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Installation#

This section describes how to install k0smotron on top of an existing k0s Kubernetes cluster that allows for creation and management of the k0s control plane.

TL;DR

kubectl apply --server-side=true -f https://docs.k0smotron.io/v1.2.0/install.yaml

Known limitations#

Areas in which k0smotron is currently limited include:

  • Control plane exposure

    Currently k0smotron only supports ClusterIP, NodePort, and LoadBalancer services, and often it is necessary to further configure created services to ease their interaction with cloud provider implementations.

  • Updates prevalence

    Although k0smotron can easily update the cluster control plane, in standalone mode such updates do not extend to worker nodes.

Hardware requirements#

k0smotron does not require any special hardware for workloads aside from the one required for k0s. For details on k0s hardware requirements for workloads, see k0s documentation.

Software prerequisites#

k0smotron requires the following software to be preinstalled:

  • Kubernetes management cluster. In this documentation set, we use the k0s Kubernetes distribution as a management cluster. For Cluster API integration, you can use a Cluster API cluster.
  • kubectl installed locally.

  • For Cluster API integration:

    • clusterctl installed locally.
    • Configured cloud provider. In this documentation set, we describe configuration examples for the following providers: AWS, Docker, Hetzner Cloud, OpenStack, vSphere. For setup instructions, refer to the official documentation of the selected cloud provider.
  • Optional. CSI provider for persistent storage in managed clusters.
  • Optional. Load balancer provider for ensuring high availability of the control plane.

Full installation#

A full k0smotron installation implies the following components:

  • k0smotron operator
  • Custom Resource Definitions
  • Role-based access control rules
  • Bootstrap provider
  • Infrastructure provider
  • Control plane provider

To install the full version of k0smotron:

kubectl apply --server-side=true -f https://docs.k0smotron.io/v1.2.0/install.yaml

Now, you can create your first control planes using k0smotron either as a standalone manager, or as a Cluster API provider. For use case details, see k0smotron usage.

Per-module installation for Cluster API#

k0smotron is compatible with clusterctl and can act as a Cluster API bootstrap, infrastructure, and control plane provider. You can use clusterctl to install each k0smotron Cluster API module separately:

clusterctl init --bootstrap k0sproject-k0smotron \
                --control-plane k0sproject-k0smotron \
                --infrastructure k0sproject-k0smotron

To start using the k0smotron Cluster API, refer to Cluster API.