Download Kubernetes Windows
Aide Broeckel
Windows applications constitute a large portion of the services and applications thatrun in many organizations. Windows containersprovide a way to encapsulate processes and package dependencies, making it easierto use DevOps practices and follow cloud native patterns for Windows applications.
Organizations with investments in Windows-based applications and Linux-basedapplications don't have to look for separate orchestrators to manage their workloads,leading to increased operational efficiencies across their deployments, regardlessof operating system.
To enable the orchestration of Windows containers in Kubernetes, include Windows nodesin your existing Linux cluster. Scheduling Windows containers inPods on Kubernetes is similar toscheduling Linux-based containers.
In order to run Windows containers, your Kubernetes cluster must includemultiple operating systems.While you can only run the control plane on Linux,you can deploy worker nodes running either Windows or Linux.
From an API and kubectl perspective, Windows containers behave in much the sameway as Linux-based containers. However, there are some notable differences in keyfunctionality which are outlined in this section.
In the above list, wildcards (*) indicate all elements in a list.For example, spec.containers[*].securityContext refers to the SecurityContext objectfor all containers. If any of these fields is specified, the Pod willnot be admitted by the API server.
Pods, workload resources, and Services are critical elements to managing Windowsworkloads on Kubernetes. However, on their own they are not enough to enablethe proper lifecycle management of Windows workloads in a dynamic cloud nativeenvironment.
Container exit codes follow the same convention where 0 is success, and nonzero is failure.The specific error codes may differ across Windows and Linux. However, exit codespassed from the Kubernetes components (kubelet, kube-proxy) are unchanged.
The kubelet can now request that pods running on Windows nodes use the host's network namespace insteadof creating a new pod network namespace. To enable this functionality pass --feature-gates=WindowsHostNetwork=true to the kubelet.
Kubernetes maintains a multi-architecture image that includes support for Windows.For Kubernetes v1.30.0 the recommended pause image is registry.k8s.io/pause:3.6.The source codeis available on GitHub.
Microsoft maintains a different multi-architecture image, with Linux and Windowsamd64 support, that you can find as mcr.microsoft.com/oss/kubernetes/pause:3.6.This image is built from the same source as the Kubernetes maintained image butall of the Windows binaries are authenticode signed by Microsoft.The Kubernetes project recommends using the Microsoft maintained image if you aredeploying to a production or production-like environment that requires signedbinaries.
On Windows nodes, strict compatibility rules apply where the host OS version mustmatch the container base image OS version. Only Windows containers with a containeroperating system of Windows Server 2019 are fully supported.
Refer toHardware requirements for Windows Server Microsoft documentationfor the most up-to-date information on minimum hardware requirements. For guidance on deciding on resources forproduction worker nodes refer to Production worker nodes Kubernetes documentation.
To optimize system resources, if a graphical user interface is not required,it may be preferable to use a Windows Server OS installation that excludesthe Windows Desktop Experienceinstallation option, as this configuration typically frees up more systemresources.
In assessing disk space for Windows worker nodes, take note that Windows container images are typically larger thanLinux container images, with container image sizes rangingfrom 300MB to over 10GBfor a single image. Additionally, take note that the C: drive in Windows containers represents a virtual free size of20GB by default, which is not the actual consumed space, but rather the disk size for which a single container can growto occupy when using local storage on the host.See Containers on Windows - Container Storage Documentationfor more detail.
Some additional, Windows-specific troubleshooting help is includedin this section. Logs are an important element of troubleshootingissues in Kubernetes. Make sure to include them any time you seektroubleshooting assistance from other contributors. Follow theinstructions in theSIG Windows contributing guide on gathering logs.
If you have what looks like a bug, or you would like tomake a feature request, please follow the SIG Windows contributing guide to create a new issue.You should first search the list of issues in case it wasreported previously and comment with your experience on the issue and add additionallogs. SIG Windows channel on the Kubernetes Slack is also a great avenue to get some initial support andtroubleshooting ideas prior to creating a ticket.
The Kubernetes project provides a Windows Operational Readiness specification,accompanied by a structured test suite. This suite is split into two sets of tests,core and extended, each containing categories aimed at testing specific areas.It can be used to validate all the functionalities of a Windows and hybrid system(mixed with Linux nodes) with full coverage.
Items on this page refer to third party products or projects that provide functionality required by Kubernetes. The Kubernetes project authors aren't responsible for those third-party products or projects. See the CNCF website guidelines for more details.
Hi, Does anyone know where are the images stored in the node or cluster? In my windows node, I tried to find it by tying docker image ls or ctr image ls; none of them can find any; also in the Linux node, please? Because I tried to delete some images but in vain. Many thanks!
This is giving error:
Failed to auto detect backend type. IPIP is not supported on Windows nodes but found IP pools with IPIP enabled. Rerun
install script with the CalicoBackend param provided
At C:\k\install-calico-windows.ps1:179 char:16
I think I am running into this same problem connecting a windows server 2022 Standard to a microk8s cluster running 1.27.2. I follow the steps outlined but when I query for nodes in the cluster after copying the kube config over and starting the kubelet service, but still no windows node. Is there any troubleshooting forum/slack/email that I can request help through?
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I had a kubernetes single node cluster on my windows 10 machine. Due some errors I had to reinstall the Docker Desktop and since then kubernetes installation has failed while docker installed successfully. All attempts to resolve e.g. deleting the config file in .kube directory and complete reinstallation have failed. See attached pix for details. Installed docker version is Docker version 18.09.2, build 6247962. All search online efforts do not yield a possible solution. I would appreciate pointers to a solution or walk-around.
In my case, it was- x509: certificate is valid for docker-for-desktop, kubernetes, kubernetes.default, kubernetes.default.svc, kubernetes.default.svc.cluster.local, host.docker.internal, not vm.docker.internal
**To add a windows environment variable, type environment on windows search and open 'Edit the system environment variables' or open it directly from Control Panel. Click environment variables button and add a new one to the system variables
After investigation, there were solutions with .kube and config deletion, pki and similar. I also investigated whether the network setup and company policies, dns and similar would have an impact. All was partially posible but none provided solution.
The only solution that worked was to Uninstall and Install the latest stable Docker Desktop. So, my understanding is that since there are a lot of upgrades on this docker setup over time, some config or part of installation made a confusion and unrecovarable kubernetes setup/first start.
Hi, I recently rebooted y win 10 where I have Docker desktop up-to-date version (updated 3 days back).
Docker engine starts and I can see it in green state but Kubernetes always in red status with a message indication
and Reset kubernetes while I was checking the output of ps aux in the terminal (in the VM). I saw a kubeadm init command running and then stopping, so I copied the command out to ran manually, but I had to find out where I had to run it. I had the process ID from the ps aux command output so I used the same nsenter command that I used to get into the VM, but in this case I had to use that ID instead of 1. Finally I realized that was actually the container that runs the Docker daemon. So I ran this command (in the VM)
I am not sure once I issue
docker run --rm -it --privileged --pid host nicolaka/netshoot nsenter --all -t 1
then how can acces the VM and what is the relation beteen Kubernetes and the this VM !
Ok I will check this tomorrow morning as it is too late now in Paris. But what is strange as you can notice in the last snapshot I have 2 api server container, 1 is off after 7 seconds the 2nd is up and running
This is my case, I am Devops Expert and not end users, I do a lot of POCs and help companies to start their journies around the new technologies. I use docker since 2015 and have solved so many problems as well as Kubernetes on Ubuntu. I started recently enabling kubernetes with docker desktop for demo sakes and rapid POCs or teach some dev members
Hello again rimelek, well I did the following
1 - I upgraded docker 4.25 to 4.26 it did not help
1 - Purge Clean data (which is a radical solution) once it finished Docker and kubernetes STARTED again but I lost all my images and containers.