Setup a k3s Cluster at home quickly
Table of Contents
Devops - This article is part of a series.
I was setting up a new Fedora Server VM over the weekend and wanted to use it as a kubernetes cluster to run my containerized workloads. I usually install docker and docker-compose and get on with my work. But I wanted to set up a k8s cluster for fun. When looking up online I found a quick and easy way to set it up.
Why k3s over k8s? #
Rather than going with a full-blown k8s cluster with multiple VMs, I went with a single node k3s setup. k3s is a lightweight k8s, it has a smaller footprint and is great for a home lab.
I would encourage you to check out their docs for more info based on your requirements, but the gist is as follows.
Requirements #
The minimum hardware requirement is
| Spec | Min | Recommended |
|---|---|---|
| CPU | 1 core | 2 core |
| RAM | 512 MB | 1 GB |
I am running this on a Fedora Server VM with 4 cores and 8 GB of RAM, so well above the recommended settings.
Installation #
The command to install is,
curl -sfL https://get.k3s.io | sh -
It will ask for the sudo password. Have a look at the script before running it at Installation Script. Also, they have a lot of options to customize the components installed. Check out the full list at Config Options.
Verify the install #
If everything goes well, you should be able to check the service through systemctl.
$ systemctl status k3s
● k3s.service - Lightweight Kubernetes
Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/k3s.service; enabled; preset: disabled)
Drop-In: /usr/lib/systemd/system/service.d
└─10-timeout-abort.conf
Active: active (running) since Sun 2024-07-14 18:47:30 IST; 21min ago
Docs: https://k3s.io
Check the default k3s objects #
Running the following command gives you all the k3s objects deployed.
$ sudo kubectl get all -n kube-system
NAME READY STATUS RESTARTS AGE
pod/coredns-6799fbcd5-svqqf 1/1 Running 0 26m
pod/local-path-provisioner-6f5d79df6-d8h5g 1/1 Running 0 26m
pod/metrics-server-54fd9b65b-5xxq4 0/1 Running 0 26m
NAME TYPE CLUSTER-IP EXTERNAL-IP PORT(S) AGE
service/kube-dns ClusterIP 10.43.0.10 <none> 53/UDP,53/TCP,9153/TCP 26m
service/metrics-server ClusterIP 10.43.198.179 <none> 443/TCP 26m
NAME READY UP-TO-DATE AVAILABLE AGE
deployment.apps/coredns 1/1 1 1 26m
deployment.apps/local-path-provisioner 1/1 1 1 26m
deployment.apps/metrics-server 0/1 1 0 26m
NAME DESIRED CURRENT READY AGE
replicaset.apps/coredns-6799fbcd5 1 1 1 26m
replicaset.apps/local-path-provisioner-6f5d79df6 1 1 1 26m
replicaset.apps/metrics-server-54fd9b65b 1 1 0 26m
Configuring k3s #
Create and edit the following file to configure the k3s setup.
sudo vi /etc/rancher/k3s/config.yaml
Check out all the available config at k3s Config.
Post, the creation/updation of the config file, restart using systemctl.
sudo systemctl restart k3s
Stopping k3s #
Just use systemctl to stop the service.
sudo systemctl stop k3s
Unintalling k3s #
Uninstalling is also a breeze with k3s, as it generates an uninstall script as soon as you install k3s at /usr/local/bin/k3s-uninstall.sh.
Just run the script to uninstall.
/usr/local/bin/k3s-uninstall.sh
Post uninstall and check the status with systemctl.
systemctl status k3s