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Configuration

This guide covers how to configure KIND cluster creation.

We know this is currently a bit lacking right now and will expand it over time - PRs welcome!

Getting Started

To configure kind cluster creation, you will need to create a YAML config file. This file follows Kubernetes conventions for versioning etc.

A minimal valid config is:

  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4

This config merely specifies that we are configuration a KIND cluster (kind: Cluster) and that the version of KIND’s config we are using is v1alpha4 (apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4).

Any given version of kind may support different versions which will have different options and behavior. This is why we must always specify the version.

This mechanism is inspired by Kubernetes resources and component config.

To use this config, place the contents in a file config.yaml and then run kind create cluster --config=config.yaml from the same directory.

You can also include a full file path like kind create cluster --config=/foo/bar/config.yaml.

Cluster-Wide Options

The following high level options are available.

NOTE: not all options are documented yet! We will fix this with time, PRs welcome!

Feature Gates

Kubernetes feature gates can be enabled cluster-wide across all Kubernetes components with the following config:

kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 featureGates: # any feature gate can be enabled here with “Name”: true # or disabled here with “Name”: false # not all feature gates are tested, however “CSIMigration”: true

  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. featureGates:
  4.   # any feature gate can be enabled here with “Name”: true
  5.   # or disabled here with “Name”: false
  6.   # not all feature gates are tested, however
  7.   “CSIMigration”: true
### Runtime Config Kubernetes API server runtime-config can be toggled using the runtimeConfig key, which maps to the --runtime-config kube-apiserver flag. This may be used to e.g. disable beta / alpha APIs. kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 runtimeConfig: “api/alpha”: “false” 
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. runtimeConfig:
  4.   “api/alpha”: “false”
### Networking Multiple details of the cluster’s networking can be customized under the networking field. #### IP Family KIND has limited support for IPv6 (and soon dual-stack!) clusters, you can switch from the default of IPv4 by setting: kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 networking: ipFamily: ipv6 
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. networking:
  4.   ipFamily: ipv6
NOTE: you may need to reconfigure your docker daemon to enable ipv6 in order to use this. IPv6 does not work on docker for mac because port forwarding ipv6 is not yet supported in docker for mac. #### API Server The API Server listen address and port can be customized with: kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 networking: # WARNING: It is _strongly_ recommended that you keep this the default # (127.0.0.1) for security reasons. However it is possible to change this. apiServerAddress: “127.0.0.1” # By default the API server listens on a random open port. # You may choose a specific port but probably don’t need to in most cases. # Using a random port makes it easier to spin up multiple clusters. apiServerPort: 6443 
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. networking:
  4.   # WARNING: It is strongly recommended that you keep this the default
  5.   # (127.0.0.1) for security reasons. However it is possible to change this.
  6.   apiServerAddress: “127.0.0.1”
  7.   # By default the API server listens on a random open port.
  8.   # You may choose a specific port but probably don’t need to in most cases.
  9.   # Using a random port makes it easier to spin up multiple clusters.
  10.   apiServerPort: 6443
> security goose says > > Security Goose Says: > > NOTE: You should really think thrice before exposing your kind cluster publicly! kind does not ship with state of the art security or any update strategy (other than disposing your cluster and creating a new one)! We strongly discourage exposing kind to anything other than loopback. #### Pod Subnet You can configure the subnet used for pod IPs by setting kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 networking: podSubnet: “10.244.0.0/16” 
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. networking:
  4.   podSubnet: “10.244.0.0/16”
#### Service Subnet You can configure the Kubernetes service subnet used for service IPs by setting kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 networking: serviceSubnet: “10.96.0.0/12” 
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. networking:
  4.   serviceSubnet: “10.96.0.0/12”
#### Disable Default CNI KIND ships with a simple networking implementation (“kindnetd”) based around standard CNI plugins (ptp, host-local, …) and simple netlink routes. This CNI also handles IP masquerade. You may disable the default to install a different CNI. This is a power user feature with limited support, but many common CNI manifests are known to work, e.g. Calico. kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 networking: # the default CNI will not be installed disableDefaultCNI: true 
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. networking:
  4.   # the default CNI will not be installed
  5.   disableDefaultCNI: true
#### kube-proxy mode You can configure the kube-proxy mode that will be used, between iptables and ipvs. By default iptables is used kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 networking: kubeProxyMode: “ipvs” 
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. networking:
  4.   kubeProxyMode: “ipvs”
### Nodes The kind: Cluster object has a nodes field containing a list of node objects. If unset this defaults to: nodes: # one node hosting a control plane - role: control-plane You can create a multi node cluster with the following config: kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 # One control plane node and three “workers”. # # While these will not add more real compute capacity and # have limited isolation, this can be useful for testing # rolling updates etc. # # The API-server and other control plane components will be # on the control-plane node. # # You probably don’t need this unless you are testing Kubernetes itself. nodes: - role: control-plane - role: worker - role: worker - role: worker 
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. # One control plane node and three “workers”.
  4. #
  5. # While these will not add more real compute capacity and
  6. # have limited isolation, this can be useful for testing
  7. # rolling updates etc.
  8. #
  9. # The API-server and other control plane components will be
  10. # on the control-plane node.
  11. #
  12. # You probably don’t need this unless you are testing Kubernetes itself.
  13. nodes:
  14. - role: control-plane
  15. - role: worker
  16. - role: worker
  17. - role: worker
You can also set a specific Kubernetes version by setting the node‘s container image. You can find available image tags on the releases page. Please include the @sha256: image digest from the image in the release notes, as seen in this example: kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 nodes: - role: control-plane - role: worker image: kindest/node:v1.16.4@sha256:b91a2c2317a000f3a783489dfb755064177dbc3a0b2f4147d50f04825d016f55 
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. nodes:
  4. - role: control-plane
  5. - role: worker
  6.   image: kindest/node:v1.16.4@sha256:b91a2c2317a000f3a783489dfb755064177dbc3a0b2f4147d50f04825d016f55
## Per-Node Options The following options are available for setting on each entry in nodes. NOTE: not all options are documented yet! We will fix this with time, PRs welcome! ### Extra Mounts Extra mounts can be used to pass through storage on the host to a kind node for persisting data, mounting through code etc. kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 nodes: - role: control-plane # add a mount from /path/to/my/files on the host to /files on the node extraMounts: - hostPath: /path/to/my/files/ containerPath: /files
examples/config-with-mounts.yaml —>
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. nodes:
  4. - role: control-plane
  5.   # add a mount from /path/to/my/files on the host to /files on the node
  6.   extraMounts:
  7.   - hostPath: /path/to/my/files/
  8.     containerPath: /files
### Extra Port Mappings Extra port mappings can be used to port forward to the kind nodes. This is a cross-platform option to get traffic into your kind cluster. With docker on Linux you can simply send traffic to the node IPs from the host without this, but to cover macOS and Windows you’ll want to use these. You may also want to see the Ingress Guide. kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 nodes: - role: control-plane # port forward 80 on the host to 80 on this node extraPortMappings: - containerPort: 80 hostPort: 80 # optional: set the bind address on the host # 0.0.0.0 is the current default listenAddress: “127.0.0.1” # optional: set the protocol to one of TCP, UDP, SCTP. # TCP is the default protocol: TCP
examples/config-with-port-mapping.yaml —>
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. nodes:
  4. - role: control-plane
  5.   # port forward 80 on the host to 80 on this node
  6.   extraPortMappings:
  7.   - containerPort: 80
  8.     hostPort: 80
  9.     # optional: set the bind address on the host
  10.     # 0.0.0.0 is the current default
  11.     listenAddress: “127.0.0.1”
  12.     # optional: set the protocol to one of TCP, UDP, SCTP.
  13.     # TCP is the default
  14.     protocol: TCP
### Kubeadm Config Patches KIND uses kubeadm to configure cluster nodes. Formally KIND runs kubeadm init on the first control-plane node which can be customized by using the kubeadm InitConfiguration (spec) kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 nodes: - role: control-plane kubeadmConfigPatches: - | kind: InitConfiguration nodeRegistration: kubeletExtraArgs: node-labels: “my-label=true” 
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. nodes:
  4. - role: control-plane
  5.   kubeadmConfigPatches:
  6.   - |
  7.     kind: InitConfiguration
  8.     nodeRegistration:
  9.       kubeletExtraArgs:
  10.         node-labels: “my-label=true”
On every additional node configured in the KIND cluster, worker or control-plane (in HA mode), KIND runs kubeadm join which can be configured using the JoinConfiguration (spec) kind: Cluster apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4 nodes: - role: control-plane - role: worker - role: worker kubeadmConfigPatches: - | kind: JoinConfiguration nodeRegistration: kubeletExtraArgs: node-labels: “my-label2=true” - role: control-plane kubeadmConfigPatches: - | kind: JoinConfiguration nodeRegistration: kubeletExtraArgs: node-labels: “my-label3=true” 
  1. kind: Cluster
  2. apiVersion: kind.x-k8s.io/v1alpha4
  3. nodes:
  4. - role: control-plane
  5. - role: worker
  6. - role: worker
  7.   kubeadmConfigPatches:
  8.   - |
  9.     kind: JoinConfiguration
  10.     nodeRegistration:
  11.       kubeletExtraArgs:
  12.         node-labels: “my-label2=true”
  13. - role: control-plane
  14.   kubeadmConfigPatches:
  15.   - |
  16.     kind: JoinConfiguration
  17.     nodeRegistration:
  18.       kubeletExtraArgs:
  19.         node-labels: “my-label3=true”