Tag Archives: Cluster

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Tanzu Kubernetes Grid – Upgrading a Management and Workload Cluster deployed to vSphere

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In this blog post, I am going to walk through how to upgrade both your Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Management and Workload clusters. I’ll cover the Tanzu CLI options, as well as how you can leverage the features of Tanzu Mission Control for upgrades as well.

For my example use cases, I’ll be upgrading from TKG 1.4.2 to 1.5.4. Although the process should be similar for other upgrade paths, I do recommend you consult the official documentation before attempting any upgrade in case there are any changes.

Caution: VMware recommends not installing or upgrading to Tanzu Kubernetes Grid v1.5.0-v1.5.3, due to a bug in the versions of etcd in the versions of Kubernetes used by Tanzu Kubernetes Grid v1.5.0-v1.5.3. Tanzu Kubernetes Grid v1.5.4 resolves this problem by incorporating a fixed version of etcd. For more information, see Resolved Issues in the TKG v1.5 Release Notes.
Pre-requisites

To upgrade Tanzu Kubernetes Grid (TKG), you download and install the new version of the Tanzu CLI on the machine that you use as the bootstrap machine. You must also download and install base image templates and VMs, depending on whether you are upgrading clusters that you previously deployed to vSphere, Amazon EC2, or Azure.

Download the Tanzu CLI and Kubernetes OVAs

On the VMware Customer Portal download both the Tanzu CLI and OVA files as necessary.

I’ve highlighted in the below screenshot; your Management Cluster will always need to run the latest Kubernetes version.

Tanzu Kubernetes Grid - Upgrade - Download Product files - Tanzu CLI - Kubernetes OVAS

Upload Kubernetes OVAs to vCenter

Continue reading Tanzu Kubernetes Grid – Upgrading a Management and Workload Cluster deployed to vSphere →

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VMware Cloud on AWS Deep Dive – Activating, Deploying and Using the managed Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Service

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In this blog post I’m going to deep dive into the end-to-end activation, deployment, and consuming of the managed Tanzu Services (Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Service > TKGS) within a VMware Cloud on AWS SDDC. I’ll deploy a Tanzu Cluster inside a vSphere Namespace, and then deploy my trusty Pac-Man application and make it Publicly Accessible.

Previously to this capability, you would need to deploy Tanzu Kubernetes Grid to VMC, which was fully supported, as a Management Cluster and then additional Tanzu Clusters for your workloads. (See Terminology explanations here). This was a fully support option, however it did not provide you all the integrated features you could have by using the TKGS as part of your On-Premises vSphere environment.

What is Tanzu Services on VMC?

Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Service is a managed service built into the VMware Cloud on AWS vSphere environment.

This feature brings the availability of the integrated Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Service inside of vSphere itself, by coupling the platform together, you can easily deploy new Tanzu clusters, use the administration and authentication of vCenter, as well as provide governance and policies from vCenter as well.

Note: VMware Cloud on AWS does not enable activation of Tanzu Kubernetes Grid by default. Contact your account team for more information. 

Note2: In VMware Cloud on AWS, the Tanzu workload control plane can be activated only through the VMC Console.
But wait, couldn’t I already install a Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Cluster onto VMC anyway?

Tanzu Kubernetes Grid is a multi-cloud solution that deploys and manages Kubernetes clusters on your selected cloud provider. Previously to the vSphere integrated Tanzu offering for VMC that we are discussing today, you would deploy the general TKG option to your SDDC vCenter.

What differences should I know about this Tanzu Services offering in VMC versus the other Tanzu Kubernetes offering?
  • When Activated, Tanzu Kubernetes Grid for VMware Cloud on AWS is pre-provisioned with a VMC-specific content library that you cannot modify.
  • Tanzu Kubernetes Grid for VMware Cloud on AWS does not support vSphere Pods.
  • Creation of Tanzu Supervisor Namespace templates is not supported by VMware Cloud on AWS.
  • vSphere namespaces for Kubernetes releases are configured automatically during Tanzu Kubernetes Grid activation.
Activating Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Service in a VMC SDDC
Reminder: Tanzu Services Activation capabilities are not activated by default. Contact your account team for more information.

Within your VMC Console, you can either go via the Launchpad method or via the SDDC inventory item. I’ll cover both:

  • Click on Launchpad
  • Open the Kubernetes Tab
  • Click Learn More

VMC - Launchpad - Kubernetes

  • Select the Journey Tab
  • Under Stage 2 – Activate > Click Get Started

VMC - Launchpad - Kubernetes - Journey - Get started

Alternatively, from the SDDC object in the Inventory view

  • Click Actions
  • Click “Activate Tanzu Kubernetes Grid”

VMC - Inventory - SDDC - Activate Tanzu Kubernetes Grid

You will now be shown a status dialog, as VMC checks to ensure that Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Service can be activated in your cluster.

This will check you have the correct configurations and compute resources available.

VMC - Inventory - SDDC - Activate Tanzu Kubernetes Grid - Checking cluster resources

If the check is successful, you will now be presented the configuration wizard. Essentially, all you must provide is your configuration for four networks. Continue reading VMware Cloud on AWS Deep Dive – Activating, Deploying and Using the managed Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Service →

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Tanzu Mission Control – Upgrading Kubernetes for a provisioned cluster

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Now we understand how to deploy a Tanzu Kubernetes Cluster using Tanzu Mission Control, let’s look at the next lifecycle step, how to upgrade the Kubernetes version of the cluster.

Below are the other blog posts in the series.

Tanzu Mission Control 
- Getting Started Tanzu Mission Control 
- Cluster Inspections 
- Workspaces and Policies  
- Data Protection 
- Deploying TKG clusters to AWS 
- Upgrading a provisioned cluster 
- Delete a provisioned cluster 
- TKG Management support and provisioning new clusters
- TMC REST API - Postman Collection
- Using custom policies to ensure Kasten protects a deployed application

When a cluster which has been provisioned by TMC, and therefore managed by TMC, has an available upgrade, you will see an “i” icon next to the version on the clusters UI view, hovering over this will tell you there is an upgrade ready.

TMC - Clusters - Upgrade Available

Click the cluster name to take you into the cluster object to see the full details,

  1. click the actions button
  2. and select upgrade.

TMC - Cluster - Actions - Upgrade

The Upgrade Cluster dialogue will appear. Select the version you want to upgrade to and click upgrade.

TMC - Cluster - Upgrade Cluster - Select Version

On both the Cluster list and Cluster Detailed view, the status will change to upgrading.

TMC - Cluster Upgrading 2TMC - Cluster Upgrading

Once the upgrade has completed, the cluster will change back to ready and show the updated version.

TMC - Cluster upgrade complete

Wrap-up and Resources

In this quick blog post, we used Tanzu Mission Control to upgrade a provisioned Tanzu Kubernetes Grid cluster which was running in AWS. All the steps provided in this blog post can be replicated using the TMC CLI as well.

As a reminder, to take real advantage of TMC I recommend you read the follow posts:

Tanzu Mission Control 
- Getting Started Tanzu Mission Control 
- Cluster Inspections 
- Workspaces and Policies  
- Data Protection 
- Deploying TKG clusters to AWS 
- Upgrading a provisioned cluster 
- Delete a provisioned cluster 
- TKG Management support and provisioning new clusters
- TMC REST API - Postman Collection
- Using custom policies to ensure Kasten protects a deployed application

You can get hands on experience of Tanzu Mission Control yourself over on the VMware Hands-on-Lab website, which is always free!

Regards

Dean Lewis

 

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Tanzu Mission Control – Delete a provisioned cluster

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In this blog post we are going to cover off how to delete a Tanzu Kubernetes Grid cluster that has been provisioned by Tanzu Mission Control. We will cover the following areas:

Below are the other blog posts in the series.

Tanzu Mission Control 
- Getting Started Tanzu Mission Control 
- Cluster Inspections 
- Workspaces and Policies  
- Data Protection 
- Deploying TKG clusters to AWS 
- Upgrading a provisioned cluster 
- Delete a provisioned cluster 
- TKG Management support and provisioning new clusters
- TMC REST API - Postman Collection
- Using custom policies to ensure Kasten protects a deployed application

We are going to use the cluster I created in my last blog post.

Below are my EC2 instances that make up my TMC provisioned cluster, here I have filtered my view using the field “tmc.cloud.vmware.com/cluster” + cluster name.

Tanzu Mission Control - AWS Consoles - Instances - Filtered tmc.cloud.vmware.com

Deleting a Provisioned cluster in the TMC UI

In the TMC UI, going to the clusters view, you can click the three dots next to the cluster you want to remove and select delete.

Tanzu Mission Control - Clusters - Delete cluster

Alternatively, within the cluster object view, click actions then delete.

Tanzu Mission Control - Cluster Object - Delete cluster

Both options will bring up the below confirmation dialog box.

You select one of the following options:

  • Delete and remove agent (recommended)
    • Remove from TMC and delete agent extensions
  • Manually delete agent extensions
    • A secondary option whereby a manual removal is needed if a cluster delete fails

Enter the name of the cluster you want to delete, to confirm the cluster deletion.

Tanzu Mission Control - Cluster Object - Delete cluster - Confirm Continue reading Tanzu Mission Control – Delete a provisioned cluster →