Local Platforms

• 1: Docker
• 2: QEMU
• 3: VirtualBox

1 - Docker

In this guide we will create a Kubernetes cluster in Docker, using a containerized version of Talos.

Running Talos in Docker is intended to be used in CI pipelines, and local testing when you need a quick and easy cluster. Furthermore, if you are running Talos in production, it provides an excellent way for developers to develop against the same version of Talos.

Requirements

The follow are requirements for running Talos in Docker:

• Docker 18.03 or greater
• a recent version of talosctl

Caveats

Due to the fact that Talos runs in a container, certain APIs are not available when running in Docker. For example upgrade, reset, and APIs like these don’t apply in container mode.

Create the Cluster

Creating a local cluster is as simple as:

talosctl cluster create --wait

Once the above finishes successfully, your talosconfig(~/.talos/config) will be configured to point to the new cluster.

If you are running on MacOS, an additional command is required:

talosctl config --endpoints 127.0.0.1

Note: Startup times can take up to a minute before the cluster is available.

Retrieve and Configure the kubeconfig

talosctl kubeconfig .
kubectl --kubeconfig kubeconfig config set-cluster talos-default --server https://127.0.0.1:6443

Using the Cluster

Once the cluster is available, you can make use of talosctl and kubectl to interact with the cluster. For example, to view current running containers, run talosctl containers for a list of containers in the system namespace, or talosctl containers -k for the k8s.io namespace. To view the logs of a container, use talosctl logs <container> or talosctl logs -k <container>.

Cleaning Up

To cleanup, run:

talosctl cluster destroy

2 - QEMU

In this guide we will create a Kubernetes cluster using QEMU.

Video Walkthrough

To see a live demo of this writeup, see the video below:

Requirements

• Linux
• a kernel with
  • KVM enabled (/dev/kvm must exist)
  • CONFIG_NET_SCH_NETEM enabled
  • CONFIG_NET_SCH_INGRESS enabled
• at least CAP_SYS_ADMIN and CAP_NET_ADMIN capabilities
• QEMU
• bridge, static and firewall CNI plugins from the standard CNI plugins, and tc-redirect-tap CNI plugin from the awslabs tc-redirect-tap installed to /opt/cni/bin (installed automatically by talosctl)
• iptables
• /var/run/netns directory should exist

Installation

How to get QEMU

Install QEMU with your operating system package manager. For example, on Ubuntu for x86:

apt install qemu-system-x86 qemu-kvm

Install talosctl

You can download talosctl and all required binaries via github.com/talos-systems/talos/releases

curl https://github.com/siderolabs/talos/releases/download/<version>/talosctl-<platform>-<arch> -L -o talosctl

For example version v0.14.0 for linux platform:

curl https://github.com/talos-systems/talos/releases/latest/download/talosctl-linux-amd64 -L -o talosctl
sudo cp talosctl /usr/local/bin
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/talosctl

Install Talos kernel and initramfs

QEMU provisioner depends on Talos kernel (vmlinuz) and initramfs (initramfs.xz). These files can be downloaded from the Talos release:

mkdir -p _out/
curl https://github.com/siderolabs/talos/releases/download/<version>/vmlinuz-<arch> -L -o _out/vmlinuz-<arch>
curl https://github.com/siderolabs/talos/releases/download/<version>/initramfs-<arch>.xz -L -o _out/initramfs-<arch>.xz

For example version v0.14.0:

curl https://github.com/siderolabs/talos/releases/download/v0.14.0/vmlinuz-amd64 -L -o _out/vmlinuz-amd64
curl https://github.com/siderolabs/talos/releases/download/v0.14.0/initramfs-amd64.xz -L -o _out/initramfs-amd64.xz

Create the Cluster

For the first time, create root state directory as your user so that you can inspect the logs as non-root user:

mkdir -p ~/.talos/clusters

Create the cluster:

sudo -E talosctl cluster create --provisioner qemu

Before the first cluster is created, talosctl will download the CNI bundle for the VM provisioning and install it to ~/.talos/cni directory.

Once the above finishes successfully, your talosconfig (~/.talos/config) will be configured to point to the new cluster, and kubeconfig will be downloaded and merged into default kubectl config location (~/.kube/config).

Cluster provisioning process can be optimized with registry pull-through caches.

Using the Cluster

Once the cluster is available, you can make use of talosctl and kubectl to interact with the cluster. For example, to view current running containers, run talosctl -n 10.5.0.2 containers for a list of containers in the system namespace, or talosctl -n 10.5.0.2 containers -k for the k8s.io namespace. To view the logs of a container, use talosctl -n 10.5.0.2 logs <container> or talosctl -n 10.5.0.2 logs -k <container>.

A bridge interface will be created, and assigned the default IP 10.5.0.1. Each node will be directly accessible on the subnet specified at cluster creation time. A loadbalancer runs on 10.5.0.1 by default, which handles loadbalancing for the Kubernetes APIs.

You can see a summary of the cluster state by running:

$ talosctl cluster show --provisioner qemu
PROVISIONER       qemu
NAME              talos-default
NETWORK NAME      talos-default
NETWORK CIDR      10.5.0.0/24
NETWORK GATEWAY   10.5.0.1
NETWORK MTU       1500

NODES:

NAME                     TYPE           IP         CPU    RAM      DISK
talos-default-master-1   Init           10.5.0.2   1.00   1.6 GB   4.3 GB
talos-default-master-2   ControlPlane   10.5.0.3   1.00   1.6 GB   4.3 GB
talos-default-master-3   ControlPlane   10.5.0.4   1.00   1.6 GB   4.3 GB
talos-default-worker-1   Worker         10.5.0.5   1.00   1.6 GB   4.3 GB

Cleaning Up

To cleanup, run:

sudo -E talosctl cluster destroy --provisioner qemu

Note: In that case that the host machine is rebooted before destroying the cluster, you may need to manually remove ~/.talos/clusters/talos-default.

Manual Clean Up

The talosctl cluster destroy command depends heavily on the clusters state directory. It contains all related information of the cluster. The PIDs and network associated with the cluster nodes.

If you happened to have deleted the state folder by mistake or you would like to cleanup the environment, here are the steps how to do it manually:

Remove VM Launchers

Find the process of talosctl qemu-launch:

ps -elf | grep 'talosctl qemu-launch'

To remove the VMs manually, execute:

sudo kill -s SIGTERM <PID>

Example output, where VMs are running with PIDs 157615 and 157617

ps -elf | grep '[t]alosctl qemu-launch'
0 S root      157615    2835  0  80   0 - 184934 -     07:53 ?        00:00:00 talosctl qemu-launch
0 S root      157617    2835  0  80   0 - 185062 -     07:53 ?        00:00:00 talosctl qemu-launch
sudo kill -s SIGTERM 157615
sudo kill -s SIGTERM 157617

Stopping VMs

Find the process of qemu-system:

ps -elf | grep 'qemu-system'

To stop the VMs manually, execute:

sudo kill -s SIGTERM <PID>

Example output, where VMs are running with PIDs 158065 and 158216

ps -elf | grep qemu-system
2 S root     1061663 1061168 26  80   0 - 1786238 -    14:05 ?        01:53:56 qemu-system-x86_64 -m 2048 -drive format=raw,if=virtio,file=/home/username/.talos/clusters/talos-default/bootstrap-master.disk -smp cpus=2 -cpu max -nographic -netdev tap,id=net0,ifname=tap0,script=no,downscript=no -device virtio-net-pci,netdev=net0,mac=1e:86:c6:b4:7c:c4 -device virtio-rng-pci -no-reboot -boot order=cn,reboot-timeout=5000 -smbios type=1,uuid=7ec0a73c-826e-4eeb-afd1-39ff9f9160ca -machine q35,accel=kvm
2 S root     1061663 1061170 67  80   0 - 621014 -     21:23 ?        00:00:07 qemu-system-x86_64 -m 2048 -drive format=raw,if=virtio,file=/homeusername/.talos/clusters/talos-default/pxe-1.disk -smp cpus=2 -cpu max -nographic -netdev tap,id=net0,ifname=tap0,script=no,downscript=no -device virtio-net-pci,netdev=net0,mac=36:f3:2f:c3:9f:06 -device virtio-rng-pci -no-reboot -boot order=cn,reboot-timeout=5000 -smbios type=1,uuid=ce12a0d0-29c8-490f-b935-f6073ab916a6 -machine q35,accel=kvm
sudo kill -s SIGTERM 1061663
sudo kill -s SIGTERM 1061663

Remove load balancer

Find the process of talosctl loadbalancer-launch:

ps -elf | grep 'talosctl loadbalancer-launch'

To remove the LB manually, execute:

sudo kill -s SIGTERM <PID>

Example output, where loadbalancer is running with PID 157609

ps -elf | grep '[t]alosctl loadbalancer-launch'
4 S root      157609    2835  0  80   0 - 184998 -     07:53 ?        00:00:07 talosctl loadbalancer-launch --loadbalancer-addr 10.5.0.1 --loadbalancer-upstreams 10.5.0.2
sudo kill -s SIGTERM 157609

Remove DHCP server

Find the process of talosctl dhcpd-launch:

ps -elf | grep 'talosctl dhcpd-launch'

To remove the LB manually, execute:

sudo kill -s SIGTERM <PID>

Example output, where loadbalancer is running with PID 157609

ps -elf | grep '[t]alosctl dhcpd-launch'
4 S root      157609    2835  0  80   0 - 184998 -     07:53 ?        00:00:07 talosctl dhcpd-launch --state-path /home/username/.talos/clusters/talos-default --addr 10.5.0.1 --interface talosbd9c32bc
sudo kill -s SIGTERM 157609

Remove network

This is more tricky part as if you have already deleted the state folder. If you didn’t then it is written in the state.yaml in the ~/.talos/clusters/<cluster-name> directory.

sudo cat ~/.talos/clusters/<cluster-name>/state.yaml | grep bridgename
bridgename: talos<uuid>

If you only had one cluster, then it will be the interface with name talos<uuid>

46: talos<uuid>: <NO-CARRIER,BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP> mtu 1500 qdisc noqueue state DOWN group default qlen 1000
    link/ether a6:72:f4:0a:d3:9c brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 10.5.0.1/24 brd 10.5.0.255 scope global talos17c13299
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 fe80::a472:f4ff:fe0a:d39c/64 scope link
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever

To remove this interface:

sudo ip link del talos<uuid>

Remove state directory

To remove the state directory execute:

sudo rm -Rf /home/$USER/.talos/clusters/<cluster-name>

Troubleshooting

Logs

Inspect logs directory

sudo cat ~/.talos/clusters/<cluster-name>/*.log

Logs are saved under <cluster-name>-<role>-<node-id>.log

For example in case of k8s cluster name:

ls -la ~/.talos/clusters/k8s | grep log
-rw-r--r--. 1 root root      69415 Apr 26 20:58 k8s-master-1.log
-rw-r--r--. 1 root root      68345 Apr 26 20:58 k8s-worker-1.log
-rw-r--r--. 1 root root      24621 Apr 26 20:59 lb.log

Inspect logs during the installation

tail -f ~/.talos/clusters/<cluster-name>/*.log

3 - VirtualBox

In this guide we will create a Kubernetes cluster using VirtualBox.

Video Walkthrough

To see a live demo of this writeup, visit Youtube here:

Installation

How to Get VirtualBox

Install VirtualBox with your operating system package manager or from the website. For example, on Ubuntu for x86:

apt install virtualbox

Install talosctl

You can download talosctl via github.com/talos-systems/talos/releases

curl https://github.com/siderolabs/talos/releases/download/<version>/talosctl-<platform>-<arch> -L -o talosctl

For example version v0.14.0 for linux platform:

curl https://github.com/talos-systems/talos/releases/latest/download/talosctl-linux-amd64 -L -o talosctl
sudo cp talosctl /usr/local/bin
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/talosctl

Download ISO Image

In order to install Talos in VirtualBox, you will need the ISO image from the Talos release page. You can download talos-amd64.iso via github.com/talos-systems/talos/releases

mkdir -p _out/
curl https://github.com/siderolabs/talos/releases/download/<version>/talos-<arch>.iso -L -o _out/talos-<arch>.iso

For example version v0.14.0 for linux platform:

mkdir -p _out/
curl https://github.com/talos-systems/talos/releases/latest/download/talos-amd64.iso -L -o _out/talos-amd64.iso

Create VMs

Start by creating a new VM by clicking the “New” button in the VirtualBox UI:

Supply a name for this VM, and specify the Type and Version:

Edit the memory to supply at least 2GB of RAM for the VM:

Proceed through the disk settings, keeping the defaults. You can increase the disk space if desired.

Once created, select the VM and hit “Settings”:

In the “System” section, supply at least 2 CPUs:

In the “Network” section, switch the network “Attached To” section to “Bridged Adapter”:

Finally, in the “Storage” section, select the optical drive and, on the right, select the ISO by browsing your filesystem:

Repeat this process for a second VM to use as a worker node. You can also repeat this for additional nodes desired.

Start Control Plane Node

Once the VMs have been created and updated, start the VM that will be the first control plane node. This VM will boot the ISO image specified earlier and enter “maintenance mode”. Once the machine has entered maintenance mode, there will be a console log that details the IP address that the node received. Take note of this IP address, which will be referred to as $CONTROL_PLANE_IP for the rest of this guide. If you wish to export this IP as a bash variable, simply issue a command like export CONTROL_PLANE_IP=1.2.3.4.

Generate Machine Configurations

With the IP address above, you can now generate the machine configurations to use for installing Talos and Kubernetes. Issue the following command, updating the output directory, cluster name, and control plane IP as you see fit:

talosctl gen config talos-vbox-cluster https://$CONTROL_PLANE_IP:6443 --output-dir _out

This will create several files in the _out directory: controlplane.yaml, worker.yaml, and talosconfig.

Create Control Plane Node

Using the controlplane.yaml generated above, you can now apply this config using talosctl. Issue:

talosctl apply-config --insecure --nodes $CONTROL_PLANE_IP --file _out/controlplane.yaml

You should now see some action in the VirtualBox console for this VM. Talos will be installed to disk, the VM will reboot, and then Talos will configure the Kubernetes control plane on this VM.

Note: This process can be repeated multiple times to create an HA control plane.

Create Worker Node

Create at least a single worker node using a process similar to the control plane creation above. Start the worker node VM and wait for it to enter “maintenance mode”. Take note of the worker node’s IP address, which will be referred to as $WORKER_IP

Issue:

talosctl apply-config --insecure --nodes $WORKER_IP --file _out/worker.yaml

Note: This process can be repeated multiple times to add additional workers.

Using the Cluster

Once the cluster is available, you can make use of talosctl and kubectl to interact with the cluster. For example, to view current running containers, run talosctl containers for a list of containers in the system namespace, or talosctl containers -k for the k8s.io namespace. To view the logs of a container, use talosctl logs <container> or talosctl logs -k <container>.

First, configure talosctl to talk to your control plane node by issuing the following, updating paths and IPs as necessary:

export TALOSCONFIG="_out/talosconfig"
talosctl config endpoint $CONTROL_PLANE_IP
talosctl config node $CONTROL_PLANE_IP

Bootstrap Etcd

Set the endpoints and nodes:

talosctl --talosconfig talosconfig config endpoint <control plane 1 IP>
talosctl --talosconfig talosconfig config node <control plane 1 IP>

Bootstrap etcd:

talosctl --talosconfig talosconfig bootstrap

Retrieve the kubeconfig

At this point we can retrieve the admin kubeconfig by running:

talosctl --talosconfig talosconfig kubeconfig .

You can then use kubectl in this fashion:

kubectl get nodes

Cleaning Up

To cleanup, simply stop and delete the virtual machines from the VirtualBox UI.