Container Service for Kubernetes:Create and manage hybrid cloud node pools

Prerequisites

Before you begin, ensure that you have:

• An ACK managed Pro cluster with:

  • A virtual private cloud (VPC) that has cross-cloud network connectivity established

  • Kubernetes version 1.33 or later

• At least one Elastic Compute Service (ECS) node in the cluster to host critical ACK management components. For high availability, use at least three ECS nodes.

• The Terway Hybrid network plugin installed in the cluster

Default label and taint behavior

To prevent unintended impact on existing workloads, nodes in a hybrid cloud node pool are created with the following default label and taint:

apiVersion: v1
kind: Node
metadata:
  labels:
    alibabacloud.com/nodepool-type: hybridcloud
...
spec:
  taints:
  - effect: NoSchedule
    key: nodepool-type
    value: "hybridcloud"
...

To schedule pods onto hybrid nodes, add a toleration for this taint to your pod specifications. If your workloads do not need to distinguish between cloud and on-premises nodes, remove the taint.

Create a hybrid cloud node pool

Some settings, such as availability and networking, cannot be changed after the node pool is created. Creating a node pool does not affect existing node pools or their workloads.

1. Log on to the ACK console. In the left navigation pane, click Clusters.

2. On the Clusters page, click the name of the target cluster. In the left navigation pane, choose Nodes > Node Pools.

3. On the Node Pools page, click ... next to Create Node Pool, then click Create Hybrid Cloud Node Pool.

4. In the dialog box, configure the following parameters:

   Parameter	Description
   Node pool name	A unique name for the node pool. For example, hybrid-nodepool-mexxSA.
   Zone	A custom logical zone name. For example, idc-zone-1. Must be unique within the cluster.
   Network plug-in	Use CNI (Terway-Hybrid) (recommended): ensures network connectivity between pods running on-premises and in the cloud. If the Terway-Hybrid Container Network Interface (CNI) component is not installed, install it from the Add-ons page first. See Terway Hybrid network plugin. Configure CNI: select this if you need specific CNI features and want to install a custom CNI plugin.
   Network type	underlay: high performance with low latency by eliminating VXLAN encapsulation overhead. Approximately 20% higher performance than overlay mode. overlay: simple configuration and flexible deployment with no special requirements for the underlying network.

5. Click OK to create the node pool.

After the node pool is created, modify its settings on the Edit Node Pool page.

Add nodes to a hybrid cloud node pool

Add your existing on-premises or third-party cloud servers as worker nodes using one of two methods.

Remove nodes from a hybrid cloud node pool

1. On the Clusters page, click the name of the target cluster. In the left navigation pane, choose Nodes > Node Pools.

2. Click the target node pool name. On the details page, select the nodes to remove and click Batch Remove.

Billing

Costs comprise three parts:

• The cluster management fee

• The hybrid cloud node management fee (currently waived during the preview period)

• The costs of any associated cloud resources

Supported operating systems

The following table lists the operating systems supported by hybrid cloud node pools. For operating systems not in this list, contact your business manager for an evaluation.