Create a managed edge cluster

This topic describes how to create a managed edge cluster in the Alibaba Cloud Container Service for Kubernetes (ACK) console. Managed edge clusters are designed to bring cloud computing to edges (clients). Managed edge clusters can be created, managed, and maintained in the ACK console. ACK is a platform developed based on the edge computing infrastructure and integrated with cloud computing and edge computing.

1. Log on to the Container Service console.
2. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Clusters > Clusters.
3. On the Clusters page, click Create Kubernetes Cluster in the upper-right corner.
4. On the Select Cluster Template page that appears, select Edge Cluster (Preview) and click Create.
   The Managed Edge Kubernetes (Preview) page appears.
5. Configure the cluster.

   Configure basic settings

   Parameter	Description
   Cluster Name	Enter the name of the cluster. Note The name must be 1 to 63 characters in length and can contain digits, letters, and hyphens (-).
   Region	Select the region where the cluster is deployed.
   Resource Group	Move the pointer over All Resources at the top of the page, and select the resource group where the cluster is deployed. The name of the selected resource group is displayed.
   Kubernetes Version	The supported Kubernetes versions.
   VPC	Set a VPC network for the cluster. Note Kubernetes clusters support only VPC networks. Select a VPC network from the drop-down list. If no VPC network is available, click Create VPC. For more information, see Create a VPC network.
   VSwitch	Select one or more VSwitches. Note You can select up to three VSwitches deployed in different zones. If no VSwitch is available, click Create VSwitch. For more information, see Create a VSwitch.
   Pod CIDR Block	If you select Flannel, you must specify Pod CIDR Block. The CIDR blocks specified by Pod CIDR Block and Service CIDR cannot overlap with that of the VPC network or existing ACK clusters in the VPC network. The CIDR Block cannot be modified after it is specified. The Service CIDR block cannot overlap with the Pod CIDR block. For more information about network segmentation of ACK clusters, see Plan Kubernetes CIDR blocks under a VPC.
   Service CIDR
   Configure SNAT	Specify whether to configure Source Network Address Translation (SNAT) rules for the VPC network. You must configure an SNAT gateway for an edge cluster. ACK automatically selects an existing NAT gateway in the VPC network. If the VPC network does not have a NAT gateway, the system automatically creates one.
   Public Access	Specify whether to expose API server with EIP. Note Edge nodes need to call API operations over the Internet. If you clear the Expose API Server with EIP check box, the edge nodes cannot be connected to the edge cluster. As a result, the created cluster cannot be used in edge computing scenarios. The ACK API Server provides multiple HTTP-based RESTful APIs, which can be used to create, delete, modify, query, and monitor resources such as pods and services. If you select this check box, an Elastic IP address is created, and port 6443 used by the API Server is opened on master nodes. You can connect and manage the cluster by using kubeconfig over the Internet. If you clear this check box, no Elastic IP address is created. You can only connect to and manage the cluster through kubeconfig from within the VPC network.
   RDS Whitelist	Add the IP addresses of nodes to the RDS whitelist.

   Advanced settings

   Parameter	Description
   Labels	Attach labels to the cluster. Enter keys and values, and then click Add. Note Key is required. Value is optional. Keys are not case-sensitive. A key must be 1 to 64 characters in length and cannot start with aliyun, http://, or https://. Values are not case-sensitive. A value must be 1 to 128 characters in length and cannot start with http:// or https://. The keys of labels attached to the same resource must be unique. If you add a label with a used key, the label overwrites the one using the same key. You can attach up to 20 labels to each resource. If you attach more than 20 labels to a resource, all labels become invalid. You must detach unused labels for the remaining labels to take effect.
   Delete Protection	Specify whether to enable Deletion Protection. If you select this check box, the cluster cannot be deleted in the console or through the API. This avoids user errors.

6. Click Next:Worker Configurations to configure worker nodes.
   Note In a managed edge cluster, you must configure at least one worker node for deploying components.

   Parameter	Description
   Instance Type	Set instance types of worker nodes. You can select multiple instance types. For more information, see Instance families. Note To use advanced features such as logging, monitoring, and reverse tunneling, you must deploy the corresponding components in the cloud. Therefore, you must create at least one ECS instance-based worker node to deploy these components.
   Selected Types	The selected instance types are displayed.
   Quantity	Set the number of worker nodes.
   System Disk	Set the system disks of worker nodes. SSDs and ultra disks are supported.
   Mount Data Disk	Set the data disks that are mounted to the worker nodes. SSDs and ultra disks are supported.
   Logon Type	Note If you select the Install the CloudMonitor Agent on ECS Nodes or Enable Log Service check box, you must set the logon type for the ECS instance-based nodes. Key Pair: If you want to use a key pair, click create a key pair to create a key pair in the ECS console. For more information, see Create an SSH key pair. After the key pair is created, set it as the credentials for logging on to the cluster. Password: Password: Enter the password. Confirm Password: Enter the password again.
   Key Pair

7. Click Next:Component Configurations to configure components.

   Parameter	Description
   CloudMonitor Agent	Specify whether to install the Cloud Monitor agent. After the Cloud Monitor agent is installed on ECS instances, you can view monitoring information about the nodes in the Cloud Monitor console. The Prometheus monitoring service is available to users in the whitelist.
   Log Service	Specify whether to enable Log Service. You can select an existing project or create a project. If you select the Enable Log Service check box, the Log Service plug-in is automatically installed in the cluster. For more information about how to set up Log Service when you create an application, see Use Log Service to collect Kubernetes logs. If you select the Enable Log Service check box, you can specify whether to create an Ingress dashboard or create an Event Center in the Log Service console.
   Workflow Engine	Specify whether to use Alibaba Cloud Genomics Compute Service (AGS). If you select this check box, the system automatically installs the AGS workflow plug-in during cluster creation. If you clear this check box, you must manually install the AGS workflow plug-in. For more information, see Introduction to AGS CLI.

8. Click Next:Confirm Order.
9. Select the Terms of Service check box and click Create Cluster.
   Note It takes about 10 minutes to create a managed edge cluster.

Result

After the cluster is created, you can find the cluster on the Clusters page in the ACK console.

Click View Logs in the Actions column. On the Log Information page that appears, you can view cluster logs. To view more log information, click Stack events.

On the Clusters page, find the newly created cluster and click Manage in the Actions column. On the page that appears, you can view basic information about the cluster and corresponding connections.

The following information is displayed:

• API Server Public Endpoint: the IP address and port that the Kubernetes API server uses to provide services over the Internet. It allows you to manage the cluster by using kubectl or other tools on the client.
• API Server Internal Endpoint: the IP address and port that the Kubernetes API Server uses to provide services within the cluster. The endpoint belongs to the SLB instance bound to the cluster.
• Pod CIDR Block: the CIDR block of the pods in the cluster.
• Service CIDR: the CIDR block of the services in the cluster for users to access the services over the Internet.
• Testing Domain: the domain name that is used for service testing. The suffix of the domain is <cluster_id>.<region_id>.alicontainer.com.
• Pods on Each Node: the maximum number of pods that can run on each node. Default value: 128.
• Network plug-in: only the Flannel plug-in is supported.

You can use kubectl and run the kubectl get node command to connect to the cluster and view the information about the nodes in the cluster. For more information, see Connect to Kubernetes clusters through kubectl.