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Ajeet Raina Ajeet Singh Raina is a former Docker Captain, Community Leader and Arm Ambassador. He is a founder of Collabnix blogging site and has authored more than 570+ blogs on Docker, Kubernetes and Cloud-Native Technology. He runs a community Slack of 8900+ members and discord server close to 2200+ members. You can follow him on Twitter(@ajeetsraina).

Multi-Node K3s Cluster on NVIDIA Jetson Nano in 5 Minutes

6 min read

If you are looking out for lightweight Kubernetes which is easy to install and perfect for Edge, IoT, CI and ARM, then look no further. K3s is the right solution for you. K3s is a certified Kubernetes distribution designed for production workloads in unattended, resource-constrained, remote locations or inside IoT appliances.

The K3s GITHUB repository has already crossed 9000+ stars. With over 600+ forks & 50+ contributors, this project is gaining a lot of momentum across the developers. Few of notable feature offered by k3s are:

  • Single-liner installation
  • A binary of less than 40 MB
  • Both ARM64 and ARMv7 are supported with binaries and multiarch images available for both
  • Can be deployed seamlessly over Raspberry Pi 3 & 4
  • SQLite3 as the default storage mechanism. etcd3 is still available, but not the default.

Early this year, I wrote a blog post around how to build up K3s cluster on Raspberry Pi 3.

Under this blog, I will showcase how to build 2-node K3s cluster on NVIDIA Jetson Nano without any compilation pain.

Prerequisite:

  • Unboxing Jetson Nano Pack
  • Preparing your microSD card

To prepare your microSD card, you’ll need a computer with Internet connection and the ability to read and write SD cards, either via a built-in SD card slot or adapter.

  1. Download the Jetson Nano Developer Kit SD Card Image, and note where it was saved on the computer.
  2. Write the image to your microSD card( atleast 16GB size) by following the instructions below according to the type of computer you are using: Windows, Mac, or Linux. If you are using Windows laptop, you can use SDFormatter software for formatting your microSD card and Win32DiskImager to flash Jetson Nano Image. In case you are using Mac, you will need Etcher software.
  1. To prepare your microSD card, you’ll need a computer with Internet connection and the ability to read and write SD cards, either via a built-in SD card slot or adapter

The Jetson Nano SD card image is of 12GB(uncompressed size).

Next, It’s time to remove this tiny SD card from SD card reader and plugin it to Jetson Board to let it boot.

Verifying OS running on Jetson Nano

jetson@jetson-desktop:~$ sudo cat /etc/os-release
NAME="Ubuntu"
VERSION="18.04.2 LTS (Bionic Beaver)"
ID=ubuntu
ID_LIKE=debian
PRETTY_NAME="Ubuntu 18.04.2 LTS"
VERSION_ID="18.04"
HOME_URL="https://www.ubuntu.com/"
SUPPORT_URL="https://help.ubuntu.com/"
BUG_REPORT_URL="https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/"
PRIVACY_POLICY_URL="https://www.ubuntu.com/legal/terms-and-policies/privacy-policy"
VERSION_CODENAME=bionic
UBUNTU_CODENAME=bionic
jetson@jetson-desktop:~$

Setting up hostname

sudo vi /etc/hostname
master1.dell.com

Reboot the system.

Installing K3s

jetson@master1:~$ sudo curl -sfL https://get.k3s.io | sh -
[INFO]  Finding latest release
[INFO]  Using v0.9.1 as release
[INFO]  Downloading hash https://github.com/rancher/k3s/releases/download/v0.9.1/sha256sum-arm64.txt
[INFO]  Downloading binary https://github.com/rancher/k3s/releases/download/v0.9.1/k3s-arm64
[INFO]  Verifying binary download
[INFO]  Installing k3s to /usr/local/bin/k3s
[INFO]  Creating /usr/local/bin/kubectl symlink to k3s
[INFO]  Creating /usr/local/bin/crictl symlink to k3s
[INFO]  Skipping /usr/local/bin/ctr symlink to k3s, command exists in PATH at /usr/bin/ctr
[INFO]  Creating killall script /usr/local/bin/k3s-killall.sh
[INFO]  Creating uninstall script /usr/local/bin/k3s-uninstall.sh
[INFO]  env: Creating environment file /etc/systemd/system/k3s.service.env
[INFO]  systemd: Creating service file /etc/systemd/system/k3s.service
[INFO]  systemd: Enabling k3s unit
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/k3s.service → /etc/systemd/system/k3s.service.
[INFO]  systemd: Starting k3s

Listing the Nodes

jetson@master1:~$ sudo k3s kubectl get node -o wide
NAME             STATUS   ROLES    AGE     VERSION         INTERNAL-IP   EXTERNAL-IP   OS-IMAGE             KERNEL-VERSION   CONTAINER-RUNTIME
jetson-desktop   Ready    master   3m55s   v1.15.4-k3s.1   192.168.1.3   <none>        Ubuntu 18.04.2 LTS   4.9.140-tegra    containerd://1.2.8-k3s.1
jetson@master1:~$

Verifying Kubernetes Cluster Information

 sudo k3s kubectl cluster-info

Kubernetes master is running at https://127.0.0.1:6443
CoreDNS is running at https://127.0.0.1:6443/api/v1/namespaces/kube-system/services/kube-dns:dns/proxy 
To further debug and diagnose cluster problems, use 'kubectl cluster-info dump'. 

Listing out all Kubernetes Namespaces

$ sudo k3s kubectl get all --all-namespaces
NAMESPACE     NAME                             READY   STATUS              RESTARTS   AGE
kube-system   pod/coredns-66f496764-bf7qn      1/1     Running             0          79s
kube-system   pod/traefik-d869575c8-wsq2b      0/1     ContainerCreating   0          12s
kube-system   pod/svclb-traefik-gtqpd          0/3     ContainerCreating   0          12s
kube-system   pod/helm-install-traefik-4tjpc   0/1     Completed           0          79s


NAMESPACE     NAME                 TYPE           CLUSTER-IP      EXTERNAL-IP   PORT(S)                                     AGE
kube-system   service/kube-dns     ClusterIP      10.43.0.10      <none>        53/UDP,53/TCP,9153/TCP                      99s
default       service/kubernetes   ClusterIP      10.43.0.1       <none>        443/TCP                                     97s
kube-system   service/traefik      LoadBalancer   10.43.140.218   <pending>     80:31655/TCP,443:31667/TCP,8080:31486/TCP   13s

NAMESPACE     NAME                           DESIRED   CURRENT   READY   UP-TO-DATE   AVAILABLE   NODE SELECTOR   AGE
kube-system   daemonset.apps/svclb-traefik   1         1         0       1            0           <none>          13s

NAMESPACE     NAME                      READY   UP-TO-DATE   AVAILABLE   AGE
kube-system   deployment.apps/coredns   1/1     1            1           99s
kube-system   deployment.apps/traefik   0/1     1            0           13s

NAMESPACE     NAME                                DESIRED   CURRENT   READY   AGE
kube-system   replicaset.apps/coredns-66f496764   1         1         1       80s
kube-system   replicaset.apps/traefik-d869575c8   1         1         0       13s



NAMESPACE     NAME                             COMPLETIONS   DURATION   AGE
kube-system   job.batch/helm-install-traefik   1/1           69s        98s

jetson@jetson-desktop:~$

Deploying NGINX on k3s

$ sudo k3s kubectl run mynginx --image=nginx --replicas=3 --port=80
kubectl run --generator=deployment/apps.v1 is DEPRECATED and will be removed in a future version. Use kubectl run --generator=run-pod/v1 or kubectl create instead.
deployment.apps/mynginx created

Listing the NGINX Pods

sudo k3s kubectl get po
NAME                       READY   STATUS              RESTARTS   AGE
mynginx-568f57494d-8jpwq   0/1     ContainerCreating   0          69s
mynginx-568f57494d-czl9x   0/1     ContainerCreating   0          69s
mynginx-568f57494d-pnphb   0/1     ContainerCreating   0          69s

Viewing Nginx Pod details

sudo k3s kubectl describe po mynginx-568f57494d-8jpwq
Name:           mynginx-568f57494d-8jpwq
Namespace:      default
Priority:       0
Node:           jetson-desktop/192.168.1.3
Start Time:     Mon, 07 Oct 2019 20:57:14 +0530
Labels:         pod-template-hash=568f57494d
                run=mynginx
Annotations:    <none>
Status:         Pending
IP:
Controlled By:  ReplicaSet/mynginx-568f57494d
Containers:
  mynginx:
    Container ID:
    Image:          nginx
    Image ID:
    Port:           80/TCP
    Host Port:      0/TCP
    State:          Waiting
      Reason:       ContainerCreating
    Ready:          False
    Restart Count:  0
    Environment:    <none>
    Mounts:
      /var/run/secrets/kubernetes.io/serviceaccount from default-token-zjsrt (ro)
Conditions:
  Type              Status
  Initialized       True
  Ready             False
  ContainersReady   False
  PodScheduled      True
Volumes:
  default-token-zjsrt:
    Type:        Secret (a volume populated by a Secret)
    SecretName:  default-token-zjsrt
    Optional:    false
QoS Class:       BestEffort
Node-Selectors:  <none>
Tolerations:     node.kubernetes.io/not-ready:NoExecute for 300s
                 node.kubernetes.io/unreachable:NoExecute for 300s
Events:
  Type    Reason     Age   From                     Message
  ----    ------     ----  ----                     -------
  Normal  Scheduled  98s   default-scheduler        Successfully assigned default/mynginx-568f57494d-8jpwq to jetson-desktop
  Normal  Pulling    94s   kubelet, jetson-desktop  Pulling image "nginx"

Ensuring that Pods are in Running State

jetson@jetson-desktop:~$ sudo k3s kubectl get po
NAME                       READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
mynginx-568f57494d-pnphb   1/1     Running   0          113s
mynginx-568f57494d-czl9x   1/1     Running   0          113s
mynginx-568f57494d-8jpwq   1/1     Running   0          113s
jetson@jetson-desktop:~$

Exposing NGINX Port

$ sudo k3s kubectl expose deployment mynginx --port 80
service/mynginx exposed

Verifying the Endpoints

:~$ sudo k3s kubectl get endpoints mynginx
NAME      ENDPOINTS                                AGE
mynginx   10.42.0.6:80,10.42.0.7:80,10.42.0.8:80   27s

Verifying if Nginx is accessible

$ sudo curl 10.42.0.6
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Welcome to nginx!</title>
<style>
    body {
        width: 35em;
        margin: 0 auto;
        font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif;
    }
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1>Welcome to nginx!</h1>
<p>If you see this page, the nginx web server is successfully installed and
working. Further configuration is required.</p>

<p>For online documentation and support please refer to
<a href="http://nginx.org/">nginx.org</a>.<br/>
Commercial support is available at
<a href="http://nginx.com/">nginx.com</a>.</p>

<p><em>Thank you for using nginx.</em></p>
</body>
</html>
jetson@jetson

Joining Nodes

I assume that the worker node hostname is “worker1.dell.com”

 sudo cat /var/lib/rancher/k3s/server/node-token

password for jetson: K1062243e4f7c5bef777a082ae9919d3d2bf13d446bff423275XXXXd08::node:a761a49be1XXXXXXc7c9cc7ccd9baaf

Installing K3s on Worker Node and joining to the Master Node

jetson@worker1:~$ sudo curl -sfL https://get.k3s.io | K3S_URL=https://master1.dell.com:6443 K3S_TOKEN=K10a2fa03edec41872f9b4068ddcfb9afaf329e24bf25ca33a0dc879b3e02ea9805::node:f9613e3b73d8184277493911ddca4e6a  sh -
[INFO]  Finding latest release
[INFO]  Using v0.9.1 as release
[INFO]  Downloading hash https://github.com/rancher/k3s/releases/download/v0.9.1/sha256sum-arm64.txt
[INFO]  Skipping binary downloaded, installed k3s matches hash
[INFO]  Skipping /usr/local/bin/kubectl symlink to k3s, already exists
[INFO]  Skipping /usr/local/bin/crictl symlink to k3s, already exists
[INFO]  Skipping /usr/local/bin/ctr symlink to k3s, command exists in PATH at /usr/bin/ctr
[INFO]  Creating killall script /usr/local/bin/k3s-killall.sh
[INFO]  Creating uninstall script /usr/local/bin/k3s-agent-uninstall.sh
[INFO]  env: Creating environment file /etc/systemd/system/k3s-agent.service.env
[INFO]  systemd: Creating service file /etc/systemd/system/k3s-agent.service
[INFO]  systemd: Enabling k3s-agent unit
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/k3s-agent.service → /etc/systemd/system/k3s-agent.service.
[INFO]  systemd: Starting k3s-agent

jetson@master1:~$ sudo k3s kubectl get nodes
NAME               STATUS   ROLES    AGE     VERSION
master1.dell.com   Ready    master   7m45s   v1.15.4-k3s.1
worker1.dell.com   Ready    worker   24s     v1.15.4-k3s.1
jetson@master1:~$

Uninstalling k3s

/usr/local/bin/k3s-uninstall.sh 

Setting up Kubernetes Dashboard

jetson@master1:~$ cat k3s-dashboard.yaml
apiVersion: v1
kind: ServiceAccount
metadata:
  name: admin-user
  namespace: kube-system

---

apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: ClusterRoleBinding
metadata:
  name: admin-user
roleRef:
  apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io
  kind: ClusterRole
  name: cluster-admin
subjects:
- kind: ServiceAccount
  name: admin-user
  namespace: kube-system
jetson@master1:~$ sudo k3s kubectl apply -f k3s-dashboard.yaml
serviceaccount/admin-user created
clusterrolebinding.rbac.authorization.k8s.io/admin-user created
jetson@master1:~$ cat k3s-dashboard.yaml



Verifying if Kubernetes Dashboard Pods are up and Running

jetson@master1:~$ sudo k3s kubectl get po,svc,deploy -n kube-system
NAME                             READY   STATUS      RESTARTS   AGE
pod/coredns-66f496764-dgftj      1/1     Running     0          12m
pod/helm-install-traefik-skl9c   0/1     Completed   0          12m
pod/svclb-traefik-bxxpf          3/3     Running     0          11m
pod/traefik-d869575c8-wfnfx      1/1     Running     0          11m
pod/svclb-traefik-nkfms          3/3     Running     0          5m39s

NAME               TYPE           CLUSTER-IP      EXTERNAL-IP               PORT(S)                                     AGE
service/kube-dns   ClusterIP      10.43.0.10      <none>                    53/UDP,53/TCP,9153/TCP                      13m
service/traefik    LoadBalancer   10.43.213.124   192.168.1.3,192.168.1.6   80:32651/TCP,443:32650/TCP,8080:30917/TCP   11m

NAME                            READY   UP-TO-DATE   AVAILABLE   AGE
deployment.extensions/coredns   1/1     1            1           13m
deployment.extensions/traefik   1/1     1            1           11m

Enabling Kubeproxy

sudo k3s kubectl proxy
Starting to serve on 127.0.0.1:8001

Verifying if all Pods are successfully running

 sudo kubectl get po,deploy,svc -n kube-system
NAME                             READY   STATUS      RESTARTS   AGE
pod/coredns-66f496764-dgftj      1/1     Running     0          17m
pod/helm-install-traefik-skl9c   0/1     Completed   0          17m
pod/svclb-traefik-bxxpf          3/3     Running     0          16m
pod/traefik-d869575c8-wfnfx      1/1     Running     0          16m
pod/svclb-traefik-nkfms          3/3     Running     0          10m

NAME                            READY   UP-TO-DATE   AVAILABLE   AGE
deployment.extensions/coredns   1/1     1            1           17m
deployment.extensions/traefik   1/1     1            1           16m

NAME               TYPE           CLUSTER-IP      EXTERNAL-IP               PORT(S)                                     AGE
service/kube-dns   ClusterIP      10.43.0.10      <none>                    53/UDP,53/TCP,9153/TCP                      17m
service/traefik    LoadBalancer   10.43.213.124   192.168.1.3,192.168.1.6   80:32651/TCP,443:32650/TCP,8080:30917/TCP 

In my next blog post, I will showcase how GPU-enabled Kubernetes Pods can be deploy. Stay tuned !

Have Queries? Join https://launchpass.com/collabnix

Ajeet Raina Ajeet Singh Raina is a former Docker Captain, Community Leader and Arm Ambassador. He is a founder of Collabnix blogging site and has authored more than 570+ blogs on Docker, Kubernetes and Cloud-Native Technology. He runs a community Slack of 8900+ members and discord server close to 2200+ members. You can follow him on Twitter(@ajeetsraina).
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