Control Plane
The Control Plane page serves as the central hub for managing and monitoring the various components of your Kubernetes-based infrastructure. It provides an overview of the management cluster, its current status, and the add-ons and custom resource definitions (CRDs) deployed.
Management Cluster
Overview
A management cluster is used for central components that are not needed on every cluster, such as the GitOps operator (e.g. ArgoCD, if enabled), or frontends for monitoring tools like Prometheus, Grafana and Jaeger. This is especially relevant when you choose to self-host such components rather than using managed services. It is considered best practice to separate the management cluster from “workload clusters”, to reduce risk of disruption to either the core production workloads, or the supporting tools in the management cluster. However, KoalaOps doesn’t technically prevent you from designating any cluster as your “management” cluster.
Management Cluster Details
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Name: The name of your management cluster. This field is editable.
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Status: Displays the current operational status of the management cluster. For example, “ONLINE” indicates that the cluster is actively running and accessible.
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Location: Shows the physical or cloud region where the management cluster is hosted, such as “me-west1-a”. This information is crucial for understanding data residency and latency implications.
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Project: Identifies the project or namespace within which the management cluster operates, e.g., “koalabackend”. This helps in segregating and organizing resources across multiple projects.
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Default Domain: The default domain associated with the management cluster, like “admin.koalaops.com”. This domain is used by default when configuring centralized services such as Grafana UI, that you want to be accessible from outside the cluster.
Addons
This section lists the additional components or “addons” that have been installed on the management cluster to extend its functionality. Examples include:
- ArgoCD: ArgoCD is a declarative, GitOps continuous delivery tool for Kubernetes.
- Cert Manager: Ensures the management cluster has capabilities for automating the management and issuance of TLS certificates.
- External Secrets Operator: Facilitates integrating external secret management systems (e.g., AWS Secrets Manager, Azure Key Vault) with the Kubernetes cluster, enabling secure and centralized management of sensitive information.
Custom Resource Definitions (CRDs)
Provides a searchable list of CRDs deployed within the management cluster. CRDs are extensions of the Kubernetes API that allow for the creation of new, custom resources. They are pivotal for customizing Kubernetes clusters to meet specific needs.
Each CRD entry includes the name, scope (indicating whether the CRD is namespaced or cluster-wide), supported versions, age (how long it has been deployed), a brief description, and any applicable labels. The list covers a wide range of groups, indicating the diverse functionalities and integrations supported by your management cluster, such as monitoring, auto-scaling, certificate management, networking, and data migration.