The first time you use Container Service for Kubernetes (ACK), you must assign system roles to ACK with your Alibaba Cloud account. Only after you assign these roles to ACK, ACK can create clusters, save logs, and use resources in other cloud services, such as Elastic Compute Service (ECS), Object Storage Service (OSS), File Storage NAS (NAS), and Server Load Balancer (SLB). This topic describes how to activate ACK and other cloud services, assign system roles to ACK, and create an ACK managed cluster.
1. Activate ACK and assign roles to ACK
You must activate ACK before you can create an ACK cluster. If ACK is not activated, you cannot create ACK clusters. The following steps describe how to activate ACK and assign default roles to ACK.
Activate ACK
Go to the Container Service for Kubernetes page. Read and select Terms of Service. Then, click Activate Now.
Assign roles to ACK
The first time you log on to the ACK console, click Agree to Authorization on the Container service needs to create default roles page. This way, ACK can assume the relevant default roles to use resources in other cloud services to create, manage, and maintain clusters. Perform the following steps to assign roles to ACK:
Log on to the ACK console. Click Go to RAM console to go to the Cloud Resource Access Authorization page. On the Cloud Resource Access Authorization page, click Agree to Authorization. After you assign roles to ACK, refresh the ACK console to get started with ACK.
For more information about the permissions of the ACK roles, see ACK roles.
2. Activate other cloud services
The following table describes the cloud services that are required for creating, using, and managing ACK clusters. You can click the hyperlink in the Service link column to activate the corresponding cloud service with your Alibaba Cloud account. You must use your Alibaba Cloud account to activate cloud services. Resource Access Management (RAM) users are not allowed to activate cloud services. If you want to authorize a RAM user to manage activated cloud services, refer to FAQ about authorization management.
Required: the cloud services that you must activate. These services must be activated so that ACK clusters can function as normal.
Recommended: the cloud services that we recommend you to activate. You can choose to use these services when you create ACK clusters and manage applications.
Optional: the services that you can activate based on the architecture and O&M strategy.
3. Create a cluster
ACK provides various cluster parameters that you can configure to meet different requirements of your applications. If you want to create a test ACK managed cluster in the test environment, you can use the default settings for most cluster parameters. The following example shows how to quickly create an ACK managed cluster. For more information about how to create an ACK managed cluster in the production environment, see Create an ACK managed cluster.
Log on to the ACK console. On the Clusters page, click Create Kubernetes Cluster.
In the upper part of the page that appears, click the ACK Managed Cluster tab. Select Professional for Cluster Specification. If you need to access the cluster over the Internet, select Expose API server with EIP. Then, click Next:Node Pool Configurations in the lower-right corner of the page.
In the Instance Type section, select an instance type that provides 4 vCores and 8 GiB of memory, such as ecs.c6.xlarge, which belongs to the c6 compute-optimized instance family. Then, click Next:Component Configurations in the lower-right corner of the page.
Select ACK Cluster Monitoring Basic Edition for Monitor container. You can use ACK Cluster Monitoring Basic Edition free of charge. Then, click Next:Confirm Order in the lower-right corner of the page.
Click Create Cluster in the lower-right corner of the page.