Simplified Kubernetes Workflow: Launching Minikube on Hyper-V Compatible Windows 10 Machines

In today's software development landscape, online collaboration is the norm, especially when working with Kubernetes and cloud-based technologies. However, when developers find themselves without a reliable internet connection, having a local development environment that can run on a laptop and provide a basic Kubernetes setup is crucial for maintaining productivity.

In this article, I will demonstrate how minikube enables the deployment of functional Kubernetes as a single-node cluster on a laptop running Windows 10, utilizing the Hyper-V Hypervisor.

Let’s begin by installing and configuring minikube with Grafana, Prometheus, Helm, and Istio on Windows 10.

Development Machine Environment Prerequisites

• VT-x/AMD-v virtualization must be enabled in the BIOS (requires a machine restart)
• Enable Hyper-V: Navigate to “Windows features On or Off” and locate the Hyper-V section. Enable it, and then restart your machine.

Hyper-V Installation

Hyper-V has been included with Windows since Windows Server 2008, as well as Windows 8, 8.1, and 10 in the Pro versions. It can be enabled from the Control Panel at “Turn Windows features On or Off” under “Programs and Features.” Activate the “Hyper-V” checkbox, apply the change, and follow the on-screen instructions.

Network Configuration

First, you need to configure a new virtual switch to enable your virtual machine to connect to the internet. Once Hyper-V is enabled, launch the Hyper-V Manager.

Configuration can be done via the GUI by opening PowerShell as Administrator and running Hyper-V Manager

mmc.exe virtmgmt.msc

Source: https://computerstechnicians.com/it/architecture/streamlined-kubernetes-development-running-minikube-on-hyper-v-enabled-windows-10-systems/

Alternatively, we can utilize PowerShell exclusively for the remaining configurations.

Establishing an External Switch

Using PowerShell (run as Administrator)

• Retrieve a list of the network adapters in the host. Typically, you should see “Ethernet” and “Wi-Fi” on a laptop.

Get-NetAdapter

• Create the external switch, naming it VM-External-Switch, and bind it to the network adapter named Wi-Fi retrieved from the previous command. You may need to modify the -NetAdapterName to an interface connected to the internet.

New-VMSwitch -name ExternalSwitch  -NetAdapterName "Ethernet 3"  -AllowManagementOS $true

The most straightforward way to install minikube is to deploy it via choco.

Chocolatey is a Windows package manager, similar to apt-get or yum, designed to facilitate rapid installation of applications and tools. Built on the NuGet infrastructure, it utilizes PowerShell as its primary focus for delivering packages.

Follow the Installation Guide or execute the below PowerShell commands

Using PowerShell (run as Administrator):

Set-ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Scope Process -Force; iex ((New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadString(‘https://chocolatey.org/install.ps1'))

Using cmd (run as Administrator):

@”%SystemRoot%\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe” -NoProfile -InputFormat None -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Command “iex ((New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadString(‘https://chocolatey.org/install.ps1'))" && SET “PATH=%PATH%;%ALLUSERSPROFILE%\chocolatey\bin”

Once installed, check for any available upgrades for Chocolatey:

choco upgrade chocolatey

Install the kubectl CLI:

choco install kubernetes-cli

Set up minikube:

Using PowerShell (run as Administrator):

choco install minikube

Verify minikube installation:

minikube version

Explore available Kubernetes versions:

minikube get-k8s-versions

Update minikube:

minikube update-check

Initialize minikube

Review available initialization options:

minikube.exe start — help

•  vm-driver Hyper-V: Specifies the Hypervisor driver to utilize
•  cpus 4: Allocates the number of CPU “cores”, defaulting to 2 if unspecified
•  memory=4096: Allocates the amount of RAM, defaulting to 2048 if unspecified
•  hyperv-virtual-switch “VM-External-Switch”: Specifies the virtual network switch to utilize, “VM-External-Switch” created in previous steps
•  kubernetes-version string: Specifies the version of Kubernetes to install (e.g., v1.2.3)

Post-minikube Installation

• Halt minikube k8s VM

minikube stop

Disable Dynamic RAM allocation in Hyper-V

Set-VMMemory minikube -DynamicMemoryEnabled $false

Restart minikube k8s VM

minikube start

Deploy additional Kubernetes components

List minikube addons

minikube addons list

Enable Heapster for cluster performance monitoring

minikube addons enable heapster

Post-installation checks for minikube

Check minikube status

minikube status
minikube service list

Launch Kubernetes dashboard

minikube dashboard

Verify dashboard URL

minikube dashboard — url

Establish a secure shell connection to minikube

minikube ssh

Execute kubectl commands against minikube

kubectl config use-context minikube
kubectl config current-context
kubectl get po -n kube-system
kubectl get po — all-namespaces
kubectl get all — all-namespaces
kubectl api-versions | grep rbac
kubectl version
kubectl cluster-info
kubectl api-versions

Test minikube Kubernetes deployment

kubectl run hello-minikube — image=k8s.gcr.io/echoserver:1.4 — port=8080
kubectl expose deployment hello-minikube — type=NodePort
kubectl get services
kubectl get deploy
kubectl get pod

Determine IP address

minikube ip

Find mapped port number

kubectl describe service hello-minikube
kubectl get svc hello-minikube

curl http://$IP:$PORT

Remove testing deployment

kubectl delete services hello-minikube
kubectl delete deployment hello-minikube

eval $(minikube docker-env)
docker info

Minikube Add-Ons

Enumerate minikube available add-ons

minikube addons list

Activate Ingress for minikube K8s

minikube addons enable ingress

Activate Elastic Fluentd Kibana

minikube addons enable efk

Install Helm cli and initialise tiller

choco install kubernetes-helmhelm init

Post Helm installation configuration

kubectl — namespace=kube-system edit deployment/tiller-deploy

Modify automountServiceAccountToken to true

automountServiceAccountToken true

Alternatively, you can do it in one command

kubectl patch deploy --namespace kube-system tiller-deploy -p '{"spec":{"template":{"spec":{"automountServiceAccountToken":true}}}}'

Verify Helm Installation

helm version
helm search
kubectl get svc -n kube-system
helm ls — debug

Upgrade Helm

helm init --upgrade

Update Helm Repositories

helm repo update

Let’s attempt to deploy some packages and inspect using MySQL as an example.

helm inspect stable/mysql
helm install stable/mysql

Install Helm Packages for Prometheus and Grafana.

helm install stable/prometheus
helm install stable/grafana

Access Prometheus.

• Obtain the Prometheus Server URL

• Get the POD_NAME for the running Prometheus server

kubectl get pods — namespace default -l “app=prometheus,component=server” -o jsonpath=”{.items[0].metadata.name}”

Note: Replace $POD_NAME with the output from the previous command

kubectl — namespace default port-forward $POD_NAME 9090

Obtain the Alertmanager URL

Get the POD_NAME for the running Prometheus alert manager

kubectl get pods — namespace default -l “app=prometheus,component=alertmanager” -o jsonpath=”{.items[0].metadata.name}”

   Note: Replace $POD_NAME with the output from the previous command  

kubectl — namespace default port-forward $POD_NAME 9093

Obtain the PushGateway URL

Get the POD_NAME for the running Prometheus push gateway

kubectl get pods — namespace default -l “app=prometheus,component=pushgateway” -o jsonpath=”{.items[0].metadata.name}”

Replace $POD_NAME with the output from the previous command

kubectl — namespace default port-forward $POD_NAME 9091

Gain Access to Grafana

Retrieve your ‘admin’ user password in base64 and decode it by executing:

Note: This method is exclusive to Linux environments.

kubectl get secret — namespace default interested-moth-grafana -o jsonpath=”{.data.admin-password}” | base64 — decode ; echo

• Obtain the Grafana URL

• Retrieve the POD_NAME for running Grafana

kubectl get pods — namespace default -l “app=grafana” -o jsonpath=”{.items[0].metadata.name}”

  Note: Replace $POD_NAME with the output from the previous command.

kubectl — namespace default port-forward $POD_NAME 3000

Deploy the Kubernetes dashboard for Docker Kubernetes (note: Minikube comes with the dashboard pre-deployed)

helm install stable/kubernetes-dashboard
kubectl proxy

In your web browser, access the Kubernetes dashboard using the following link:

http://localhost:8001/ui

Alternatively, open in your browser:

http://localhost:8001/api/v1/namespaces/kube-system/services/https:kubernetes-dashboard:/proxy/

Install Istio.

git clone https://github.com/istio/istio.git
cd istio
kubectl create -f install/kubernetes/helm/helm-service-account.yaml
helm init — service-account tiller
helm install install/kubernetes/helm/istio — name istio
helm delete — purge istio