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I would add one more important point about kubectl? If you don't work at Google, you don't need a complexity of kubernetes at all, so better forget everything

I would add one more important point about kubectl? If you don't work at Google, you don't need a complexity of kubernetes at all, so better forget everything you already know about it. The company would be grateful. Joke aside, trying to sell something to the masses that could potentially benefit only 0.001% of the projects is just insincere. Pure CV pump and dump scheme.

imglorp 5y ago
This is getting downvoted for cynicism maybe, but I feel it's the most important advice here. Know /when/ to use Kubernetes. It's very often the wrong tool to deploy our tiny app but many of us go along with it because it ticks some management boxes for various buzzwords, compliance, hipness, or whatever. Once you get out this hammer factory, it's a big and complicated one, so you will probably need a full time team to understand it and manage it. It's also a metric hammer factory, so you'll need to adapt all your other tooling to interoperate. Most of us can get by with lesser hammer factories, even k3s is less management. If you just need to deploy some containers, think hard if you want to buy the whole tool factory or just a hammer.
- nvarsj 5y ago
  This kind of comment is on every single HN post about Kubernetes and is tiresome. I also think it's off topic (TFA is about kubectl tricks, not about the merits of K8s).
  - busterarm 5y ago
    I think it's important to have comments like those as Google, who does not use Kubernetes, is exerting a lot of pressure on the industry to adopt it. It is an extremely complicated tool to learn to use well and companies act like there aren't reasonable alternatives. Those of us who have gone through it are often coming back with war stories saying to use something else. Some of us have invested thousands of man hours into this already and have strong opinions. At the very least, give Nomad a look. It is maybe a tenth of the effort to run for exactly the features most people want and then some. People need to be made aware that there are options. I have friends at companies that have large teams just dedicated to managing Kubernetes and they still deal with failure frequently or they spend their entire day-to-day tuning etcd.
- emptysongglass 5y ago
  We get paid because we know these tools. It's why we're desired: because the company thinks they want K8s or they're one foot in EKS and they're doubling down. We don't get hired because we dare to suggest they dismantle their pilot cluster and take a sharp turn into Nomad. Most of us aren't the engineering heads of our departments. So you'll forgive us if we continue pushing the moneymakers we have in our heads and setting up our homelab clusters. I want to be paid, I want to be paid well. It may as well be pushing the technology stack that scales to megacorps because who knows maybe I'll make it there one day.
kube-system 5y ago
Kubernetes is much more simple than what we would have to do without it, and my team is much much smaller than anything at Google. For what it does, it offers some good opinions for what might otherwise be a tangle of dev ops scripts. If what you want to deploy is best described as “an application” it’s probably not the right tool for the job. If what you want to deploy is best described as “50 interconnected applications” it’s probably going to save you time.
- pgwhalen 5y ago
  > If what you want to deploy is best described as “an application” it’s probably not the right tool for the job. If what you want to deploy is best described as “50 interconnected applications” it’s probably going to save you time. This is an excellent way of looking at it. I've struggled for many years to come up with a response to hacker news comments saying you don't need kubernetes, but this sums it up about as well as I could imagine.
- busterarm 5y ago
  As someone who runs both in production, Nomad would almost certainly meet your needs. Learning how to operate Kubernetes well takes a while and I would say is only worth the investment for a extremely tiny percentage of companies.
  - sgarland 5y ago
    Maybe, but for better or worse it's also become the industry standard, much like Terraform. If you don't know k8s and Terraform, you're shooting yourself in the foot for future jobs.
    - busterarm 5y ago
      K8s is an enormously complex piece of software and I haven't met a great many people who "know" it inside and out. Basic concepts and how to write a job/service/ingress, sure. Knowing the internals and how to operate it? I'd say that's only for specialists. Most people don't need to know what a Finalizer is or does. Most people aren't going to write operators. It is a multi-year investment of time to deeply understand this tool and it's not necessary for everyone.

imglorp 5y ago

This is getting downvoted for cynicism maybe, but I feel it's the most important advice here. Know /when/ to use Kubernetes. It's very often the wrong tool to deploy our tiny app but many of us go along with it because it ticks some management boxes for various buzzwords, compliance, hipness, or whatever. Once you get out this hammer factory, it's a big and complicated one, so you will probably need a full time team to understand it and manage it. It's also a metric hammer factory, so you'll need to adapt all your other tooling to interoperate. Most of us can get by with lesser hammer factories, even k3s is less management. If you just need to deploy some containers, think hard if you want to buy the whole tool factory or just a hammer.

nvarsj 5y ago
This kind of comment is on every single HN post about Kubernetes and is tiresome. I also think it's off topic (TFA is about kubectl tricks, not about the merits of K8s).
- busterarm 5y ago
  I think it's important to have comments like those as Google, who does not use Kubernetes, is exerting a lot of pressure on the industry to adopt it. It is an extremely complicated tool to learn to use well and companies act like there aren't reasonable alternatives. Those of us who have gone through it are often coming back with war stories saying to use something else. Some of us have invested thousands of man hours into this already and have strong opinions. At the very least, give Nomad a look. It is maybe a tenth of the effort to run for exactly the features most people want and then some. People need to be made aware that there are options. I have friends at companies that have large teams just dedicated to managing Kubernetes and they still deal with failure frequently or they spend their entire day-to-day tuning etcd.
emptysongglass 5y ago
We get paid because we know these tools. It's why we're desired: because the company thinks they want K8s or they're one foot in EKS and they're doubling down. We don't get hired because we dare to suggest they dismantle their pilot cluster and take a sharp turn into Nomad. Most of us aren't the engineering heads of our departments. So you'll forgive us if we continue pushing the moneymakers we have in our heads and setting up our homelab clusters. I want to be paid, I want to be paid well. It may as well be pushing the technology stack that scales to megacorps because who knows maybe I'll make it there one day.

kube-system 5y ago

Kubernetes is much more simple than what we would have to do without it, and my team is much much smaller than anything at Google. For what it does, it offers some good opinions for what might otherwise be a tangle of dev ops scripts. If what you want to deploy is best described as “an application” it’s probably not the right tool for the job. If what you want to deploy is best described as “50 interconnected applications” it’s probably going to save you time.

pgwhalen 5y ago
> If what you want to deploy is best described as “an application” it’s probably not the right tool for the job. If what you want to deploy is best described as “50 interconnected applications” it’s probably going to save you time. This is an excellent way of looking at it. I've struggled for many years to come up with a response to hacker news comments saying you don't need kubernetes, but this sums it up about as well as I could imagine.
busterarm 5y ago
As someone who runs both in production, Nomad would almost certainly meet your needs. Learning how to operate Kubernetes well takes a while and I would say is only worth the investment for a extremely tiny percentage of companies.
- sgarland 5y ago
  Maybe, but for better or worse it's also become the industry standard, much like Terraform. If you don't know k8s and Terraform, you're shooting yourself in the foot for future jobs.
  - busterarm 5y ago
    K8s is an enormously complex piece of software and I haven't met a great many people who "know" it inside and out. Basic concepts and how to write a job/service/ingress, sure. Knowing the internals and how to operate it? I'd say that's only for specialists. Most people don't need to know what a Finalizer is or does. Most people aren't going to write operators. It is a multi-year investment of time to deeply understand this tool and it's not necessary for everyone.