# Getting Started with kops on GCE Make sure you have [installed kops](../install.md) and [installed kubectl](../install.md), and installed the [gcloud tools](https://cloud.google.com/sdk/downloads). You'll need a Google Cloud account, and make sure that gcloud is logged in to your account using `gcloud init`. You should confirm that basic commands like `gcloud compute zones list` are working. You'll also need to [configure default credentials](https://developers.google.com/accounts/docs/application-default-credentials), using `gcloud auth application-default login`. # Creating a state store kops needs a state store, to hold the configuration for your clusters. The simplest configuration for Google Cloud is to store it in a Google Cloud Storage bucket in the same account, so that's how we'll start. So, just create an empty bucket - you can use any name: `gsutil mb gs://kubernetes-clusters/` # Creating our first cluster `kops create cluster` creates the Cluster object and InstanceGroup object you'll be working with in kops: ``` PROJECT=`gcloud config get-value project` export KOPS_FEATURE_FLAGS=AlphaAllowGCE # to unlock the GCE features kops create cluster simple.k8s.local --zones us-central1-a --state gs://kubernetes-clusters/ --project=${PROJECT} ``` You can now list the Cluster objects in your kops state store (the GCS bucket we created): `kops get cluster --state gs://kubernetes-clusters/` ``` NAME CLOUD ZONES simple.k8s.local gce us-central1-a ``` This shows that you have one Cluster object configured, named `simple.k8s.local`. The cluster holds the cluster-wide configuration for a kubernetes cluster - things like the kubernetes version, and the authorization policy in use. The `kops` tool should feel a lot like `kubectl` - kops uses the same API machinery as kubernetes, so it should behave similarly, although now you are managing kubernetes clusters, instead of managing objects on a kubernetes cluster. You can see the details of your Cluster object by doing: `> kops get cluster --state gs://kubernetes-clusters/ simple.k8s.local -oyaml` ``` apiVersion: kops/v1alpha2 kind: Cluster metadata: creationTimestamp: 2017-10-03T05:07:27Z name: simple.k8s.local spec: api: loadBalancer: type: Public authorization: alwaysAllow: {} channel: stable cloudProvider: gce configBase: gs://kubernetes-clusters/simple.k8s.local etcdClusters: - etcdMembers: - instanceGroup: master-us-central1-a name: a name: main - etcdMembers: - instanceGroup: master-us-central1-a name: a name: events iam: legacy: false kubernetesApiAccess: - 0.0.0.0/0 kubernetesVersion: 1.7.2 masterPublicName: api.simple.k8s.local networking: kubenet: {} nonMasqueradeCIDR: 100.64.0.0/10 project: my-gce-project sshAccess: - 0.0.0.0/0 subnets: - name: us-central1 region: us-central1 type: Public topology: dns: type: Public masters: public nodes: public ``` Similarly, you can also see your InstanceGroups using: `kops get instancegroup --state gs://kubernetes-clusters/ --name simple.k8s.local` ``` NAME ROLE MACHINETYPE MIN MAX SUBNETS master-us-central1-a Master n1-standard-1 1 1 us-central1 nodes Node n1-standard-2 2 2 us-central1 ``` InstanceGroups are the other main kops object - an InstanceGroup manages a set of cloud instances, which then are registered in kubernetes as Nodes. You have multiple InstanceGroups for different types of instances / Nodes - in our simple example we have one for our master (which only has a single member), and one for our nodes (and we have two nodes configured). We'll see a lot more of Cluster objects and InstanceGroups as we use kops to reconfigure clusters. But let's get on with our first cluster. # Export KOPS_STATE_STORE Rather than typing the `--state` argument every time, it's much easier to export the `KOPS_STATE_STORE` environment variable: ``` export KOPS_STATE_STORE=gs://kubernetes-clusters/ ``` You can also put this in your `~/.bashrc` or similar. # Creating a cluster `kops create cluster` created the Cluster object & InstanceGroup object in our state store, but didn't actually create any instances or other cloud objects in GCE. To do that, we'll use `kops update cluster`. `kops update cluster` without `--yes` will show you a preview of all the changes will be made; it is very useful to see what kops is about to do, before actually making the changes. Run `kops update cluster simple.k8s.local` and peruse the changes. We're now finally ready to create the object: `kops update cluster simple.k8s.local --yes` (If you haven't created an SSH key, you'll have to `ssh-keygen -t rsa`) Your cluster is created in the background - kops actually creates GCE Managed Instance Groups that run the instances; this ensures that even if instances are terminated, they will automatically be relaunched by GCE and your cluster will self-heal. After a few minutes, you should be able to do `kubectl get nodes` and your first cluster should be ready! # Enjoy At this point you have a kubernetes cluster - the core commands to do so are as simple as `kops create cluster` and `kops update cluster`. There's a lot more power in kops, and even more power in kubernetes itself, so we've put a few jumping off places here. But when you're done, don't forget to [delete your cluster](#deleting-the-cluster). * [Manipulate InstanceGroups](working-with-instancegroups.md) to add more nodes, change image # Deleting the cluster When you're done using the cluster, you should delete it to release the cloud resources. `kops delete cluster` is the command. When run without `--yes` it shows a preview of the objects it will delete: ``` > kops delete cluster simple.k8s.local TYPE NAME ID Address api-simple-k8s-local api-simple-k8s-local Disk a-etcd-events-simple-k8s-local a-etcd-events-simple-k8s-local Disk a-etcd-main-simple-k8s-local a-etcd-main-simple-k8s-local ForwardingRule api-simple-k8s-local api-simple-k8s-local Instance master-us-central1-a-9847 us-central1-a/master-us-central1-a-9847 Instance nodes-0s0w us-central1-a/nodes-0s0w Instance nodes-dvlq us-central1-a/nodes-dvlq InstanceGroupManager a-master-us-central1-a-simple-k8s-local us-central1-a/a-master-us-central1-a-simple-k8s-local InstanceGroupManager a-nodes-simple-k8s-local us-central1-a/a-nodes-simple-k8s-local InstanceTemplate master-us-central1-a-simple-k8s-local-1507008700 master-us-central1-a-simple-k8s-local-1507008700 InstanceTemplate nodes-simple-k8s-local-1507008700 nodes-simple-k8s-local-1507008700 Route simple-k8s-local-715bb0c7-a7fc-11e7-93d7-42010a800002 simple-k8s-local-715bb0c7-a7fc-11e7-93d7-42010a800002 Route simple-k8s-local-9a2a08e8-a7fc-11e7-93d7-42010a800002 simple-k8s-local-9a2a08e8-a7fc-11e7-93d7-42010a800002 Route simple-k8s-local-9c17a4e6-a7fc-11e7-93d7-42010a800002 simple-k8s-local-9c17a4e6-a7fc-11e7-93d7-42010a800002 TargetPool api-simple-k8s-local api-simple-k8s-local Must specify --yes to delete cluster ``` After you've double-checked you're deleting exactly what you want to delete, run `kops delete cluster simple.k8s.local --yes`.