Hetzner Provider

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Requirements

• Hetzner Cloud account and hcloud CLI

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Supported add-ons

• Dashboard: Provides a Kubernetes dashboard UI for the cluster.
• AWS Workload Identity: Allows your pods to assume AWS IAM Roles.
• AWS ECR: Allows pulling images from private ECR registries.
• Local Path Storage: Create PVCs backed by local volumes.
• Logs: Enable logging for pods and cluster auditing.

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Step 1 - Preparing the Hetzner Cloud Environment

1. Log in to Hetzner Cloud Account: Access your Hetzner Cloud account.
2. Create a New Project: Establish a new project named hetzner-mk8s-example.
3. Create an API Token:
   • Navigate to your newly created project.
   • Click on Security in the left sidebar, then proceed to API tokens.
   • Click on Generate API Token.
   • Grant Read & Write permissions to the token and copy it.
4. Store the Token in Control Plane Secrets Manager:
   • Log in to the Control Plane Console.
   • Click on Secrets in the left sidebar and then select New.
   • Choose Opaque as the secret type and name it hetzner-mk8s-example.
   • Store the API token’s value in this secret.
5. Create Network and Security Features in Project hetzner-mk8s-example on Hetzner:
   • Network (Required):
     • Click on Networks in the left sidebar.
     • Create a new network by selecting Create Network.
       The network zone should match the location you will use for your servers. For the Locations table, click here.
   • Firewall (Recommended):
     • Click on Firewalls in the left sidebar.
     • Create a new firewall by selecting Create Firewall.
   • SSH Key (Recommended):
     • Click on Security in the left sidebar.
     • Go to SSH Keys and click on Add SSH Key.

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Step 2 - Create a Managed Kubernetes Cluster Using a Manifest File

1. Connect with hcloud CLI: Use the command hcloud context create hetzner-mk8s-example and insert the API key from the previous step.
2. Capture the IDs: Obtain the ID of the network, and optionally the firewall and the ssh-key created in the previous step using the hcloud CLI.
   • Network: Use hcloud network list.
   • Firewall: Use hcloud firewall list.
   • SSH key: Use hcloud ssh-key list.
3. Update the manifest below: Modify the following hetzner-mk8s-example.yaml YAML manifest with actual values from above. Customize the file as needed. Replace the placeholders for firewallId, networkId, and sshKey.

kind: mk8s
name: hetzner-mk8s-example
description: An example of Hetzner mk8s
tags: {}
spec:
  provider:
    hetzner:
      dedicatedServerNodePools: []
      firewallId: '1111111'
      image: ubuntu-22.04
      networkId: '2222222'
      nodePools:
        - name: general
          labels:
            environment: hetzner-mk8s-example
          maxSize: 4
          minSize: 1
          serverType: cpx31
          taints: []
      region: hel1
      sshKey: '333333'
      tokenSecretLink: //secret/hetzner-mk8s-example
  addOns:
    dashboard: {}
    localPathStorage: {}
    awsWorkloadIdentity: {}
  firewall:
    - description: Default
      sourceCIDR: 0.0.0.0/0
  version: 1.28.2

• Add-ons: Includes Dashboard, Local Path Storage, and AWS Workload Identity.
• Location: The cluster’s Kubernetes control plane will be managed in the gcp-us-east1 location. Placing worker nodes close to the control plane is recommended for optimal performance.
• Kubernetes API Firewall: Utilizes the Default rule, allowing public access to the Kubernetes API. It is advisable to restrict API access to a known IP range for security purposes.
• Kubernetes Version: 1.28.2.
• Node Pool: A single general node pool, scaling on-demand between 1 and 4 nodes.
• Server Image: Ubuntu 22.04.

4. Create the Cluster: Deploy the hetzner-mk8s-example cluster by applying the manifest.
   • Console: Apply the hetzner-mk8s-example.yaml file using the cpln apply >_ option in the upper right corner.
   • CLI: Execute cpln apply -f hetzner-mk8s-example.yaml --org YOUR_ORG_HERE.
   Wait until the cluster is initialized.

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Step 3 - Accessing the Cluster

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1. Using the Terminal

1. Obtain the Cluster’s Kubeconfig File: Execute the command cpln mk8s kubeconfig hetzner-mk8s-example -f /tmp/hetzner-mk8s-example-conf.
2. Access the Cluster with kubectl: Use the obtained kubeconfig file by running export KUBECONFIG=/tmp/hetzner-mk8s-example-conf for the current shell session.

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2. Using Kubernetes Dashboard

1. Navigate to Control Plane Console: Visit the Control Plane Console.
2. Access the Dashboard: In the Control Plane Console, navigate to Kubernetes in the left sidebar panel and click on Open under Dashboard for the cluster hetzner-mk8s-example.