Allocate IPv6 Internet bandwidth to a pod

Configure IPv6 public network bandwidth for pods

By default, IPv6 addresses work only over internal networks. To expose a pod over the internet using its IPv6 address, you must allocate IPv6 Internet bandwidth through an IPv6 gateway and optionally configure egress-only rules. This topic describes how to install the required component, configure pod annotations, and verify the result.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, ensure that you have:

An ACS cluster with IPv6 dual-stack enabled. See Create an ACS cluster.
An IPv6 gateway in the cluster VPC with the ipv6gw controller enabled. See Create and manage an IPv6 gateway.

Limitations

The maximum bandwidth and the maximum number of egress-only rules depend on your IPv6 gateway specifications. For details, see Limits.

Install ack-extend-network-controller

The ack-extend-network-controller component calls Alibaba Cloud OpenAPI to provision resources and associate an IPv6 gateway with a pod using annotations.

Important

Before installing, check whether ack-extend-network-controller is already installed via Helm or ACK Marketplace. If it is, uninstall it first.

Log on to the ACS console and click Clusters in the left-side navigation pane.
On the Clusters page, click the ID of your cluster. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Operations > Add-ons.
Search for ACK Extend Network Controller and click Install in the lower-right corner of the component card.
Click OK.

The ipv6gw feature is selected by default. No RAM permissions need to be configured.

Configure pod annotations

Add the following annotations to a pod to allocate IPv6 Internet bandwidth, set the billing method, and optionally create egress-only rules.

Annotation	Description
`network.alibabacloud.com/ipv6-bandwidth`	IPv6 Internet bandwidth in Mbit/s. Valid values: 1–5000. For details, see AllocateIpv6InternetBandwidth.
`network.alibabacloud.com/ipv6-egress-only`	Set to an empty string (`""`) to create egress-only rules.
`network.alibabacloud.com/ipv6-internet-charge-type`	Billing method for IPv6 Internet bandwidth. Valid values: `PayByBandwidth` (default, pay-by-bandwidth) and `PayByTraffic` (pay-by-data-transfer). For details, see AllocateIpv6InternetBandwidth.

Deploy a pod with IPv6 Internet bandwidth

The following example deploys a pod with 10 Mbit/s IPv6 Internet bandwidth and egress-only rules enabled. Choose either the ACS console or kubectl.

Use the ACS console

Log on to the ACS console and click Clusters in the left-side navigation pane.
On the Clusters page, click the ID of your cluster. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Workloads > Deployments.

In the upper-left corner of the Deployments page, click Create from YAML. Replace the content in the Templates editor with the following and click Create.

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: example
  labels:
    app: example
spec:
  replicas: 1
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: example
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: example
      annotations:
        network.alibabacloud.com/ipv6-bandwidth: "10"                        # IPv6 Internet bandwidth: 10 Mbit/s
        network.alibabacloud.com/ipv6-egress-only: ""                        # Enable egress-only rules
        network.alibabacloud.com/ipv6-internet-charge-type: "PayByTraffic"   # Billing: pay-by-data-transfer
    spec:
      containers:
      - name: example
        image: nginx

On the Deployments page, click the name of the example Deployment to view the pod names.
Verify the configuration by running the following command with the pod name:
```
kubectl get podipv6gws.alibabacloud.com -oyaml <pod-name>
```

Use kubectl

Create a file named example.yaml with the following content.

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: example
  labels:
    app: example
spec:
  replicas: 1
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: example
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: example
      annotations:
        network.alibabacloud.com/ipv6-bandwidth: "10"                        # IPv6 Internet bandwidth: 10 Mbit/s
        network.alibabacloud.com/ipv6-egress-only: ""                        # Enable egress-only rules
        network.alibabacloud.com/ipv6-internet-charge-type: "PayByTraffic"   # Billing: pay-by-data-transfer
    spec:
      containers:
      - name: example
        image: nginx

Apply the manifest.

kubectl apply -f example.yaml

Expected output:

deployment.apps/example created

List the PodIPv6GW resources in the Deployment namespace to get the pod name.
```
kubectl get podipv6gws -n <namespace>
```

Check the PodIPv6GW resource for a specific pod.

kubectl get podipv6gws.alibabacloud.com -oyaml <pod-name>

Verify the configuration

After the pod is running, check the PodIPv6GW resource to confirm that the IPv6 gateway and bandwidth were provisioned correctly.

kubectl get podipv6gws.alibabacloud.com -oyaml example-674b897446-q****

Expected output:

apiVersion: alibabacloud.com/v1beta1
kind: PodIPv6GW
metadata:
  creationTimestamp: "2024-02-07T06:00:48Z"
  finalizers:
  - ipv6gw-controller.alibabacloud.com/finalizer
  generation: 1
  name: example-674b897446-q****
  namespace: default
  ownerReferences:
  - apiVersion: v1
    kind: Pod
    name: example-674b897446-q****
    uid: bdf86c45-7**5-4**4-b**3-9b****
  resourceVersion: "11488"
  uid: 78747d60-9**8-4**e-b**8-f7f7c****
spec:
  bandwidth: 10
  egressOnlyRule: true
  internetChargeType: PayByTraffic
  ipv6Address: 2408:4006:1115:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx
status:
  ipv6AddressID: ipv6-xxx
  ipv6EgressOnlyRuleID: ipv6py-xxx
  ipv6GatewayID: ipv6gw-xxx
  ipv6InternetBandwidthID: ipv6bw-xxx

The configuration is successful when:

`spec.bandwidth` matches the value you set (10 in this example).
`spec.egressOnlyRule: true` confirms egress-only rules are active.
`status.ipv6GatewayID` is non-empty, confirming the IPv6 gateway was associated.
`status.ipv6InternetBandwidthID` is non-empty, confirming the bandwidth plan was created.