3. Expand “APIs for managing bundles”
  4. Expand the first “GET” command

VCF SDDC Manager - API - Get Bundles

  • Click Execute, no need to fill anything in

VCF SDDC Manager - API - Get Bundles - Execute

  • Download or Copy the response output.

VCF SDDC Manager - API - Get Bundles - Response

  • Find your Bundle ID within your output, you need to look for the top level ID of the JSON block, and ensure that this bundle says successfully downloaded.

VCF SDDC Manager API Get Bundles Response JSON Find Bundle ID

SSH to your SDDC Manager and elevate to root.

# su
{provide password to elevate to root}
# /opt/vmware/vcf/lcm/lcm-app/bin/bundle_cleanup.py {Bundle_id}

Example below
# /opt/vmware/vcf/lcm/lcm-app/bin/bundle_cleanup.py f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d447860e3169

VCF SDDC Manager bundle cleanup.py script

You will see the following output when the script has run.

-----------------------------------------------------
LOG FILE : /var/log/vmware/vcf/lcm/bundle_cleanup.log
-----------------------------------------------------
2021-03-08 12:18:31,809 [INFO] root: Performing cleanup for bundle with IDs : [' f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d447860e3169']
2021-03-08 12:18:31,809 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: psql --host=localhost -U postg res -d lcm -tc "select count(*) from upgrade where upgrade_status in ('INPROGRES S','CANCELLING');"
2021-03-08 12:18:31,848 [INFO] root: b' 0\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:31,848 [INFO] root: b'\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:31,848 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:31,849 [INFO] root: Out: 0

2021-03-08 12:18:31,849 [INFO] root: Stopping LCM service.
2021-03-08 12:18:31,849 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: systemctl stop lcm
2021-03-08 12:18:32,290 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:32,290 [INFO] root: Out:
2021-03-08 12:18:32,291 [INFO] root: Removing LCM NFS mount.
2021-03-08 12:18:32,291 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: rm -rf /nfs/vmware/vcf/nfs-mou nt/bundle/f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d447860e3169
2021-03-08 12:18:32,683 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:32,684 [INFO] root: Out:
2021-03-08 12:18:32,684 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: psql --host=localhost -U postg res -d lcm -tc "select upload_id from bundle_upload where bundle_id = 'f004390e- 26be-4690-9d7b-d447860e3169';"
2021-03-08 12:18:32,704 [INFO] root: b'\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,705 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:32,705 [INFO] root: Out:

2021-03-08 12:18:32,705 [INFO] root: Bundle with ID : f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d4 47860e3169 not found in bundle upload table
2021-03-08 12:18:32,706 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: psql --host=localhost -U postg res -d lcm -tc "select download_id from bundledownload_by_id where bundle_id = ' f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d447860e3169';"
2021-03-08 12:18:32,724 [INFO] root: b' 0fb2e30e-d991-4b63-8686-42fab98a1c9e\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,724 [INFO] root: b'\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,725 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:32,725 [INFO] root: Out: 0fb2e30e-d991-4b63-8686-42fab98a1c9e

2021-03-08 12:18:32,725 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: curl -s -X DELETE localhost/ta sks/registrations/0fb2e30e-d991-4b63-8686-42fab98a1c9e
2021-03-08 12:18:32,830 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:32,830 [INFO] root: Out:
2021-03-08 12:18:32,830 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: psql --host=localhost -U postg res -d lcm -tc "select upgrade_id from upgrade where bundle_id = 'f004390e-26be- 4690-9d7b-d447860e3169';"
2021-03-08 12:18:32,852 [INFO] root: b'\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,853 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:32,853 [INFO] root: Out:

2021-03-08 12:18:32,853 [INFO] root: Bundle with ID : f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d4 47860e3169 not found in upgrade table
2021-03-08 12:18:32,854 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: psql --host=localhost -U postg res -d lcm -tc "select upgrade_id from upgrade where bundle_id = 'f004390e-26be- 4690-9d7b-d447860e3169';"
2021-03-08 12:18:32,873 [INFO] root: b'\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,874 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:32,874 [INFO] root: Out:

2021-03-08 12:18:32,874 [INFO] root: Bundle with ID : f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d4 47860e3169 not found in upgrade table
2021-03-08 12:18:32,875 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: psql --host=localhost -U postg res -d lcm -tc "select count(*) from bundle where bundle_id = 'f004390e-26be-469 0-9d7b-d447860e3169';"
2021-03-08 12:18:32,894 [INFO] root: b' 1\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,895 [INFO] root: b'\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,895 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:32,895 [INFO] root: Out: 1

2021-03-08 12:18:32,896 [INFO] root: Deleting bundle & upgrade info for bundle I D : f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d447860e3169
2021-03-08 12:18:32,896 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: psql --host=localhost -U postg res -d lcm -c "delete from bundle where bundle_id = 'f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d44 7860e3169';"
2021-03-08 12:18:32,923 [INFO] root: b'DELETE 1\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,924 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:32,924 [INFO] root: Out: DELETE 1

2021-03-08 12:18:32,924 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: psql --host=localhost -U postg res -d lcm -tc "select count(*) from image where bundle_id = 'f004390e-26be-4690 -9d7b-d447860e3169';"
2021-03-08 12:18:32,943 [INFO] root: b' 1\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,943 [INFO] root: b'\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,943 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:32,944 [INFO] root: Out: 1

2021-03-08 12:18:32,944 [INFO] root: Deleting bundle f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d44 7860e3169 in image table
2021-03-08 12:18:32,944 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: psql --host=localhost -U postg res -d lcm -c "delete from image where bundle_id = 'f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d447 860e3169';"
2021-03-08 12:18:32,967 [INFO] root: b'DELETE 1\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,967 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:32,967 [INFO] root: Out: DELETE 1

2021-03-08 12:18:32,968 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: psql --host=localhost -U postg res -d lcm -tc "select count(*) from partner_bundle_metadata where bundle_id = ' f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d447860e3169';"
2021-03-08 12:18:32,990 [INFO] root: b' 0\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,990 [INFO] root: b'\n'
2021-03-08 12:18:32,990 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:32,990 [INFO] root: Out: 0

2021-03-08 12:18:32,990 [INFO] root: Bundle with ID : f004390e-26be-4690-9d7b-d4 47860e3169 not found in partner_bundle_metadata table
2021-03-08 12:18:32,991 [INFO] root: Starting LCM service.
2021-03-08 12:18:32,991 [INFO] root: Execute cmd: systemctl start lcm
2021-03-08 12:18:33,135 [INFO] root: RC: 0
2021-03-08 12:18:33,136 [INFO] root: Out:

Going back into your SDDC Manager UI, and clicking the Bundle Management page, you will see your bundle has now been deleted.

It will take a few minutes for the Bundle services to restart, and you may see the message “Depot still initializing”.

Regards

Dean Lewis

 

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How to backup and restore your container workloads using Kasten by Veeam

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This blog posts covers using Kasten by Veeam to create backup policies for data protection, and how to restore your data. This blog post follows on from the two installation guides;

Deploying a PacMan browser game as test application

To provide a demo mission critical application for this blog post, I’ve deployed PacMan into my OpenShift cluster, which is accessible via a web browser to play. You can find the files from this GitHub repo to deploy into your own environment.

pacman

This application uses MongoDB to store the scores from the games to give me persistent data stored on a PVC.

pacman high scores

You can see all of the PacMan resources below by running:

kubectl get all -n pacman

kubectl get all -n pacman

Creating a Policy to protect your deployment and data

Log into your Kasten Dashboard.

If you have not yet deployed and configured Kasten, please see these earlier blog posts.

- Installing Kasten for Red Hat OpenShift
- Installing Kasten for VMware Tanzu Kubernetes

On the Kasten dashboard, click the Policy tile (or new policy link within the tile).

Kasten Dashboard create policy Continue reading How to backup and restore your container workloads using Kasten by Veeam →