Getting Started with Minikube

Getting Started with Minikube and Kubernetes: Creating and Exposing a Deployment

When working with Kubernetes locally, Minikube provides an easy-to-use environment for spinning up clusters. In this tutorial, you will learn how to create a Kubernetes deployment, expose it as a service, and access the service via the terminal.

Prerequisites

• Installed Minikube
• Installed kubectl (Kubernetes CLI)

Step 1: Create a Deployment

The first step is to create a Kubernetes deployment. We will use a simple echo server for this purpose.

kubectl create deployment hello-minikube1 --image=kicbase/echo-server:1.0

This command will create a deployment called hello-minikube1 using the kicbase/echo-server Docker image.

Step 2: Expose the Deployment

To make this deployment accessible, you need to expose it as a NodePort service:

kubectl expose deployment hello-minikube1 --type=NodePort --port=8080

The --type=NodePort flag allows external access to the service via a random high port on the node.

Step 3: Retrieve Service Information

To get details about the exposed service, run:

kubectl get svc

This will show output similar to the following:

NAME            TYPE        CLUSTER-IP       EXTERNAL-IP   PORT(S)          AGE
hello-minikube1 NodePort    10.104.246.206   <none>        8080:32342/TCP   12s

Here, the service is exposed on port 32342.

Step 4: Access the Service

You can now access the service using Minikube’s built-in command:

minikube service hello-minikube1 --url

This will give you the URL to access the echo server, something like:

http://192.168.49.2:32342

Step 5: Verify the Service

To confirm that the service is up and running, open another terminal and use the curl command:

curl http://192.168.49.2:32342

You should see a response similar to:

Request served by hello-minikube1-67bf99b564-fwrrv

This confirms that your deployment is running and accessible.

Step 6: Inspect the NodePort

You can further verify the NodePort being used with the following command:

kubectl get service hello-minikube1 --output='jsonpath="{.spec.ports[0].nodePort}"'

This outputs the NodePort (32342 in this case).

Step 7: Tunneling with Docker

If you need to establish a secure tunnel to your Minikube cluster via SSH, use the following command:

ps -ef | grep docker@127.0.0.1
ssh -o UserKnownHostsFile=/dev/null -o StrictHostKeyChecking=no -N docker@127.0.0.1 -p 55972 -i /Users/FOO/.minikube/machines/minikube/id_rsa -L TUNNEL_PORT:CLUSTER_IP:TARGET_PORT

This command will open a tunnel to your Minikube cluster for advanced use cases.

Bonus: Load Balancing with Minikube

Minikube also provides load balancing capabilities. You can access a service using the following command:

minikube service my-httpbin --url

This is a convenient way to simulate production-level load balancing scenarios in your local environment.

Conclusion

By following this guide, you’ve successfully created a Kubernetes deployment using Minikube, exposed it as a service, and accessed it using simple terminal commands. This process is an excellent starting point for learning more about Kubernetes and how it handles deployments, services, and load balancing.