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Create EKS Cluster & Node Groups

Step-00: Introduction

  • Understand about EKS Core Objects
  • Control Plane
  • Worker Nodes & Node Groups
  • Fargate Profiles
  • VPC
  • Create EKS Cluster
  • Associate EKS Cluster to IAM OIDC Provider
  • Create EKS Node Groups
  • Verify Cluster, Node Groups, EC2 Instances, IAM Policies and Node Groups

Step-01: Create EKS Cluster using eksctl

  • It will take 15 to 20 minutes to create the Cluster Control Plane 
    # Create Cluster
eksctl create cluster --name=eksdemo1 \
                      --region=us-east-1 \
                      --zones=us-east-1a,us-east-1b \
                      --without-nodegroup 

# Get List of clusters
eksctl get clusters

Step-02: Create & Associate IAM OIDC Provider for our EKS Cluster

  • To enable and use AWS IAM roles for Kubernetes service accounts on our EKS cluster, we must create & associate OIDC identity provider.
  • To do so using eksctl we can use the below command.
  • Use latest eksctl version (as on today the latest version is 0.21.0) 
    # Template
eksctl utils associate-iam-oidc-provider \
    --region region-code \
    --cluster <cluter-name> \
    --approve

# Replace with region & cluster name
eksctl utils associate-iam-oidc-provider \
    --region us-east-1 \
    --cluster eksdemo1 \
    --approve

Step-03: Create EC2 Keypair

  • Create a new EC2 Keypair with name as kube-demo
  • This keypair we will use it when creating the EKS NodeGroup.
  • This will help us to login to the EKS Worker Nodes using Terminal.

Step-04: Create Node Group with additional Add-Ons in Public Subnets

  • These add-ons will create the respective IAM policies for us automatically within our Node Group role.
# Create Public Node Group   
eksctl create nodegroup --cluster=eksdemo1 \
                        --region=us-east-1 \
                        --name=eksdemo1-ng-public1 \
                        --node-type=t3.medium \
                        --nodes=2 \
                        --nodes-min=2 \
                        --nodes-max=4 \
                        --node-volume-size=20 \
                        --ssh-access \
                        --ssh-public-key=kube-demo \
                        --managed \
                        --asg-access \
                        --external-dns-access \
                        --full-ecr-access \
                        --appmesh-access \
                        --alb-ingress-access

AWS EKS - Elastic Kubernetes Service - Masterclass

Image

Step-05: Verify Cluster & Nodes

Verify NodeGroup subnets to confirm EC2 Instances are in Public Subnet

  • Verify the node group subnet to ensure it created in public subnets
  • Go to Services -> EKS -> eksdemo -> eksdemo1-ng1-public
  • Click on Associated subnet in Details tab
  • Click on Route Table Tab.
  • We should see that internet route via Internet Gateway (0.0.0.0/0 -> igw-xxxxxxxx)

Verify Cluster, NodeGroup in EKS Management Console

  • Go to Services -> Elastic Kubernetes Service -> eksdemo1

List Worker Nodes

# List EKS clusters
eksctl get cluster

# List NodeGroups in a cluster
eksctl get nodegroup --cluster=<clusterName>

# List Nodes in current kubernetes cluster
kubectl get nodes -o wide

# Our kubectl context should be automatically changed to new cluster
kubectl config view --minify

Verify Worker Node IAM Role and list of Policies

  • Go to Services -> EC2 -> Worker Nodes
  • Click on IAM Role associated to EC2 Worker Nodes

Verify Security Group Associated to Worker Nodes

  • Go to Services -> EC2 -> Worker Nodes
  • Click on Security Group associated to EC2 Instance which contains remote in the name.

Verify CloudFormation Stacks

  • Verify Control Plane Stack & Events
  • Verify NodeGroup Stack & Events

Login to Worker Node using Keypai kube-demo

  • Login to worker node 
    # For MAC or Linux or Windows10
ssh -i kube-demo.pem ec2-user@<Public-IP-of-Worker-Node>

# For Windows 7
Use putty

Step-06: Update Worker Nodes Security Group to allow all traffic

  • We need to allow All Traffic on worker node security group

Additional References

  • https://docs.aws.amazon.com/eks/latest/userguide/enable-iam-roles-for-service-accounts.html
  • https://docs.aws.amazon.com/eks/latest/userguide/create-service-account-iam-policy-and-role.html