Proposal: HPA Status Conditions

This proposal details an extension to the HPA status field that would
add conditions, similar to other Kubernetes objects.

contributors/design-proposals/hpa-status-conditions.md

@@ -0,0 +1,121 @@
+Horizontal Pod Autoscaler Status Conditions
+===========================================
+
+Currently, the HPA status conveys the last scale time, current and desired
+replacas, and the last-retrieved values of the metrics used to autoscale.
+
+However, the status field conveys no information about whether or not the
+HPA controller encountered difficulties while attempting to fetch metrics,
+or to scale.  While this information is generally conveyed via events,
+events are difficult to use to determine the current state of the HPA.
+
+Other objects, such as Pods, include a `Conditions` field, which describe
+the current condition of the object.  Adding such a field to the HPA
+provides clear indications of the current state of the HPA, allowing users
+to more easily recognize problems in their setups.
+
+API Change
+----------
+
+The status of the HPA object will gain a new field, `Conditions`, of type
+`[]HorizontalPodAutoscalerCondition`, defined as follows:
+
+```go
+// HorizontalPodAutoscalerConditionType are the valid conditions of
+// a HorizontalPodAutoscaler (see later on in the proposal for valid
+// values)
+type HorizontalPodAutoscalerConditionType string
+
+// HorizontalPodAutoscalerCondition describes the state of
+// a HorizontalPodAutoscaler at a certain point.
+type HorizontalPodAutoscalerCondition struct {
+    // type describes the current condition
+    Type HorizontalPodAutoscalerConditionType
+    // status is the status of the condition (True, False, Unknown)
+    Status ConditionStatus
+    // LastTransitionTime is the last time the condition transitioned from
+    // one status to another
+    // +optional
+    LastTransitionTime metav1.Time
+    // reason is the reason for the condition's last transition.
+    // +optional
+    Reason string
+    // message is a human-readable explanation containing details about
+    // the transition
+    Message string
+}
+```
+
+Current Conditions Conveyed via Events
+--------------------------------------
+
+The following is a list of events emitted by the HPA controller (as of the
+writing of this proposal), with descriptions of the conditions which they
+represent.  All of these events are caused by issues which block scaling
+entirely.
+
+- *SelectorRequired*: the target scalable resource's scale is missing
+  a selector.
+
+- *InvalidSelector*: the target scalable's selector couldn't be parsed.
+
+- *FailedGet{Object,Pods,Resource}Metric*: the HPA controller was unable
+  to fetch one metric.
+
+- *InvalidMetricSourceType*: the HPA controller encountered an unknown
+  metric source type.
+
+- *FailedComputeMetricsReplicas*: this is fired in conjunction with one of
+  the two previous events.
+
+- *FailedConvertHPA*: the HPA controller was unable to convert the given
+  HPA to the v2alpha1 version.
+
+- *FailedGetScale*: the HPA controller was unable to actually fetch the
+  scale for the given scalable resource.
+
+- *FailedRescale*: a scale update was needed and the HPA controller was
+  unable to actually update the scale subresource of the target scalable.
+
+- *SuccesfulRescale*: a scale update was needed and everything went
+  properly.
+
+- *FailedUpdateStatus*: the HPA controller failed to update the status of
+  the HPA object.
+
+New Conditions Types
+--------------------
+
+The above conditions can be coalesced into several condition types. Each
+condition has one or more associated `Reason` values which map back to
+some of the events described above.
+
+- *CanAccessScale*: this condition, when false, indicates issues actually
+  getting or updating the scale of the target scalable.  Potential
+  `Reason` values include `FailedGet`, `FailedUpdate`
+- *InBackoff*: this condition, when true, indicates that the HPA is
+  currently within a "scale forbidden window", and therefore will not
+  perform scale operations in a particular direction.  Potential `Reason`
+  values include `BackoffBoth`, `BackoffDownscale`, and `BackoffUpscale`.
+- *CanComputeReplicas*: this condition, when false, indicates issues
+  computing the desired replica counts.  Potential `Reason` values include
+  `FailedGet{Object,Pods,Resource}Metric`, `InvalidMetricSourceType`, and
+  `InvalidSelector` (which includes both missing and unparsable selectors,
+  which can be detailed in the `Message` field).
+- *DesiredOutsideRange*: this condition, when true, indicates that the
+  desired scale currently would be outside the range allowed by the HPA
+  spec, and is therefore capped.  Potential `Reason` values include
+  `TooFewReplicas` and `TooManyReplicas`.
+
+The `FailedUpdateStatus` event is not described here, as a failure to
+update the HPA status would preclude actually conveying this information.
+`FailedConvertHPA` is also not described, since it exists more as an
+implementation detail of how the current mechanics of the HPA are
+implemented, and less as part of the inherent functionality of the HPA
+controller.
+
+Open Questions
+--------------
+
+* Should `CanScale` be split into `CanGetScale` and `CanUpdateScale` or
+  something equivalent?