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Installing a cluster on VMC with user-provisioned infrastructure and network customizations

In OpenShift Container Platform version 4.10, you can install a cluster on your VMware vSphere instance using infrastructure you provision with customized network configuration options by deploying it to VMware Cloud (VMC) on AWS.

Once you configure your VMC environment for OpenShift Container Platform deployment, you use the OpenShift Container Platform installation program from the bastion management host, co-located in the VMC environment. The installation program and control plane automates the process of deploying and managing the resources needed for the OpenShift Container Platform cluster.

By customizing your network configuration, your cluster can coexist with existing IP address allocations in your environment and integrate with existing VXLAN configurations. You must set most of the network configuration parameters during installation, and you can modify only kubeProxy configuration parameters in a running cluster.

OpenShift Container Platform supports deploying a cluster to a single VMware vCenter only. Deploying a cluster with machines/machine sets on multiple vCenters is not supported.

Setting up VMC for vSphere

You can install OpenShift Container Platform on VMware Cloud (VMC) on AWS hosted vSphere clusters to enable applications to be deployed and managed both on-premise and off-premise, across the hybrid cloud.

VMC on AWS Architecture

You must configure several options in your VMC environment prior to installing OpenShift Container Platform on VMware vSphere. Ensure your VMC environment has the following prerequisites:

  • Create a non-exclusive, DHCP-enabled, NSX-T network segment and subnet. Other virtual machines (VMs) can be hosted on the subnet, but at least eight IP addresses must be available for the OpenShift Container Platform deployment.

  • Configure the following firewall rules:

    • An ANY:ANY firewall rule between the OpenShift Container Platform compute network and the internet. This is used by nodes and applications to download container images.

    • An ANY:ANY firewall rule between the installation host and the software-defined data center (SDDC) management network on port 443. This allows you to upload the Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) OVA during deployment.

    • An HTTPS firewall rule between the OpenShift Container Platform compute network and vCenter. This connection allows OpenShift Container Platform to communicate with vCenter for provisioning and managing nodes, persistent volume claims (PVCs), and other resources.

  • You must have the following information to deploy OpenShift Container Platform:

    • The OpenShift Container Platform cluster name, such as vmc-prod-1.

    • The base DNS name, such as companyname.com.

    • If not using the default, the pod network CIDR and services network CIDR must be identified, which are set by default to 10.128.0.0/14 and 172.30.0.0/16, respectively. These CIDRs are used for pod-to-pod and pod-to-service communication and are not accessible externally; however, they must not overlap with existing subnets in your organization.

    • The following vCenter information:

      • vCenter hostname, username, and password

      • Datacenter name, such as SDDC-Datacenter

      • Cluster name, such as Cluster-1

      • Network name

      • Datastore name, such as WorkloadDatastore

        It is recommended to move your vSphere cluster to the VMC Compute-ResourcePool resource pool after your cluster installation is finished.

  • A Linux-based host deployed to VMC as a bastion.

    • The bastion host can be Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) or any another Linux-based host; it must have internet connectivity and the ability to upload an OVA to the ESXi hosts.

    • Download and install the OpenShift CLI tools to the bastion host.

      • The openshift-install installation program

      • The OpenShift CLI (oc) tool

You cannot use the VMware NSX Container Plugin for Kubernetes (NCP), and NSX is not used as the OpenShift SDN. The version of NSX currently available with VMC is incompatible with the version of NCP certified with OpenShift Container Platform.

However, the NSX DHCP service is used for virtual machine IP management with the full-stack automated OpenShift Container Platform deployment and with nodes provisioned, either manually or automatically, by the Machine API integration with vSphere. Additionally, NSX firewall rules are created to enable access with the OpenShift Container Platform cluster and between the bastion host and the VMC vSphere hosts.

VMC Sizer tool

VMware Cloud on AWS is built on top of AWS bare metal infrastructure; this is the same bare metal infrastructure which runs AWS native services. When a VMware cloud on AWS software-defined data center (SDDC) is deployed, you consume these physical server nodes and run the VMware ESXi hypervisor in a single tenant fashion. This means the physical infrastructure is not accessible to anyone else using VMC. It is important to consider how many physical hosts you will need to host your virtual infrastructure.

To determine this, VMware provides the VMC on AWS Sizer. With this tool, you can define the resources you intend to host on VMC:

  • Types of workloads

  • Total number of virtual machines

  • Specification information such as:

    • Storage requirements

    • vCPUs

    • vRAM

    • Overcommit ratios

With these details, the sizer tool can generate a report, based on VMware best practices, and recommend your cluster configuration and the number of hosts you will need.

vSphere prerequisites

Internet access for OpenShift Container Platform

In OpenShift Container Platform 4.10, you require access to the internet to install your cluster.

You must have internet access to:

  • Access OpenShift Cluster Manager to download the installation program and perform subscription management. If the cluster has internet access and you do not disable Telemetry, that service automatically entitles your cluster.

  • Access Quay.io to obtain the packages that are required to install your cluster.

  • Obtain the packages that are required to perform cluster updates.

If your cluster cannot have direct internet access, you can perform a restricted network installation on some types of infrastructure that you provision. During that process, you download the required content and use it to populate a mirror registry with the installation packages. With some installation types, the environment that you install your cluster in will not require internet access. Before you update the cluster, you update the content of the mirror registry.

VMware vSphere infrastructure requirements

You must install the OpenShift Container Platform cluster on a VMware vSphere version 7 instance that meets the requirements for the components that you use.

OpenShift Container Platform version 4.10 does not support VMware vSphere version 8.0.

You can host the VMware vSphere infrastructure on-premise or on a VMware Cloud Verified provider that meets the requirements outlined in the following table:

Table 1. Version requirements for vSphere virtual environments
Virtual environment product Required version

VM hardware version

15 or later

vSphere ESXi hosts

7

vCenter host

7

Installing a cluster on VMware vSphere version 7.0 Update 1 is now deprecated. These versions are still fully supported, but version 4.10 of OpenShift Container Platform requires vSphere virtual hardware version 15 or later. Hardware version 15 is now the default for vSphere virtual machines in OpenShift Container Platform. To update the hardware version for your vSphere nodes, see the "Updating hardware on nodes running in vSphere" article.

If your vSphere nodes are below hardware version 15 or your VMware vSphere version is earlier than 6.7U3, upgrading from OpenShift Container Platform 4.10 to OpenShift Container Platform 4.11 is not available.
Table 2. Minimum supported vSphere version for VMware components
Component Minimum supported versions Description

Hypervisor

vSphere 7 with HW version 15

This version is the minimum version that Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) supports. For more information about supported hardware on the latest version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) that is compatible with RHCOS, see Hardware on the Red Hat Customer Portal.

Storage with in-tree drivers

vSphere 7

This plugin creates vSphere storage by using the in-tree storage drivers for vSphere included in OpenShift Container Platform.

If you use a vSphere version 6.5 instance, upgrade to 7.0 before you install OpenShift Container Platform.

You must ensure that the time on your ESXi hosts is synchronized before you install OpenShift Container Platform. See Edit Time Configuration for a Host in the VMware documentation.

VMware vSphere CSI Driver Operator requirements

To install the vSphere CSI Driver Operator, the following requirements must be met:

  • VMware vSphere version 6.7U3 or later

  • Virtual machines of hardware version 15 or later

  • No third-party vSphere CSI driver already installed in the cluster

If a third-party vSphere CSI driver is present in the cluster, OpenShift Container Platform does not overwrite it. If you continue with the third-party vSphere CSI driver when upgrading to the next major version of OpenShift Container Platform, the oc CLI prompts you with the following message:

VSphereCSIDriverOperatorCRUpgradeable: VMwareVSphereControllerUpgradeable:
found existing unsupported csi.vsphere.vmware.com driver

The previous message informs you that Red Hat does not support the third-party vSphere CSI driver during an OpenShift Container Platform upgrade operation. You can choose to ignore this message and continue with the upgrade operation.
Additional resources

Requirements for a cluster with user-provisioned infrastructure

For a cluster that contains user-provisioned infrastructure, you must deploy all of the required machines.

This section describes the requirements for deploying OpenShift Container Platform on user-provisioned infrastructure.

Required machines for cluster installation

The smallest OpenShift Container Platform clusters require the following hosts:

Table 3. Minimum required hosts
Hosts Description

One temporary bootstrap machine

The cluster requires the bootstrap machine to deploy the OpenShift Container Platform cluster on the three control plane machines. You can remove the bootstrap machine after you install the cluster.

Three control plane machines

The control plane machines run the Kubernetes and OpenShift Container Platform services that form the control plane.

At least two compute machines, which are also known as worker machines.

The workloads requested by OpenShift Container Platform users run on the compute machines.

To maintain high availability of your cluster, use separate physical hosts for these cluster machines.

The bootstrap and control plane machines must use Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) as the operating system. However, the compute machines can choose between Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) and Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 8.4–8.8.

Note that RHCOS is based on Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 8 and inherits all of its hardware certifications and requirements. See Red Hat Enterprise Linux technology capabilities and limits.

Minimum resource requirements for cluster installation

Each cluster machine must meet the following minimum requirements:

Table 4. Minimum resource requirements
Machine Operating System vCPU [1] Virtual RAM Storage IOPS [2]

Bootstrap

RHCOS

4

16 GB

100 GB

300

Control plane

RHCOS

4

16 GB

100 GB

300

Compute

RHCOS, RHEL 8.4–8.8 [3]

2

8 GB

100 GB

300

  1. One vCPU is equivalent to one physical core when simultaneous multithreading (SMT), or hyperthreading, is not enabled. When enabled, use the following formula to calculate the corresponding ratio: (threads per core × cores) × sockets = vCPUs.

  2. OpenShift Container Platform and Kubernetes are sensitive to disk performance, and faster storage is recommended, particularly for etcd on the control plane nodes which require a 10 ms p99 fsync duration. Note that on many cloud platforms, storage size and IOPS scale together, so you might need to over-allocate storage volume to obtain sufficient performance.

  3. As with all user-provisioned installations, if you choose to use RHEL compute machines in your cluster, you take responsibility for all operating system life cycle management and maintenance, including performing system updates, applying patches, and completing all other required tasks. Use of RHEL 7 compute machines is deprecated and has been removed in OpenShift Container Platform 4.10 and later.

If an instance type for your platform meets the minimum requirements for cluster machines, it is supported to use in OpenShift Container Platform.

Certificate signing requests management

Because your cluster has limited access to automatic machine management when you use infrastructure that you provision, you must provide a mechanism for approving cluster certificate signing requests (CSRs) after installation. The kube-controller-manager only approves the kubelet client CSRs. The machine-approver cannot guarantee the validity of a serving certificate that is requested by using kubelet credentials because it cannot confirm that the correct machine issued the request. You must determine and implement a method of verifying the validity of the kubelet serving certificate requests and approving them.

Networking requirements for user-provisioned infrastructure

All the Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) machines require networking to be configured in initramfs during boot to fetch their Ignition config files.

During the initial boot, the machines require an IP address configuration that is set either through a DHCP server or statically by providing the required boot options. After a network connection is established, the machines download their Ignition config files from an HTTP or HTTPS server. The Ignition config files are then used to set the exact state of each machine. The Machine Config Operator completes more changes to the machines, such as the application of new certificates or keys, after installation.

It is recommended to use a DHCP server for long-term management of the cluster machines. Ensure that the DHCP server is configured to provide persistent IP addresses, DNS server information, and hostnames to the cluster machines.

If a DHCP service is not available for your user-provisioned infrastructure, you can instead provide the IP networking configuration and the address of the DNS server to the nodes at RHCOS install time. These can be passed as boot arguments if you are installing from an ISO image. See the Installing RHCOS and starting the OpenShift Container Platform bootstrap process section for more information about static IP provisioning and advanced networking options.

The Kubernetes API server must be able to resolve the node names of the cluster machines. If the API servers and worker nodes are in different zones, you can configure a default DNS search zone to allow the API server to resolve the node names. Another supported approach is to always refer to hosts by their fully-qualified domain names in both the node objects and all DNS requests.

Setting the cluster node hostnames through DHCP

On Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) machines, the hostname is set through NetworkManager. By default, the machines obtain their hostname through DHCP. If the hostname is not provided by DHCP, set statically through kernel arguments, or another method, it is obtained through a reverse DNS lookup. Reverse DNS lookup occurs after the network has been initialized on a node and can take time to resolve. Other system services can start prior to this and detect the hostname as localhost or similar. You can avoid this by using DHCP to provide the hostname for each cluster node.

Additionally, setting the hostnames through DHCP can bypass any manual DNS record name configuration errors in environments that have a DNS split-horizon implementation.

Network connectivity requirements

You must configure the network connectivity between machines to allow OpenShift Container Platform cluster components to communicate. Each machine must be able to resolve the hostnames of all other machines in the cluster.

This section provides details about the ports that are required.

In connected OpenShift Container Platform environments, all nodes are required to have internet access to pull images for platform containers and provide telemetry data to Red Hat.
Table 5. Ports used for all-machine to all-machine communications
Protocol Port Description

ICMP

N/A

Network reachability tests

TCP

1936

Metrics

9000-9999

Host level services, including the node exporter on ports 9100-9101 and the Cluster Version Operator on port 9099.

10250-10259

The default ports that Kubernetes reserves

10256

openshift-sdn

UDP

4789

VXLAN

6081

Geneve

9000-9999

Host level services, including the node exporter on ports 9100-9101.

500

IPsec IKE packets

4500

IPsec NAT-T packets

TCP/UDP

30000-32767

Kubernetes node port

ESP

N/A

IPsec Encapsulating Security Payload (ESP)
Table 6. Ports used for all-machine to control plane communications
Protocol Port Description

TCP

6443

Kubernetes API
Table 7. Ports used for control plane machine to control plane machine communications
Protocol Port Description

TCP

2379-2380

etcd server and peer ports

Ethernet adaptor hardware address requirements

When provisioning VMs for the cluster, the ethernet interfaces configured for each VM must use a MAC address from the VMware Organizationally Unique Identifier (OUI) allocation ranges:

  • 00:05:69:00:00:00 to 00:05:69:FF:FF:FF

  • 00:0c:29:00:00:00 to 00:0c:29:FF:FF:FF

  • 00:1c:14:00:00:00 to 00:1c:14:FF:FF:FF

  • 00:50:56:00:00:00 to 00:50:56:3F:FF:FF

If a MAC address outside the VMware OUI is used, the cluster installation will not succeed.

NTP configuration for user-provisioned infrastructure

OpenShift Container Platform clusters are configured to use a public Network Time Protocol (NTP) server by default. If you want to use a local enterprise NTP server, or if your cluster is being deployed in a disconnected network, you can configure the cluster to use a specific time server. For more information, see the documentation for Configuring chrony time service.

If a DHCP server provides NTP server information, the chrony time service on the Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) machines read the information and can sync the clock with the NTP servers.

User-provisioned DNS requirements

In OpenShift Container Platform deployments, DNS name resolution is required for the following components:

  • The Kubernetes API

  • The OpenShift Container Platform application wildcard

  • The bootstrap, control plane, and compute machines

Reverse DNS resolution is also required for the Kubernetes API, the bootstrap machine, the control plane machines, and the compute machines.

DNS A/AAAA or CNAME records are used for name resolution and PTR records are used for reverse name resolution. The reverse records are important because Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) uses the reverse records to set the hostnames for all the nodes, unless the hostnames are provided by DHCP. Additionally, the reverse records are used to generate the certificate signing requests (CSR) that OpenShift Container Platform needs to operate.

It is recommended to use a DHCP server to provide the hostnames to each cluster node. See the DHCP recommendations for user-provisioned infrastructure section for more information.

The following DNS records are required for a user-provisioned OpenShift Container Platform cluster and they must be in place before installation. In each record, <cluster_name> is the cluster name and <base_domain> is the base domain that you specify in the install-config.yaml file. A complete DNS record takes the form: <component>.<cluster_name>.<base_domain>..

Table 8. Required DNS records
Component Record Description

Kubernetes API

api.<cluster_name>.<base_domain>.

A DNS A/AAAA or CNAME record, and a DNS PTR record, to identify the API load balancer. These records must be resolvable by both clients external to the cluster and from all the nodes within the cluster.

api-int.<cluster_name>.<base_domain>.

A DNS A/AAAA or CNAME record, and a DNS PTR record, to internally identify the API load balancer. These records must be resolvable from all the nodes within the cluster.

The API server must be able to resolve the worker nodes by the hostnames that are recorded in Kubernetes. If the API server cannot resolve the node names, then proxied API calls can fail, and you cannot retrieve logs from pods.

Routes

*.apps.<cluster_name>.<base_domain>.

A wildcard DNS A/AAAA or CNAME record that refers to the application ingress load balancer. The application ingress load balancer targets the machines that run the Ingress Controller pods. The Ingress Controller pods run on the compute machines by default. These records must be resolvable by both clients external to the cluster and from all the nodes within the cluster.

For example, console-openshift-console.apps.<cluster_name>.<base_domain> is used as a wildcard route to the OpenShift Container Platform console.

Bootstrap machine

bootstrap.<cluster_name>.<base_domain>.

A DNS A/AAAA or CNAME record, and a DNS PTR record, to identify the bootstrap machine. These records must be resolvable by the nodes within the cluster.

Control plane machines

<master><n>.<cluster_name>.<base_domain>.

DNS A/AAAA or CNAME records and DNS PTR records to identify each machine for the control plane nodes. These records must be resolvable by the nodes within the cluster.

Compute machines

<worker><n>.<cluster_name>.<base_domain>.

DNS A/AAAA or CNAME records and DNS PTR records to identify each machine for the worker nodes. These records must be resolvable by the nodes within the cluster.

In OpenShift Container Platform 4.4 and later, you do not need to specify etcd host and SRV records in your DNS configuration.

You can use the dig command to verify name and reverse name resolution. See the section on Validating DNS resolution for user-provisioned infrastructure for detailed validation steps.

Example DNS configuration for user-provisioned clusters

This section provides A and PTR record configuration samples that meet the DNS requirements for deploying OpenShift Container Platform on user-provisioned infrastructure. The samples are not meant to provide advice for choosing one DNS solution over another.

In the examples, the cluster name is ocp4 and the base domain is example.com.

Example DNS A record configuration for a user-provisioned cluster

The following example is a BIND zone file that shows sample A records for name resolution in a user-provisioned cluster.

Sample DNS zone database 
$TTL 1W
@	IN	SOA	ns1.example.com.	root (
			2019070700	; serial
			3H		; refresh (3 hours)
			30M		; retry (30 minutes)
			2W		; expiry (2 weeks)
			1W )		; minimum (1 week)
	IN	NS	ns1.example.com.
	IN	MX 10	smtp.example.com.
;
;
ns1.example.com.		IN	A	192.168.1.5
smtp.example.com.		IN	A	192.168.1.5
;
helper.example.com.		IN	A	192.168.1.5
helper.ocp4.example.com.	IN	A	192.168.1.5
;
api.ocp4.example.com.		IN	A	192.168.1.5 (1)
api-int.ocp4.example.com.	IN	A	192.168.1.5 (2)
;
*.apps.ocp4.example.com.	IN	A	192.168.1.5 (3)
;
bootstrap.ocp4.example.com.	IN	A	192.168.1.96 (4)
;
master0.ocp4.example.com.	IN	A	192.168.1.97 (5)
master1.ocp4.example.com.	IN	A	192.168.1.98 (5)
master2.ocp4.example.com.	IN	A	192.168.1.99 (5)
;
worker0.ocp4.example.com.	IN	A	192.168.1.11 (6)
worker1.ocp4.example.com.	IN	A	192.168.1.7 (6)
;
;EOF
1 Provides name resolution for the Kubernetes API. The record refers to the IP address of the API load balancer.
2 Provides name resolution for the Kubernetes API. The record refers to the IP address of the API load balancer and is used for internal cluster communications.
3 Provides name resolution for the wildcard routes. The record refers to the IP address of the application ingress load balancer. The application ingress load balancer targets the machines that run the Ingress Controller pods. The Ingress Controller pods run on the compute machines by default.

In the example, the same load balancer is used for the Kubernetes API and application ingress traffic. In production scenarios, you can deploy the API and application ingress load balancers separately so that you can scale the load balancer infrastructure for each in isolation.
4 Provides name resolution for the bootstrap machine.
5 Provides name resolution for the control plane machines.
6 Provides name resolution for the compute machines.
Example DNS PTR record configuration for a user-provisioned cluster

The following example BIND zone file shows sample PTR records for reverse name resolution in a user-provisioned cluster.

Sample DNS zone database for reverse records 
$TTL 1W
@	IN	SOA	ns1.example.com.	root (
			2019070700	; serial
			3H		; refresh (3 hours)
			30M		; retry (30 minutes)
			2W		; expiry (2 weeks)
			1W )		; minimum (1 week)
	IN	NS	ns1.example.com.
;
5.1.168.192.in-addr.arpa.	IN	PTR	api.ocp4.example.com. (1)
5.1.168.192.in-addr.arpa.	IN	PTR	api-int.ocp4.example.com. (2)
;
96.1.168.192.in-addr.arpa.	IN	PTR	bootstrap.ocp4.example.com. (3)
;
97.1.168.192.in-addr.arpa.	IN	PTR	master0.ocp4.example.com. (4)
98.1.168.192.in-addr.arpa.	IN	PTR	master1.ocp4.example.com. (4)
99.1.168.192.in-addr.arpa.	IN	PTR	master2.ocp4.example.com. (4)
;
11.1.168.192.in-addr.arpa.	IN	PTR	worker0.ocp4.example.com. (5)
7.1.168.192.in-addr.arpa.	IN	PTR	worker1.ocp4.example.com. (5)
;
;EOF
1 Provides reverse DNS resolution for the Kubernetes API. The PTR record refers to the record name of the API load balancer.
2 Provides reverse DNS resolution for the Kubernetes API. The PTR record refers to the record name of the API load balancer and is used for internal cluster communications.
3 Provides reverse DNS resolution for the bootstrap machine.
4 Provides reverse DNS resolution for the control plane machines.
5 Provides reverse DNS resolution for the compute machines.

A PTR record is not required for the OpenShift Container Platform application wildcard.

Load balancing requirements for user-provisioned infrastructure

Before you install OpenShift Container Platform, you must provision the API and application ingress load balancing infrastructure. In production scenarios, you can deploy the API and application ingress load balancers separately so that you can scale the load balancer infrastructure for each in isolation.

If you want to deploy the API and application Ingress load balancers with a Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) instance, you must purchase the RHEL subscription separately.

The load balancing infrastructure must meet the following requirements:

  1. API load balancer: Provides a common endpoint for users, both human and machine, to interact with and configure the platform. Configure the following conditions:

    • Layer 4 load balancing only. This can be referred to as Raw TCP, SSL Passthrough, or SSL Bridge mode. If you use SSL Bridge mode, you must enable Server Name Indication (SNI) for the API routes.

    • A stateless load balancing algorithm. The options vary based on the load balancer implementation.

    Do not configure session persistence for an API load balancer. Configuring session persistence for a Kubernetes API server might cause performance issues from excess application traffic for your OpenShift Container Platform cluster and the Kubernetes API that runs inside the cluster.

    Configure the following ports on both the front and back of the load balancers:

    Table 9. API load balancer
    Port Back-end machines (pool members) Internal External Description

    6443

    Bootstrap and control plane. You remove the bootstrap machine from the load balancer after the bootstrap machine initializes the cluster control plane. You must configure the /readyz endpoint for the API server health check probe.

    X

    X

    Kubernetes API server

    22623

    Bootstrap and control plane. You remove the bootstrap machine from the load balancer after the bootstrap machine initializes the cluster control plane.

    X

    Machine config server

    The load balancer must be configured to take a maximum of 30 seconds from the time the API server turns off the /readyz endpoint to the removal of the API server instance from the pool. Within the time frame after /readyz returns an error or becomes healthy, the endpoint must have been removed or added. Probing every 5 or 10 seconds, with two successful requests to become healthy and three to become unhealthy, are well-tested values.

  2. Application Ingress load balancer: Provides an ingress point for application traffic flowing in from outside the cluster. A working configuration for the Ingress router is required for an OpenShift Container Platform cluster.

    Configure the following conditions:

    • Layer 4 load balancing only. This can be referred to as Raw TCP, SSL Passthrough, or SSL Bridge mode. If you use SSL Bridge mode, you must enable Server Name Indication (SNI) for the ingress routes.

    • A connection-based or session-based persistence is recommended, based on the options available and types of applications that will be hosted on the platform.

    If the true IP address of the client can be seen by the application Ingress load balancer, enabling source IP-based session persistence can improve performance for applications that use end-to-end TLS encryption.

    Configure the following ports on both the front and back of the load balancers:

    Table 10. Application Ingress load balancer
    Port Back-end machines (pool members) Internal External Description

    443

    The machines that run the Ingress Controller pods, compute, or worker, by default.

    X

    X

    HTTPS traffic

    80

    The machines that run the Ingress Controller pods, compute, or worker, by default.

    X

    X

    HTTP traffic

    If you are deploying a three-node cluster with zero compute nodes, the Ingress Controller pods run on the control plane nodes. In three-node cluster deployments, you must configure your application Ingress load balancer to route HTTP and HTTPS traffic to the control plane nodes.

Example load balancer configuration for user-provisioned clusters

This section provides an example API and application ingress load balancer configuration that meets the load balancing requirements for user-provisioned clusters. The sample is an /etc/haproxy/haproxy.cfg configuration for an HAProxy load balancer. The example is not meant to provide advice for choosing one load balancing solution over another.

In the example, the same load balancer is used for the Kubernetes API and application ingress traffic. In production scenarios, you can deploy the API and application ingress load balancers separately so that you can scale the load balancer infrastructure for each in isolation.

If you are using HAProxy as a load balancer and SELinux is set to enforcing, you must ensure that the HAProxy service can bind to the configured TCP port by running setsebool -P haproxy_connect_any=1.
Sample API and application Ingress load balancer configuration 
global
  log         127.0.0.1 local2
  pidfile     /var/run/haproxy.pid
  maxconn     4000
  daemon
defaults
  mode                    http
  log                     global
  option                  dontlognull
  option http-server-close
  option                  redispatch
  retries                 3
  timeout http-request    10s
  timeout queue           1m
  timeout connect         10s
  timeout client          1m
  timeout server          1m
  timeout http-keep-alive 10s
  timeout check           10s
  maxconn                 3000
listen api-server-6443 (1)
  bind *:6443
  mode tcp
  server bootstrap bootstrap.ocp4.example.com:6443 check inter 1s backup (2)
  server master0 master0.ocp4.example.com:6443 check inter 1s
  server master1 master1.ocp4.example.com:6443 check inter 1s
  server master2 master2.ocp4.example.com:6443 check inter 1s
listen machine-config-server-22623 (3)
  bind *:22623
  mode tcp
  server bootstrap bootstrap.ocp4.example.com:22623 check inter 1s backup (2)
  server master0 master0.ocp4.example.com:22623 check inter 1s
  server master1 master1.ocp4.example.com:22623 check inter 1s
  server master2 master2.ocp4.example.com:22623 check inter 1s
listen ingress-router-443 (4)
  bind *:443
  mode tcp
  balance source
  server worker0 worker0.ocp4.example.com:443 check inter 1s
  server worker1 worker1.ocp4.example.com:443 check inter 1s
listen ingress-router-80 (5)
  bind *:80
  mode tcp
  balance source
  server worker0 worker0.ocp4.example.com:80 check inter 1s
  server worker1 worker1.ocp4.example.com:80 check inter 1s
1 Port 6443 handles the Kubernetes API traffic and points to the control plane machines.
2 The bootstrap entries must be in place before the OpenShift Container Platform cluster installation and they must be removed after the bootstrap process is complete.
3 Port 22623 handles the machine config server traffic and points to the control plane machines.
4 Port 443 handles the HTTPS traffic and points to the machines that run the Ingress Controller pods. The Ingress Controller pods run on the compute machines by default.
5 Port 80 handles the HTTP traffic and points to the machines that run the Ingress Controller pods. The Ingress Controller pods run on the compute machines by default.

If you are deploying a three-node cluster with zero compute nodes, the Ingress Controller pods run on the control plane nodes. In three-node cluster deployments, you must configure your application Ingress load balancer to route HTTP and HTTPS traffic to the control plane nodes.

If you are using HAProxy as a load balancer, you can check that the haproxy process is listening on ports 6443, 22623, 443, and 80 by running netstat -nltupe on the HAProxy node.

Preparing the user-provisioned infrastructure

Before you install OpenShift Container Platform on user-provisioned infrastructure, you must prepare the underlying infrastructure.

This section provides details about the high-level steps required to set up your cluster infrastructure in preparation for an OpenShift Container Platform installation. This includes configuring IP networking and network connectivity for your cluster nodes, enabling the required ports through your firewall, and setting up the required DNS and load balancing infrastructure.

After preparation, your cluster infrastructure must meet the requirements outlined in the Requirements for a cluster with user-provisioned infrastructure section.

Prerequisites
Procedure

  1. If you are using DHCP to provide the IP networking configuration to your cluster nodes, configure your DHCP service.

    1. Add persistent IP addresses for the nodes to your DHCP server configuration. In your configuration, match the MAC address of the relevant network interface to the intended IP address for each node.

    2. When you use DHCP to configure IP addressing for the cluster machines, the machines also obtain the DNS server information through DHCP. Define the persistent DNS server address that is used by the cluster nodes through your DHCP server configuration.

      If you are not using a DHCP service, you must provide the IP networking configuration and the address of the DNS server to the nodes at RHCOS install time. These can be passed as boot arguments if you are installing from an ISO image. See the Installing RHCOS and starting the OpenShift Container Platform bootstrap process section for more information about static IP provisioning and advanced networking options.

    3. Define the hostnames of your cluster nodes in your DHCP server configuration. See the Setting the cluster node hostnames through DHCP section for details about hostname considerations.

      If you are not using a DHCP service, the cluster nodes obtain their hostname through a reverse DNS lookup.

  2. Ensure that your network infrastructure provides the required network connectivity between the cluster components. See the Networking requirements for user-provisioned infrastructure section for details about the requirements.

  3. Configure your firewall to enable the ports required for the OpenShift Container Platform cluster components to communicate. See Networking requirements for user-provisioned infrastructure section for details about the ports that are required.

    By default, port 1936 is accessible for an OpenShift Container Platform cluster, because each control plane node needs access to this port.

    Avoid using the Ingress load balancer to expose this port, because doing so might result in the exposure of sensitive information, such as statistics and metrics, related to Ingress Controllers.

  4. Setup the required DNS infrastructure for your cluster.

    1. Configure DNS name resolution for the Kubernetes API, the application wildcard, the bootstrap machine, the control plane machines, and the compute machines.

    2. Configure reverse DNS resolution for the Kubernetes API, the bootstrap machine, the control plane machines, and the compute machines.

      See the User-provisioned DNS requirements section for more information about the OpenShift Container Platform DNS requirements.

  5. Validate your DNS configuration.

    1. From your installation node, run DNS lookups against the record names of the Kubernetes API, the wildcard routes, and the cluster nodes. Validate that the IP addresses in the responses correspond to the correct components.

    2. From your installation node, run reverse DNS lookups against the IP addresses of the load balancer and the cluster nodes. Validate that the record names in the responses correspond to the correct components.

      See the Validating DNS resolution for user-provisioned infrastructure section for detailed DNS validation steps.

  6. Provision the required API and application ingress load balancing infrastructure. See the Load balancing requirements for user-provisioned infrastructure section for more information about the requirements.

Some load balancing solutions require the DNS name resolution for the cluster nodes to be in place before the load balancing is initialized.

Validating DNS resolution for user-provisioned infrastructure

You can validate your DNS configuration before installing OpenShift Container Platform on user-provisioned infrastructure.

The validation steps detailed in this section must succeed before you install your cluster.
Prerequisites

  • You have configured the required DNS records for your user-provisioned infrastructure.

Procedure

  1. From your installation node, run DNS lookups against the record names of the Kubernetes API, the wildcard routes, and the cluster nodes. Validate that the IP addresses contained in the responses correspond to the correct components.

    1. Perform a lookup against the Kubernetes API record name. Check that the result points to the IP address of the API load balancer:

      $ dig +noall +answer @<nameserver_ip> api.<cluster_name>.<base_domain> (1)
      1 Replace <nameserver_ip> with the IP address of the nameserver, <cluster_name> with your cluster name, and <base_domain> with your base domain name.
      Example output
      api.ocp4.example.com.		0	IN	A	192.168.1.5

    2. Perform a lookup against the Kubernetes internal API record name. Check that the result points to the IP address of the API load balancer:

      $ dig +noall +answer @<nameserver_ip> api-int.<cluster_name>.<base_domain>
      Example output
      api-int.ocp4.example.com.		0	IN	A	192.168.1.5

    3. Test an example *.apps.<cluster_name>.<base_domain> DNS wildcard lookup. All of the application wildcard lookups must resolve to the IP address of the application ingress load balancer:

      $ dig +noall +answer @<nameserver_ip> random.apps.<cluster_name>.<base_domain>
      Example output
      random.apps.ocp4.example.com.		0	IN	A	192.168.1.5

      In the example outputs, the same load balancer is used for the Kubernetes API and application ingress traffic. In production scenarios, you can deploy the API and application ingress load balancers separately so that you can scale the load balancer infrastructure for each in isolation.

      You can replace random with another wildcard value. For example, you can query the route to the OpenShift Container Platform console:

      $ dig +noall +answer @<nameserver_ip> console-openshift-console.apps.<cluster_name>.<base_domain>
      Example output
      console-openshift-console.apps.ocp4.example.com. 0 IN	A 192.168.1.5

    4. Run a lookup against the bootstrap DNS record name. Check that the result points to the IP address of the bootstrap node:

      $ dig +noall +answer @<nameserver_ip> bootstrap.<cluster_name>.<base_domain>
      Example output
      bootstrap.ocp4.example.com.		0	IN	A	192.168.1.96

    5. Use this method to perform lookups against the DNS record names for the control plane and compute nodes. Check that the results correspond to the IP addresses of each node.

  2. From your installation node, run reverse DNS lookups against the IP addresses of the load balancer and the cluster nodes. Validate that the record names contained in the responses correspond to the correct components.

    1. Perform a reverse lookup against the IP address of the API load balancer. Check that the response includes the record names for the Kubernetes API and the Kubernetes internal API:

      $ dig +noall +answer @<nameserver_ip> -x 192.168.1.5
      Example output
      5.1.168.192.in-addr.arpa. 0	IN	PTR	api-int.ocp4.example.com. (1)
5.1.168.192.in-addr.arpa. 0	IN	PTR	api.ocp4.example.com. (2)
      1 Provides the record name for the Kubernetes internal API.
      2 Provides the record name for the Kubernetes API.

      A PTR record is not required for the OpenShift Container Platform application wildcard. No validation step is needed for reverse DNS resolution against the IP address of the application ingress load balancer.

    2. Perform a reverse lookup against the IP address of the bootstrap node. Check that the result points to the DNS record name of the bootstrap node:

      $ dig +noall +answer @<nameserver_ip> -x 192.168.1.96
      Example output
      96.1.168.192.in-addr.arpa. 0	IN	PTR	bootstrap.ocp4.example.com.

    3. Use this method to perform reverse lookups against the IP addresses for the control plane and compute nodes. Check that the results correspond to the DNS record names of each node.

Generating a key pair for cluster node SSH access

During an OpenShift Container Platform installation, you can provide an SSH public key to the installation program. The key is passed to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) nodes through their Ignition config files and is used to authenticate SSH access to the nodes. The key is added to the ~/.ssh/authorized_keys list for the core user on each node, which enables password-less authentication.

After the key is passed to the nodes, you can use the key pair to SSH in to the RHCOS nodes as the user core. To access the nodes through SSH, the private key identity must be managed by SSH for your local user.

If you want to SSH in to your cluster nodes to perform installation debugging or disaster recovery, you must provide the SSH public key during the installation process. The ./openshift-install gather command also requires the SSH public key to be in place on the cluster nodes.

Do not skip this procedure in production environments, where disaster recovery and debugging is required.

You must use a local key, not one that you configured with platform-specific approaches such as AWS key pairs.
Procedure

  1. If you do not have an existing SSH key pair on your local machine to use for authentication onto your cluster nodes, create one. For example, on a computer that uses a Linux operating system, run the following command:

    $ ssh-keygen -t ed25519 -N '' -f <path>/<file_name> (1)
    1 Specify the path and file name, such as ~/.ssh/id_ed25519, of the new SSH key. If you have an existing key pair, ensure your public key is in the your ~/.ssh directory.

    If you plan to install an OpenShift Container Platform cluster that uses FIPS validated or Modules In Process cryptographic libraries on the x86_64 architecture, do not create a key that uses the ed25519 algorithm. Instead, create a key that uses the rsa or ecdsa algorithm.

  2. View the public SSH key:

    $ cat <path>/<file_name>.pub

    For example, run the following to view the ~/.ssh/id_ed25519.pub public key:

    $ cat ~/.ssh/id_ed25519.pub

  3. Add the SSH private key identity to the SSH agent for your local user, if it has not already been added. SSH agent management of the key is required for password-less SSH authentication onto your cluster nodes, or if you want to use the ./openshift-install gather command.

    On some distributions, default SSH private key identities such as ~/.ssh/id_rsa and ~/.ssh/id_dsa are managed automatically.

    1. If the ssh-agent process is not already running for your local user, start it as a background task:

      $ eval "$(ssh-agent -s)"
      Example output
      Agent pid 31874

      If your cluster is in FIPS mode, only use FIPS-compliant algorithms to generate the SSH key. The key must be either RSA or ECDSA.

  4. Add your SSH private key to the ssh-agent:

    $ ssh-add <path>/<file_name> (1)
    1 Specify the path and file name for your SSH private key, such as ~/.ssh/id_ed25519
    Example output
    Identity added: /home/<you>/<path>/<file_name> (<computer_name>)
Next steps

  • When you install OpenShift Container Platform, provide the SSH public key to the installation program.

Obtaining the installation program

Before you install OpenShift Container Platform, download the installation file on a local computer.

Prerequisites

  • You have a computer that runs Linux or macOS, with 500 MB of local disk space

Procedure

  1. Access the Infrastructure Provider page on the OpenShift Cluster Manager site. If you have a Red Hat account, log in with your credentials. If you do not, create an account.

  2. Select your infrastructure provider.

  3. Navigate to the page for your installation type, download the installation program that corresponds with your host operating system and architecture, and place the file in the directory where you will store the installation configuration files.

    The installation program creates several files on the computer that you use to install your cluster. You must keep the installation program and the files that the installation program creates after you finish installing the cluster. Both files are required to delete the cluster.

    Deleting the files created by the installation program does not remove your cluster, even if the cluster failed during installation. To remove your cluster, complete the OpenShift Container Platform uninstallation procedures for your specific cloud provider.

  4. Extract the installation program. For example, on a computer that uses a Linux operating system, run the following command:

    $ tar -xvf openshift-install-linux.tar.gz

  5. Download your installation pull secret from the Red Hat OpenShift Cluster Manager. This pull secret allows you to authenticate with the services that are provided by the included authorities, including Quay.io, which serves the container images for OpenShift Container Platform components.

Manually creating the installation configuration file

For user-provisioned installations of OpenShift Container Platform, you manually generate your installation configuration file.

Prerequisites

  • You have an SSH public key on your local machine to provide to the installation program. The key will be used for SSH authentication onto your cluster nodes for debugging and disaster recovery.

  • You have obtained the OpenShift Container Platform installation program and the pull secret for your cluster.

Procedure

  1. Create an installation directory to store your required installation assets in:

    $ mkdir <installation_directory>

    You must create a directory. Some installation assets, like bootstrap X.509 certificates have short expiration intervals, so you must not reuse an installation directory. If you want to reuse individual files from another cluster installation, you can copy them into your directory. However, the file names for the installation assets might change between releases. Use caution when copying installation files from an earlier OpenShift Container Platform version.

  2. Customize the sample install-config.yaml file template that is provided and save it in the <installation_directory>.

    You must name this configuration file install-config.yaml.

    For some platform types, you can alternatively run ./openshift-install create install-config --dir <installation_directory> to generate an install-config.yaml file. You can provide details about your cluster configuration at the prompts.

  3. Back up the install-config.yaml file so that you can use it to install multiple clusters.

    The install-config.yaml file is consumed during the next step of the installation process. You must back it up now.

Sample install-config.yaml file for VMware vSphere

You can customize the install-config.yaml file to specify more details about your OpenShift Container Platform cluster’s platform or modify the values of the required parameters.

apiVersion: v1
baseDomain: example.com (1)
compute: (2)
- hyperthreading: Enabled (3)
  name: worker
  replicas: 0 (4)
controlPlane: (2)
  hyperthreading: Enabled (3)
  name: master
  replicas: 3 (5)
metadata:
  name: test (6)
platform:
  vsphere:
    vcenter: your.vcenter.server (7)
    username: username (8)
    password: password (9)
    datacenter: datacenter (10)
    defaultDatastore: datastore (11)
    folder: "/<datacenter_name>/vm/<folder_name>/<subfolder_name>" (12)
    resourcePool: "/<datacenter_name>/host/<cluster_name>/Resources/<resource_pool_name>" (13)
    diskType: thin (14)
fips: false (15)
pullSecret: '{"auths": ...}' (16)
sshKey: 'ssh-ed25519 AAAA...' (17)
1 The base domain of the cluster. All DNS records must be sub-domains of this base and include the cluster name.
2 The controlPlane section is a single mapping, but the compute section is a sequence of mappings. To meet the requirements of the different data structures, the first line of the compute section must begin with a hyphen, -, and the first line of the controlPlane section must not. Although both sections currently define a single machine pool, it is possible that future versions of OpenShift Container Platform will support defining multiple compute pools during installation. Only one control plane pool is used.
3 Whether to enable or disable simultaneous multithreading, or hyperthreading. By default, simultaneous multithreading is enabled to increase the performance of your machines' cores. You can disable it by setting the parameter value to Disabled. If you disable simultaneous multithreading in some cluster machines, you must disable it in all cluster machines.

If you disable simultaneous multithreading, ensure that your capacity planning accounts for the dramatically decreased machine performance. Your machines must use at least 8 CPUs and 32 GB of RAM if you disable simultaneous multithreading.
4 You must set the value of the replicas parameter to 0. This parameter controls the number of workers that the cluster creates and manages for you, which are functions that the cluster does not perform when you use user-provisioned infrastructure. You must manually deploy worker machines for the cluster to use before you finish installing OpenShift Container Platform.
5 The number of control plane machines that you add to the cluster. Because the cluster uses this values as the number of etcd endpoints in the cluster, the value must match the number of control plane machines that you deploy.
6 The cluster name that you specified in your DNS records.
7 The fully-qualified hostname or IP address of the vCenter server.
8 The name of the user for accessing the server. This user must have at least the roles and privileges that are required for static or dynamic persistent volume provisioning in vSphere.
9 The password associated with the vSphere user.
10 The vSphere datacenter.
11 The default vSphere datastore to use.
12 Optional parameter: For installer-provisioned infrastructure, the absolute path of an existing folder where the installation program creates the virtual machines, for example, /<datacenter_name>/vm/<folder_name>/<subfolder_name>. If you do not provide this value, the installation program creates a top-level folder in the datacenter virtual machine folder that is named with the infrastructure ID. If you are providing the infrastructure for the cluster and you do not want to use the default StorageClass object, named thin, you can omit the folder parameter from the install-config.yaml file.
13 Optional parameter: For installer-provisioned infrastructure, the absolute path of an existing resource pool where the installation program creates the virtual machines, for example, /<datacenter_name>/host/<cluster_name>/Resources/<resource_pool_name>/<optional_nested_resource_pool_name>. If you do not specify a value, resources are installed in the root of the cluster /example_datacenter/host/example_cluster/Resources.
14 The vSphere disk provisioning method.
15 Whether to enable or disable FIPS mode. By default, FIPS mode is not enabled. If FIPS mode is enabled, the Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) machines that OpenShift Container Platform runs on bypass the default Kubernetes cryptography suite and use the cryptography modules that are provided with RHCOS instead.

To enable FIPS mode for your cluster, you must run the installation program from a Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) computer configured to operate in FIPS mode. For more information about configuring FIPS mode on RHEL, see Installing the system in FIPS mode. The use of FIPS validated or Modules In Process cryptographic libraries is only supported on OpenShift Container Platform deployments on the x86_64 architecture.
16 The pull secret that you obtained from OpenShift Cluster Manager. This pull secret allows you to authenticate with the services that are provided by the included authorities, including Quay.io, which serves the container images for OpenShift Container Platform components.
17 The public portion of the default SSH key for the core user in Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS).

Configuring the cluster-wide proxy during installation

Production environments can deny direct access to the internet and instead have an HTTP or HTTPS proxy available. You can configure a new OpenShift Container Platform cluster to use a proxy by configuring the proxy settings in the install-config.yaml file.

Prerequisites

  • You have an existing install-config.yaml file.

  • You reviewed the sites that your cluster requires access to and determined whether any of them need to bypass the proxy. By default, all cluster egress traffic is proxied, including calls to hosting cloud provider APIs. You added sites to the Proxy object’s spec.noProxy field to bypass the proxy if necessary.

    The Proxy object status.noProxy field is populated with the values of the networking.machineNetwork[].cidr, networking.clusterNetwork[].cidr, and networking.serviceNetwork[] fields from your installation configuration.

    For installations on Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud Platform (GCP), Microsoft Azure, and Red Hat OpenStack Platform (RHOSP), the Proxy object status.noProxy field is also populated with the instance metadata endpoint (169.254.169.254).
Procedure

  1. Edit your install-config.yaml file and add the proxy settings. For example:

    apiVersion: v1
baseDomain: my.domain.com
proxy:
  httpProxy: http://<username>:<pswd>@<ip>:<port> (1)
  httpsProxy: https://<username>:<pswd>@<ip>:<port> (2)
  noProxy: example.com (3)
additionalTrustBundle: | (4)
    -----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----
    <MY_TRUSTED_CA_CERT>
    -----END CERTIFICATE-----
...
    1 A proxy URL to use for creating HTTP connections outside the cluster. The URL scheme must be http.
    2 A proxy URL to use for creating HTTPS connections outside the cluster.
    3 A comma-separated list of destination domain names, IP addresses, or other network CIDRs to exclude from proxying. Preface a domain with . to match subdomains only. For example, .y.com matches x.y.com, but not y.com. Use * to bypass the proxy for all destinations. You must include vCenter’s IP address and the IP range that you use for its machines.
    4 If provided, the installation program generates a config map that is named user-ca-bundle in the openshift-config namespace that contains one or more additional CA certificates that are required for proxying HTTPS connections. The Cluster Network Operator then creates a trusted-ca-bundle config map that merges these contents with the Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) trust bundle, and this config map is referenced in the trustedCA field of the Proxy object. The additionalTrustBundle field is required unless the proxy’s identity certificate is signed by an authority from the RHCOS trust bundle.

    The installation program does not support the proxy readinessEndpoints field.

    If the installer times out, restart and then complete the deployment by using the wait-for command of the installer. For example:

    $ ./openshift-install wait-for install-complete --log-level debug

  2. Save the file and reference it when installing OpenShift Container Platform.

The installation program creates a cluster-wide proxy that is named cluster that uses the proxy settings in the provided install-config.yaml file. If no proxy settings are provided, a cluster Proxy object is still created, but it will have a nil spec.

Only the Proxy object named cluster is supported, and no additional proxies can be created.

Specifying advanced network configuration

You can use advanced network configuration for your cluster network provider to integrate your cluster into your existing network environment. You can specify advanced network configuration only before you install the cluster.

Customizing your network configuration by modifying the OpenShift Container Platform manifest files created by the installation program is not supported. Applying a manifest file that you create, as in the following procedure, is supported.
Prerequisites

  • You have created the install-config.yaml file and completed any modifications to it.

Procedure

  1. Change to the directory that contains the installation program and create the manifests:

    $ ./openshift-install create manifests --dir <installation_directory> (1)
    1 <installation_directory> specifies the name of the directory that contains the install-config.yaml file for your cluster.

  2. Create a stub manifest file for the advanced network configuration that is named cluster-network-03-config.yml in the <installation_directory>/manifests/ directory:

    apiVersion: operator.openshift.io/v1
kind: Network
metadata:
  name: cluster
spec:

  3. Specify the advanced network configuration for your cluster in the cluster-network-03-config.yml file, such as in the following examples:

    Specify a different VXLAN port for the OpenShift SDN network provider
    apiVersion: operator.openshift.io/v1
kind: Network
metadata:
  name: cluster
spec:
  defaultNetwork:
    openshiftSDNConfig:
      vxlanPort: 4800
    Enable IPsec for the OVN-Kubernetes network provider
    apiVersion: operator.openshift.io/v1
kind: Network
metadata:
  name: cluster
spec:
  defaultNetwork:
    ovnKubernetesConfig:
      ipsecConfig: {}

  4. Optional: Back up the manifests/cluster-network-03-config.yml file. The installation program consumes the manifests/ directory when you create the Ignition config files.

  5. Remove the Kubernetes manifest files that define the control plane machines and compute machineSets:

    $ rm -f openshift/99_openshift-cluster-api_master-machines-*.yaml openshift/99_openshift-cluster-api_worker-machineset-*.yaml

    Because you create and manage these resources yourself, you do not have to initialize them.

    • You can preserve the MachineSet files to create compute machines by using the machine API, but you must update references to them to match your environment.

Cluster Network Operator configuration

The configuration for the cluster network is specified as part of the Cluster Network Operator (CNO) configuration and stored in a custom resource (CR) object that is named cluster. The CR specifies the fields for the Network API in the operator.openshift.io API group.

The CNO configuration inherits the following fields during cluster installation from the Network API in the Network.config.openshift.io API group and these fields cannot be changed:

clusterNetwork

IP address pools from which pod IP addresses are allocated.

serviceNetwork

IP address pool for services.

defaultNetwork.type

Cluster network provider, such as OpenShift SDN or OVN-Kubernetes.

You can specify the cluster network provider configuration for your cluster by setting the fields for the defaultNetwork object in the CNO object named cluster.

Cluster Network Operator configuration object

The fields for the Cluster Network Operator (CNO) are described in the following table:

Table 11. Cluster Network Operator configuration object
Field Type Description

metadata.name

string

The name of the CNO object. This name is always cluster.

spec.clusterNetwork

array

A list specifying the blocks of IP addresses from which pod IP addresses are allocated and the subnet prefix length assigned to each individual node in the cluster. For example:

spec:
  clusterNetwork:
  - cidr: 10.128.0.0/19
    hostPrefix: 23
  - cidr: 10.128.32.0/19
    hostPrefix: 23

You can customize this field only in the install-config.yaml file before you create the manifests. The value is read-only in the manifest file.

spec.serviceNetwork

array

A block of IP addresses for services. The OpenShift SDN and OVN-Kubernetes Container Network Interface (CNI) network providers support only a single IP address block for the service network. For example:

spec:
  serviceNetwork:
  - 172.30.0.0/14

You can customize this field only in the install-config.yaml file before you create the manifests. The value is read-only in the manifest file.

spec.defaultNetwork

object

Configures the Container Network Interface (CNI) cluster network provider for the cluster network.

spec.kubeProxyConfig

object

The fields for this object specify the kube-proxy configuration. If you are using the OVN-Kubernetes cluster network provider, the kube-proxy configuration has no effect.

defaultNetwork object configuration

The values for the defaultNetwork object are defined in the following table:

Table 12. defaultNetwork object
Field Type Description

type

string

Either OpenShiftSDN or OVNKubernetes. The cluster network provider is selected during installation. This value cannot be changed after cluster installation.

OpenShift Container Platform uses the OpenShift SDN Container Network Interface (CNI) cluster network provider by default.

openshiftSDNConfig

object

This object is only valid for the OpenShift SDN cluster network provider.

ovnKubernetesConfig

object

This object is only valid for the OVN-Kubernetes cluster network provider.
Configuration for the OpenShift SDN CNI cluster network provider

The following table describes the configuration fields for the OpenShift SDN Container Network Interface (CNI) cluster network provider.

Table 13. openshiftSDNConfig object
Field Type Description

mode

string

Configures the network isolation mode for OpenShift SDN. The default value is NetworkPolicy.

The values Multitenant and Subnet are available for backwards compatibility with OpenShift Container Platform 3.x but are not recommended. This value cannot be changed after cluster installation.

mtu

integer

The maximum transmission unit (MTU) for the VXLAN overlay network. This is detected automatically based on the MTU of the primary network interface. You do not normally need to override the detected MTU.

If the auto-detected value is not what you expect it to be, confirm that the MTU on the primary network interface on your nodes is correct. You cannot use this option to change the MTU value of the primary network interface on the nodes.

If your cluster requires different MTU values for different nodes, you must set this value to 50 less than the lowest MTU value in your cluster. For example, if some nodes in your cluster have an MTU of 9001, and some have an MTU of 1500, you must set this value to 1450.

This value cannot be changed after cluster installation.

vxlanPort

integer

The port to use for all VXLAN packets. The default value is 4789. This value cannot be changed after cluster installation.

If you are running in a virtualized environment with existing nodes that are part of another VXLAN network, then you might be required to change this. For example, when running an OpenShift SDN overlay on top of VMware NSX-T, you must select an alternate port for the VXLAN, because both SDNs use the same default VXLAN port number.

On Amazon Web Services (AWS), you can select an alternate port for the VXLAN between port 9000 and port 9999.
Example OpenShift SDN configuration
defaultNetwork:
  type: OpenShiftSDN
  openshiftSDNConfig:
    mode: NetworkPolicy
    mtu: 1450
    vxlanPort: 4789
Configuration for the OVN-Kubernetes CNI cluster network provider

The following table describes the configuration fields for the OVN-Kubernetes CNI cluster network provider.

Table 14. ovnKubernetesConfig object
Field Type Description

mtu

integer

The maximum transmission unit (MTU) for the Geneve (Generic Network Virtualization Encapsulation) overlay network. This is detected automatically based on the MTU of the primary network interface. You do not normally need to override the detected MTU.

If the auto-detected value is not what you expect it to be, confirm that the MTU on the primary network interface on your nodes is correct. You cannot use this option to change the MTU value of the primary network interface on the nodes.

If your cluster requires different MTU values for different nodes, you must set this value to 100 less than the lowest MTU value in your cluster. For example, if some nodes in your cluster have an MTU of 9001, and some have an MTU of 1500, you must set this value to 1400.

genevePort

integer

The port to use for all Geneve packets. The default value is 6081. This value cannot be changed after cluster installation.

ipsecConfig

object

Specify an empty object to enable IPsec encryption. This value cannot be changed after cluster installation.

policyAuditConfig

object

Specify a configuration object for customizing network policy audit logging. If unset, the defaults audit log settings are used.

gatewayConfig

object

Optional: Specify a configuration object for customizing how egress traffic is sent to the node gateway.

While migrating egress traffic, you can expect some disruption to workloads and service traffic until the Cluster Network Operator (CNO) successfully rolls out the changes.
Table 15. policyAuditConfig object
Field Type Description

rateLimit

integer

The maximum number of messages to generate every second per node. The default value is 20 messages per second.

maxFileSize

integer

The maximum size for the audit log in bytes. The default value is 50000000 or 50 MB.

destination

string

One of the following additional audit log targets:

libc

The libc syslog() function of the journald process on the host.

udp:<host>:<port>

A syslog server. Replace <host>:<port> with the host and port of the syslog server.

unix:<file>

A Unix Domain Socket file specified by <file>.

null

Do not send the audit logs to any additional target.

syslogFacility

string

The syslog facility, such as kern, as defined by RFC5424. The default value is local0.
Table 16. gatewayConfig object
Field Type Description

routingViaHost

boolean

Set this field to true to send egress traffic from pods to the host networking stack. For highly-specialized installations and applications that rely on manually configured routes in the kernel routing table, you might want to route egress traffic to the host networking stack. By default, egress traffic is processed in OVN to exit the cluster and is not affected by specialized routes in the kernel routing table. The default value is false.

This field has an interaction with the Open vSwitch hardware offloading feature. If you set this field to true, you do not receive the performance benefits of the offloading because egress traffic is processed by the host networking stack.
Example OVN-Kubernetes configuration with IPSec enabled
defaultNetwork:
  type: OVNKubernetes
  ovnKubernetesConfig:
    mtu: 1400
    genevePort: 6081
    ipsecConfig: {}

kubeProxyConfig object configuration

The values for the kubeProxyConfig object are defined in the following table:

Table 17. kubeProxyConfig object
Field Type Description

iptablesSyncPeriod

string

The refresh period for iptables rules. The default value is 30s. Valid suffixes include s, m, and h and are described in the Go time package documentation.

Because of performance improvements introduced in OpenShift Container Platform 4.3 and greater, adjusting the iptablesSyncPeriod parameter is no longer necessary.

proxyArguments.iptables-min-sync-period

array

The minimum duration before refreshing iptables rules. This field ensures that the refresh does not happen too frequently. Valid suffixes include s, m, and h and are described in the Go time package. The default value is:

kubeProxyConfig:
  proxyArguments:
    iptables-min-sync-period:
    - 0s

Creating the Ignition config files

Because you must manually start the cluster machines, you must generate the Ignition config files that the cluster needs to make its machines.

  • The Ignition config files that the installation program generates contain certificates that expire after 24 hours, which are then renewed at that time. If the cluster is shut down before renewing the certificates and the cluster is later restarted after the 24 hours have elapsed, the cluster automatically recovers the expired certificates. The exception is that you must manually approve the pending node-bootstrapper certificate signing requests (CSRs) to recover kubelet certificates. See the documentation for Recovering from expired control plane certificates for more information.

  • It is recommended that you use Ignition config files within 12 hours after they are generated because the 24-hour certificate rotates from 16 to 22 hours after the cluster is installed. By using the Ignition config files within 12 hours, you can avoid installation failure if the certificate update runs during installation.
Prerequisites

  • Obtain the OpenShift Container Platform installation program and the pull secret for your cluster. For a restricted network installation, these files are on your mirror host.

Procedure

  • Obtain the Ignition config files:

    $ ./openshift-install create ignition-configs --dir <installation_directory> (1)
    1 For <installation_directory>, specify the directory name to store the files that the installation program creates.

    If you created an install-config.yaml file, specify the directory that contains it. Otherwise, specify an empty directory. Some installation assets, like bootstrap X.509 certificates have short expiration intervals, so you must not reuse an installation directory. If you want to reuse individual files from another cluster installation, you can copy them into your directory. However, the file names for the installation assets might change between releases. Use caution when copying installation files from an earlier OpenShift Container Platform version.

    The following files are generated in the directory:

    .
├── auth
│   ├── kubeadmin-password
│   └── kubeconfig
├── bootstrap.ign
├── master.ign
├── metadata.json
└── worker.ign

Extracting the infrastructure name

The Ignition config files contain a unique cluster identifier that you can use to uniquely identify your cluster in VMware Cloud on AWS. If you plan to use the cluster identifier as the name of your virtual machine folder, you must extract it.

Prerequisites

  • You obtained the OpenShift Container Platform installation program and the pull secret for your cluster.

  • You generated the Ignition config files for your cluster.

  • You installed the jq package.

Procedure

  • To extract and view the infrastructure name from the Ignition config file metadata, run the following command:

    $ jq -r .infraID <installation_directory>/metadata.json (1)
    1 For <installation_directory>, specify the path to the directory that you stored the installation files in.
    Example output
    openshift-vw9j6 (1)
    1 The output of this command is your cluster name and a random string.

Installing RHCOS and starting the OpenShift Container Platform bootstrap process

To install OpenShift Container Platform on user-provisioned infrastructure on VMware vSphere, you must install Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) on vSphere hosts. When you install RHCOS, you must provide the Ignition config file that was generated by the OpenShift Container Platform installation program for the type of machine you are installing. If you have configured suitable networking, DNS, and load balancing infrastructure, the OpenShift Container Platform bootstrap process begins automatically after the RHCOS machines have rebooted.

Prerequisites

  • You have obtained the Ignition config files for your cluster.

  • You have access to an HTTP server that you can access from your computer and that the machines that you create can access.

  • You have created a vSphere cluster.

Procedure

  1. Upload the bootstrap Ignition config file, which is named <installation_directory>/bootstrap.ign, that the installation program created to your HTTP server. Note the URL of this file.

  2. Save the following secondary Ignition config file for your bootstrap node to your computer as <installation_directory>/merge-bootstrap.ign:

    {
  "ignition": {
    "config": {
      "merge": [
        {
          "source": "<bootstrap_ignition_config_url>", (1)
          "verification": {}
        }
      ]
    },
    "timeouts": {},
    "version": "3.2.0"
  },
  "networkd": {},
  "passwd": {},
  "storage": {},
  "systemd": {}
}
    1 Specify the URL of the bootstrap Ignition config file that you hosted.

    When you create the virtual machine (VM) for the bootstrap machine, you use this Ignition config file.

  3. Locate the following Ignition config files that the installation program created:

    • <installation_directory>/master.ign

    • <installation_directory>/worker.ign

    • <installation_directory>/merge-bootstrap.ign

  4. Convert the Ignition config files to Base64 encoding. Later in this procedure, you must add these files to the extra configuration parameter guestinfo.ignition.config.data in your VM.

    For example, if you use a Linux operating system, you can use the base64 command to encode the files.

    $ base64 -w0 <installation_directory>/master.ign > <installation_directory>/master.64
    $ base64 -w0 <installation_directory>/worker.ign > <installation_directory>/worker.64
    $ base64 -w0 <installation_directory>/merge-bootstrap.ign > <installation_directory>/merge-bootstrap.64

    If you plan to add more compute machines to your cluster after you finish installation, do not delete these files.

  5. Obtain the RHCOS OVA image. Images are available from the RHCOS image mirror page.

    The RHCOS images might not change with every release of OpenShift Container Platform. You must download an image with the highest version that is less than or equal to the OpenShift Container Platform version that you install. Use the image version that matches your OpenShift Container Platform version if it is available.

    The filename contains the OpenShift Container Platform version number in the format rhcos-vmware.<architecture>.ova.

  6. In the vSphere Client, create a folder in your datacenter to store your VMs.

    1. Click the VMs and Templates view.

    2. Right-click the name of your datacenter.

    3. Click New Folder → New VM and Template Folder.

    4. In the window that is displayed, enter the folder name. If you did not specify an existing folder in the install-config.yaml file, then create a folder with the same name as the infrastructure ID. You use this folder name so vCenter dynamically provisions storage in the appropriate location for its Workspace configuration.

  7. In the vSphere Client, create a template for the OVA image and then clone the template as needed.

    In the following steps, you create a template and then clone the template for all of your cluster machines. You then provide the location for the Ignition config file for that cloned machine type when you provision the VMs.

    1. From the Hosts and Clusters tab, right-click your cluster name and select Deploy OVF Template.

    2. On the Select an OVF tab, specify the name of the RHCOS OVA file that you downloaded.

    3. On the Select a name and folder tab, set a Virtual machine name for your template, such as Template-RHCOS. Click the name of your vSphere cluster and select the folder you created in the previous step.

    4. On the Select a compute resource tab, click the name of your vSphere cluster.

    5. On the Select storage tab, configure the storage options for your VM.

      • Select Thin Provision or Thick Provision, based on your storage preferences.

      • Select the datastore that you specified in your install-config.yaml file.

    6. On the Select network tab, specify the network that you configured for the cluster, if available.

    7. When creating the OVF template, do not specify values on the Customize template tab or configure the template any further.

      Do not start the original VM template. The VM template must remain off and must be cloned for new RHCOS machines. Starting the VM template configures the VM template as a VM on the platform, which prevents it from being used as a template that machine sets can apply configurations to.

  8. Optional: Update the configured virtual hardware version in the VM template, if necessary. Follow Upgrading a virtual machine to the latest hardware version in the VMware documentation for more information.

    It is recommended that you update the hardware version of the VM template to version 15 before creating VMs from it, if necessary. Using hardware version 13 for your cluster nodes running on vSphere is now deprecated. If your imported template defaults to hardware version 13, you must ensure that your ESXi host is on 6.7U3 or later before upgrading the VM template to hardware version 15. If your vSphere version is less than 6.7U3, you can skip this upgrade step; however, a future version of OpenShift Container Platform is scheduled to remove support for hardware version 13 and vSphere versions less than 6.7U3.

  9. After the template deploys, deploy a VM for a machine in the cluster.

    1. Right-click the template name and click Clone → Clone to Virtual Machine.

    2. On the Select a name and folder tab, specify a name for the VM. You might include the machine type in the name, such as control-plane-0 or compute-1.

      Ensure that all virtual machine names across a vSphere installation are unique.

    3. On the Select a name and folder tab, select the name of the folder that you created for the cluster.

    4. On the Select a compute resource tab, select the name of a host in your datacenter.

    5. On the Select clone options, select Customize this virtual machine’s hardware.

    6. Optional: On the Customize hardware tab, click VM Options → Advanced.

      The following configuration suggestions are for example purposes only. As a cluster administrator, you must configure resources according to the resource demands placed on your cluster. To best manage cluster resources, consider creating a resource pool from the cluster’s root resource pool.

      • Override default DHCP networking in vSphere. To enable static IP networking:

        • Set your static IP configuration:

          $ export IPCFG="ip=<ip>::<gateway>:<netmask>:<hostname>:<iface>:none nameserver=srv1 [nameserver=srv2 [nameserver=srv3 [...]]]"
          Example command
          $ export IPCFG="ip=192.168.100.101::192.168.100.254:255.255.255.0:::none nameserver=8.8.8.8"

      • Click Edit Configuration, and on the Configuration Parameters window, search the list of available parameters for steal clock accounting (stealclock.enable). Set the parameter to the value of TRUE. Enabling steal clock accounting can help with troubleshooting cluster issues.

      • Click Add Configuration Params. Define the following parameter names and values:

        • disk.EnableUUID: Specify TRUE.

        • stealclock.enable: If this parameter was not defined, add it and specify TRUE.

        • Create a child resource pool from the cluster’s root resource pool. Perform resource allocation in this child resource pool.

    7. In the Virtual Hardware panel of the Customize hardware tab, modify the specified values as required. Ensure that the amount of RAM, CPU, and disk storage meets the minimum requirements for the machine type.

    8. Complete the configuration and power on the VM.

    9. Check the console output to verify that Ignition ran.

      Example command
      Ignition: ran on 2022/03/14 14:48:33 UTC (this boot)
Ignition: user-provided config was applied

  10. Create the rest of the machines for your cluster by following the preceding steps for each machine.

    You must create the bootstrap and control plane machines at this time. Because some pods are deployed on compute machines by default, also create at least two compute machines before you install the cluster.

Adding more compute machines to a cluster in vSphere

You can add more compute machines to a user-provisioned OpenShift Container Platform cluster on VMware vSphere.

Prerequisites

  • Obtain the base64-encoded Ignition file for your compute machines.

  • You have access to the vSphere template that you created for your cluster.

Procedure

  1. After the template deploys, deploy a VM for a machine in the cluster.

    1. Right-click the template’s name and click Clone → Clone to Virtual Machine.

    2. On the Select a name and folder tab, specify a name for the VM. You might include the machine type in the name, such as compute-1.

      Ensure that all virtual machine names across a vSphere installation are unique.

    3. On the Select a name and folder tab, select the name of the folder that you created for the cluster.

    4. On the Select a compute resource tab, select the name of a host in your datacenter.

    5. On the Select clone options, select Customize this virtual machine’s hardware.

    6. On the Customize hardware tab, click VM Options → Advanced.

      • Click Edit Configuration, and on the Configuration Parameters window, click Add Configuration Params. Define the following parameter names and values:

        • guestinfo.ignition.config.data: Paste the contents of the base64-encoded compute Ignition config file for this machine type.

        • guestinfo.ignition.config.data.encoding: Specify base64.

        • disk.EnableUUID: Specify TRUE.

    7. In the Virtual Hardware panel of the Customize hardware tab, modify the specified values as required. Ensure that the amount of RAM, CPU, and disk storage meets the minimum requirements for the machine type. Also, make sure to select the correct network under Add network adapter if there are multiple networks available.

    8. Complete the configuration and power on the VM.

  2. Continue to create more compute machines for your cluster.

Disk partitioning

In most cases, data partitions are originally created by installing RHCOS, rather than by installing another operating system. In such cases, the OpenShift Container Platform installer should be allowed to configure your disk partitions.

However, there are two cases where you might want to intervene to override the default partitioning when installing an OpenShift Container Platform node:

  • Create separate partitions: For greenfield installations on an empty disk, you might want to add separate storage to a partition. This is officially supported for making /var or a subdirectory of /var, such as /var/lib/etcd, a separate partition, but not both.

    For disk sizes larger than 100GB, and especially disk sizes larger than 1TB, create a separate /var partition. See "Creating a separate /var partition" and this Red Hat Knowledgebase article for more information.

    Kubernetes supports only two file system partitions. If you add more than one partition to the original configuration, Kubernetes cannot monitor all of them.

  • Retain existing partitions: For a brownfield installation where you are reinstalling OpenShift Container Platform on an existing node and want to retain data partitions installed from your previous operating system, there are both boot arguments and options to coreos-installer that allow you to retain existing data partitions.

Creating a separate /var partition

In general, disk partitioning for OpenShift Container Platform should be left to the installer. However, there are cases where you might want to create separate partitions in a part of the filesystem that you expect to grow.

OpenShift Container Platform supports the addition of a single partition to attach storage to either the /var partition or a subdirectory of /var. For example:

  • /var/lib/containers: Holds container-related content that can grow as more images and containers are added to a system.

  • /var/lib/etcd: Holds data that you might want to keep separate for purposes such as performance optimization of etcd storage.

  • /var: Holds data that you might want to keep separate for purposes such as auditing.

    For disk sizes larger than 100GB, and especially larger than 1TB, create a separate /var partition.

Storing the contents of a /var directory separately makes it easier to grow storage for those areas as needed and reinstall OpenShift Container Platform at a later date and keep that data intact. With this method, you will not have to pull all your containers again, nor will you have to copy massive log files when you update systems.

Because /var must be in place before a fresh installation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS), the following procedure sets up the separate /var partition by creating a machine config manifest that is inserted during the openshift-install preparation phases of an OpenShift Container Platform installation.

Procedure

  1. Create a directory to hold the OpenShift Container Platform installation files:

    $ mkdir $HOME/clusterconfig

  2. Run openshift-install to create a set of files in the manifest and openshift subdirectories. Answer the system questions as you are prompted:

    $ openshift-install create manifests --dir $HOME/clusterconfig
? SSH Public Key ...
$ ls $HOME/clusterconfig/openshift/
99_kubeadmin-password-secret.yaml
99_openshift-cluster-api_master-machines-0.yaml
99_openshift-cluster-api_master-machines-1.yaml
99_openshift-cluster-api_master-machines-2.yaml
...

  3. Create a Butane config that configures the additional partition. For example, name the file $HOME/clusterconfig/98-var-partition.bu, change the disk device name to the name of the storage device on the worker systems, and set the storage size as appropriate. This example places the /var directory on a separate partition:

    variant: openshift
version: 4.10.0
metadata:
  labels:
    machineconfiguration.openshift.io/role: worker
  name: 98-var-partition
storage:
  disks:
  - device: /dev/<device_name> (1)
    partitions:
    - label: var
      start_mib: <partition_start_offset> (2)
      size_mib: <partition_size> (3)
  filesystems:
    - device: /dev/disk/by-partlabel/var
      path: /var
      format: xfs
      mount_options: [defaults, prjquota] (4)
      with_mount_unit: true
    1 The storage device name of the disk that you want to partition.
    2 When adding a data partition to the boot disk, a minimum value of 25000 mebibytes is recommended. The root file system is automatically resized to fill all available space up to the specified offset. If no value is specified, or if the specified value is smaller than the recommended minimum, the resulting root file system will be too small, and future reinstalls of RHCOS might overwrite the beginning of the data partition.
    3 The size of the data partition in mebibytes.
    4 The prjquota mount option must be enabled for filesystems used for container storage.

    When creating a separate /var partition, you cannot use different instance types for worker nodes, if the different instance types do not have the same device name.

  4. Create a manifest from the Butane config and save it to the clusterconfig/openshift directory. For example, run the following command:

    $ butane $HOME/clusterconfig/98-var-partition.bu -o $HOME/clusterconfig/openshift/98-var-partition.yaml

  5. Run openshift-install again to create Ignition configs from a set of files in the manifest and openshift subdirectories:

    $ openshift-install create ignition-configs --dir $HOME/clusterconfig
$ ls $HOME/clusterconfig/
auth  bootstrap.ign  master.ign  metadata.json  worker.ign

Now you can use the Ignition config files as input to the vSphere installation procedures to install Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) systems.

Updating the bootloader using bootupd

To update the bootloader by using bootupd, you must either install bootupd on RHCOS machines manually or provide a machine config with the enabled systemd unit. Unlike grubby or other bootloader tools, bootupd does not manage kernel space configuration such as passing kernel arguments.

After you have installed bootupd, you can manage it remotely from the OpenShift Container Platform cluster.

It is recommended that you use bootupd only on bare metal or virtualized hypervisor installations, such as for protection against the BootHole vulnerability.
Manual install method

You can manually install bootupd by using the bootctl command-line tool.

  1. Inspect the system status:

    # bootupctl status
    Example output for x86_64
    Component EFI
  Installed: grub2-efi-x64-1:2.04-31.fc33.x86_64,shim-x64-15-8.x86_64
  Update: At latest version
    Example output for aarch64
    Component EFI
  Installed: grub2-efi-aa64-1:2.02-99.el8_4.1.aarch64,shim-aa64-15.4-2.el8_1.aarch64
  Update: At latest version

  1. RHCOS images created without bootupd installed on them require an explicit adoption phase.

    If the system status is Adoptable, perform the adoption:

    # bootupctl adopt-and-update
    Example output
    Updated: grub2-efi-x64-1:2.04-31.fc33.x86_64,shim-x64-15-8.x86_64

  2. If an update is available, apply the update so that the changes take effect on the next reboot:

    # bootupctl update
    Example output
    Updated: grub2-efi-x64-1:2.04-31.fc33.x86_64,shim-x64-15-8.x86_64
Machine config method

Another way to enable bootupd is by providing a machine config.

  • Provide a machine config file with the enabled systemd unit, as shown in the following example:

    Example output
      variant: rhcos
  version: 1.1.0
  systemd:
    units:
      - name: custom-bootupd-auto.service
        enabled: true
        contents: |
          [Unit]
          Description=Bootupd automatic update

          [Service]
          ExecStart=/usr/bin/bootupctl update
          RemainAfterExit=yes

          [Install]
          WantedBy=multi-user.target

Waiting for the bootstrap process to complete

The OpenShift Container Platform bootstrap process begins after the cluster nodes first boot into the persistent RHCOS environment that has been installed to disk. The configuration information provided through the Ignition config files is used to initialize the bootstrap process and install OpenShift Container Platform on the machines. You must wait for the bootstrap process to complete.

Prerequisites

  • You have created the Ignition config files for your cluster.

  • You have configured suitable network, DNS and load balancing infrastructure.

  • You have obtained the installation program and generated the Ignition config files for your cluster.

  • You installed RHCOS on your cluster machines and provided the Ignition config files that the OpenShift Container Platform installation program generated.

  • Your machines have direct internet access or have an HTTP or HTTPS proxy available.

Procedure

  1. Monitor the bootstrap process:

    $ ./openshift-install --dir <installation_directory> wait-for bootstrap-complete \ (1)
    --log-level=info (2)
    1 For <installation_directory>, specify the path to the directory that you stored the installation files in.
    2 To view different installation details, specify warn, debug, or error instead of info.
    Example output
    INFO Waiting up to 30m0s for the Kubernetes API at https://api.test.example.com:6443...
INFO API v1.23.0 up
INFO Waiting up to 30m0s for bootstrapping to complete...
INFO It is now safe to remove the bootstrap resources

    The command succeeds when the Kubernetes API server signals that it has been bootstrapped on the control plane machines.

  2. After bootstrap process is complete, remove the bootstrap machine from the load balancer.

    You must remove the bootstrap machine from the load balancer at this point. You can also remove or reformat the bootstrap machine itself.

Logging in to the cluster by using the CLI

You can log in to your cluster as a default system user by exporting the cluster kubeconfig file. The kubeconfig file contains information about the cluster that is used by the CLI to connect a client to the correct cluster and API server. The file is specific to a cluster and is created during OpenShift Container Platform installation.

Prerequisites

  • You deployed an OpenShift Container Platform cluster.

  • You installed the oc CLI.

Procedure

  1. Export the kubeadmin credentials:

    $ export KUBECONFIG=<installation_directory>/auth/kubeconfig (1)
    1 For <installation_directory>, specify the path to the directory that you stored the installation files in.

  2. Verify you can run oc commands successfully using the exported configuration:

    $ oc whoami
    Example output
    system:admin

Approving the certificate signing requests for your machines

When you add machines to a cluster, two pending certificate signing requests (CSRs) are generated for each machine that you added. You must confirm that these CSRs are approved or, if necessary, approve them yourself. The client requests must be approved first, followed by the server requests.

Prerequisites

  • You added machines to your cluster.

Procedure

  1. Confirm that the cluster recognizes the machines:

    $ oc get nodes
    Example output
    NAME      STATUS    ROLES   AGE  VERSION
master-0  Ready     master  63m  v1.23.0
master-1  Ready     master  63m  v1.23.0
master-2  Ready     master  64m  v1.23.0

    The output lists all of the machines that you created.

    The preceding output might not include the compute nodes, also known as worker nodes, until some CSRs are approved.

  2. Review the pending CSRs and ensure that you see the client requests with the Pending or Approved status for each machine that you added to the cluster:

    $ oc get csr
    Example output
    NAME        AGE     REQUESTOR                                                                   CONDITION
csr-8b2br   15m     system:serviceaccount:openshift-machine-config-operator:node-bootstrapper   Pending
csr-8vnps   15m     system:serviceaccount:openshift-machine-config-operator:node-bootstrapper   Pending
...

    In this example, two machines are joining the cluster. You might see more approved CSRs in the list.

  3. If the CSRs were not approved, after all of the pending CSRs for the machines you added are in Pending status, approve the CSRs for your cluster machines:

    Because the CSRs rotate automatically, approve your CSRs within an hour of adding the machines to the cluster. If you do not approve them within an hour, the certificates will rotate, and more than two certificates will be present for each node. You must approve all of these certificates. After the client CSR is approved, the Kubelet creates a secondary CSR for the serving certificate, which requires manual approval. Then, subsequent serving certificate renewal requests are automatically approved by the machine-approver if the Kubelet requests a new certificate with identical parameters.

    For clusters running on platforms that are not machine API enabled, such as bare metal and other user-provisioned infrastructure, you must implement a method of automatically approving the kubelet serving certificate requests (CSRs). If a request is not approved, then the oc exec, oc rsh, and oc logs commands cannot succeed, because a serving certificate is required when the API server connects to the kubelet. Any operation that contacts the Kubelet endpoint requires this certificate approval to be in place. The method must watch for new CSRs, confirm that the CSR was submitted by the node-bootstrapper service account in the system:node or system:admin groups, and confirm the identity of the node.

    • To approve them individually, run the following command for each valid CSR:

      $ oc adm certificate approve <csr_name> (1)
      1 <csr_name> is the name of a CSR from the list of current CSRs.

    • To approve all pending CSRs, run the following command:

      $ oc get csr -o go-template='{{range .items}}{{if not .status}}{{.metadata.name}}{{"\n"}}{{end}}{{end}}' | xargs --no-run-if-empty oc adm certificate approve

      Some Operators might not become available until some CSRs are approved.

  4. Now that your client requests are approved, you must review the server requests for each machine that you added to the cluster:

    $ oc get csr
    Example output
    NAME        AGE     REQUESTOR                                                                   CONDITION
csr-bfd72   5m26s   system:node:ip-10-0-50-126.us-east-2.compute.internal                       Pending
csr-c57lv   5m26s   system:node:ip-10-0-95-157.us-east-2.compute.internal                       Pending
...

  5. If the remaining CSRs are not approved, and are in the Pending status, approve the CSRs for your cluster machines:

    • To approve them individually, run the following command for each valid CSR:

      $ oc adm certificate approve <csr_name> (1)
      1 <csr_name> is the name of a CSR from the list of current CSRs.

    • To approve all pending CSRs, run the following command:

      $ oc get csr -o go-template='{{range .items}}{{if not .status}}{{.metadata.name}}{{"\n"}}{{end}}{{end}}' | xargs oc adm certificate approve

  6. After all client and server CSRs have been approved, the machines have the Ready status. Verify this by running the following command:

    $ oc get nodes
    Example output
    NAME      STATUS    ROLES   AGE  VERSION
master-0  Ready     master  73m  v1.23.0
master-1  Ready     master  73m  v1.23.0
master-2  Ready     master  74m  v1.23.0
worker-0  Ready     worker  11m  v1.23.0
worker-1  Ready     worker  11m  v1.23.0

    It can take a few minutes after approval of the server CSRs for the machines to transition to the Ready status.
Additional information

Initial Operator configuration

After the control plane initializes, you must immediately configure some Operators so that they all become available.

Prerequisites

  • Your control plane has initialized.

Procedure

  1. Watch the cluster components come online:

    $ watch -n5 oc get clusteroperators
    Example output
    NAME                                       VERSION   AVAILABLE   PROGRESSING   DEGRADED   SINCE
authentication                             4.10.0    True        False         False      19m
baremetal                                  4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
cloud-credential                           4.10.0    True        False         False      40m
cluster-autoscaler                         4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
config-operator                            4.10.0    True        False         False      38m
console                                    4.10.0    True        False         False      26m
csi-snapshot-controller                    4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
dns                                        4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
etcd                                       4.10.0    True        False         False      36m
image-registry                             4.10.0    True        False         False      31m
ingress                                    4.10.0    True        False         False      30m
insights                                   4.10.0    True        False         False      31m
kube-apiserver                             4.10.0    True        False         False      26m
kube-controller-manager                    4.10.0    True        False         False      36m
kube-scheduler                             4.10.0    True        False         False      36m
kube-storage-version-migrator              4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
machine-api                                4.10.0    True        False         False      29m
machine-approver                           4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
machine-config                             4.10.0    True        False         False      36m
marketplace                                4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
monitoring                                 4.10.0    True        False         False      29m
network                                    4.10.0    True        False         False      38m
node-tuning                                4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
openshift-apiserver                        4.10.0    True        False         False      32m
openshift-controller-manager               4.10.0    True        False         False      30m
openshift-samples                          4.10.0    True        False         False      32m
operator-lifecycle-manager                 4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
operator-lifecycle-manager-catalog         4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
operator-lifecycle-manager-packageserver   4.10.0    True        False         False      32m
service-ca                                 4.10.0    True        False         False      38m
storage                                    4.10.0    True        False         False      37m

  2. Configure the Operators that are not available.

Image registry removed during installation

On platforms that do not provide shareable object storage, the OpenShift Image Registry Operator bootstraps itself as Removed. This allows openshift-installer to complete installations on these platform types.

After installation, you must edit the Image Registry Operator configuration to switch the managementState from Removed to Managed.

Image registry storage configuration

The Image Registry Operator is not initially available for platforms that do not provide default storage. After installation, you must configure your registry to use storage so that the Registry Operator is made available.

Instructions are shown for configuring a persistent volume, which is required for production clusters. Where applicable, instructions are shown for configuring an empty directory as the storage location, which is available for only non-production clusters.

Additional instructions are provided for allowing the image registry to use block storage types by using the Recreate rollout strategy during upgrades.

Configuring block registry storage for VMware vSphere

To allow the image registry to use block storage types such as vSphere Virtual Machine Disk (VMDK) during upgrades as a cluster administrator, you can use the Recreate rollout strategy.

Block storage volumes are supported but not recommended for use with image registry on production clusters. An installation where the registry is configured on block storage is not highly available because the registry cannot have more than one replica.
Procedure

  1. To set the image registry storage as a block storage type, patch the registry so that it uses the Recreate rollout strategy and runs with only 1 replica:

    $ oc patch config.imageregistry.operator.openshift.io/cluster --type=merge -p '{"spec":{"rolloutStrategy":"Recreate","replicas":1}}'

  2. Provision the PV for the block storage device, and create a PVC for that volume. The requested block volume uses the ReadWriteOnce (RWO) access mode.

    1. Create a pvc.yaml file with the following contents to define a VMware vSphere PersistentVolumeClaim object:

      kind: PersistentVolumeClaim
apiVersion: v1
metadata:
  name: image-registry-storage (1)
  namespace: openshift-image-registry (2)
spec:
  accessModes:
  - ReadWriteOnce (3)
  resources:
    requests:
      storage: 100Gi (4)
      1 A unique name that represents the PersistentVolumeClaim object.
      2 The namespace for the PersistentVolumeClaim object, which is openshift-image-registry.
      3 The access mode of the persistent volume claim. With ReadWriteOnce, the volume can be mounted with read and write permissions by a single node.
      4 The size of the persistent volume claim.

    2. Create the PersistentVolumeClaim object from the file:

      $ oc create -f pvc.yaml -n openshift-image-registry

  3. Edit the registry configuration so that it references the correct PVC:

    $ oc edit config.imageregistry.operator.openshift.io -o yaml
    Example output
    storage:
  pvc:
    claim: (1)
    1 Creating a custom PVC allows you to leave the claim field blank for the default automatic creation of an image-registry-storage PVC.

For instructions about configuring registry storage so that it references the correct PVC, see Configuring the registry for vSphere.

Completing installation on user-provisioned infrastructure

After you complete the Operator configuration, you can finish installing the cluster on infrastructure that you provide.

Prerequisites

  • Your control plane has initialized.

  • You have completed the initial Operator configuration.

Procedure

  1. Confirm that all the cluster components are online with the following command:

    $ watch -n5 oc get clusteroperators
    Example output
    NAME                                       VERSION   AVAILABLE   PROGRESSING   DEGRADED   SINCE
authentication                             4.10.0    True        False         False      19m
baremetal                                  4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
cloud-credential                           4.10.0    True        False         False      40m
cluster-autoscaler                         4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
config-operator                            4.10.0    True        False         False      38m
console                                    4.10.0    True        False         False      26m
csi-snapshot-controller                    4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
dns                                        4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
etcd                                       4.10.0    True        False         False      36m
image-registry                             4.10.0    True        False         False      31m
ingress                                    4.10.0    True        False         False      30m
insights                                   4.10.0    True        False         False      31m
kube-apiserver                             4.10.0    True        False         False      26m
kube-controller-manager                    4.10.0    True        False         False      36m
kube-scheduler                             4.10.0    True        False         False      36m
kube-storage-version-migrator              4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
machine-api                                4.10.0    True        False         False      29m
machine-approver                           4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
machine-config                             4.10.0    True        False         False      36m
marketplace                                4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
monitoring                                 4.10.0    True        False         False      29m
network                                    4.10.0    True        False         False      38m
node-tuning                                4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
openshift-apiserver                        4.10.0    True        False         False      32m
openshift-controller-manager               4.10.0    True        False         False      30m
openshift-samples                          4.10.0    True        False         False      32m
operator-lifecycle-manager                 4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
operator-lifecycle-manager-catalog         4.10.0    True        False         False      37m
operator-lifecycle-manager-packageserver   4.10.0    True        False         False      32m
service-ca                                 4.10.0    True        False         False      38m
storage                                    4.10.0    True        False         False      37m

    Alternatively, the following command notifies you when all of the clusters are available. It also retrieves and displays credentials:

    $ ./openshift-install --dir <installation_directory> wait-for install-complete (1)
    1 For <installation_directory>, specify the path to the directory that you stored the installation files in.
    Example output
    INFO Waiting up to 30m0s for the cluster to initialize...

    The command succeeds when the Cluster Version Operator finishes deploying the OpenShift Container Platform cluster from Kubernetes API server.

    • The Ignition config files that the installation program generates contain certificates that expire after 24 hours, which are then renewed at that time. If the cluster is shut down before renewing the certificates and the cluster is later restarted after the 24 hours have elapsed, the cluster automatically recovers the expired certificates. The exception is that you must manually approve the pending node-bootstrapper certificate signing requests (CSRs) to recover kubelet certificates. See the documentation for Recovering from expired control plane certificates for more information.

    • It is recommended that you use Ignition config files within 12 hours after they are generated because the 24-hour certificate rotates from 16 to 22 hours after the cluster is installed. By using the Ignition config files within 12 hours, you can avoid installation failure if the certificate update runs during installation.

  2. Confirm that the Kubernetes API server is communicating with the pods.

    1. To view a list of all pods, use the following command:

      $ oc get pods --all-namespaces
      Example output
      NAMESPACE                         NAME                                            READY   STATUS      RESTARTS   AGE
openshift-apiserver-operator      openshift-apiserver-operator-85cb746d55-zqhs8   1/1     Running     1          9m
openshift-apiserver               apiserver-67b9g                                 1/1     Running     0          3m
openshift-apiserver               apiserver-ljcmx                                 1/1     Running     0          1m
openshift-apiserver               apiserver-z25h4                                 1/1     Running     0          2m
openshift-authentication-operator authentication-operator-69d5d8bf84-vh2n8        1/1     Running     0          5m
...

    2. View the logs for a pod that is listed in the output of the previous command by using the following command:

      $ oc logs <pod_name> -n <namespace> (1)
      1 Specify the pod name and namespace, as shown in the output of the previous command.

      If the pod logs display, the Kubernetes API server can communicate with the cluster machines.

  3. For an installation with Fibre Channel Protocol (FCP), additional steps are required to enable multipathing. Do not enable multipathing during installation.

    See "Enabling multipathing with kernel arguments on RHCOS" in the Post-installation machine configuration tasks documentation for more information.

You can add extra compute machines after the cluster installation is completed by following Adding compute machines to vSphere.

Backing up VMware vSphere volumes

OpenShift Container Platform provisions new volumes as independent persistent disks to freely attach and detach the volume on any node in the cluster. As a consequence, it is not possible to back up volumes that use snapshots, or to restore volumes from snapshots. See Snapshot Limitations for more information.

Procedure

To create a backup of persistent volumes:

  1. Stop the application that is using the persistent volume.

  2. Clone the persistent volume.

  3. Restart the application.

  4. Create a backup of the cloned volume.

  5. Delete the cloned volume.

Telemetry access for OpenShift Container Platform

In OpenShift Container Platform 4.10, the Telemetry service, which runs by default to provide metrics about cluster health and the success of updates, requires internet access. If your cluster is connected to the internet, Telemetry runs automatically, and your cluster is registered to OpenShift Cluster Manager.

After you confirm that your OpenShift Cluster Manager inventory is correct, either maintained automatically by Telemetry or manually by using OpenShift Cluster Manager, use subscription watch to track your OpenShift Container Platform subscriptions at the account or multi-cluster level.

Additional resources

Next steps