Preparing GKE resources for the GitLab chart
For a fully functional GitLab instance, you will need a few resources before deploying the GitLab chart. The following is how these charts are deployed and tested within GitLab.
Creating the GKE cluster
To get started easier, a script is provided to automate the cluster creation. Alternatively, a cluster can be created manually as well.
Prerequisites:
- Install the prerequisites.
- Install the Google SDK.
Scripted cluster creation
A bootstrap script has been created to automate much of the setup process for users on GCP/GKE.
The script will:
- Create a new GKE cluster.
- Allow the cluster to modify DNS records.
- Setup
kubectl, and connect it to the cluster.
The script reads various parameters from environment variables and the argument
up for bootstrap or down for clean up.
The table below describes all variables.
| Variable | Description | Default value |
|---|---|---|
| REGION | The region where your cluster lives | us-central1 |
| ZONE_EXTENSION | The extension (a, b, c) of the zone name where your cluster instances live | b |
| CLUSTER_NAME | The name of the cluster | gitlab-cluster |
| CLUSTER_VERSION | The version of your GKE cluster | GKE default, check the GKE release notes |
| MACHINE_TYPE | The cluster instances’ type | n2d-standard-4 |
| NUM_NODES | The number of nodes required. | 2 |
| AUTOSCALE_MIN_NODES | The minimum number of nodes the autoscaler should scale down to. | 0 |
| AUTOSCALE_MAX_NODES | The maximum number of nodes the autoscaler should scale up to. | NUM_NODES |
| PROJECT | The ID of your GCP project | No defaults, required to be set. |
| ADMIN_USER | The user to assign cluster-admin access to during setup | current gcloud user |
| RBAC_ENABLED | If you know whether your cluster has RBAC enabled set this variable. | true |
| PREEMPTIBLE | Cheaper, clusters live at most 24 hrs. No SLA on nodes/disks | false |
| USE_STATIC_IP | Create a static IP for GitLab instead of an ephemeral IP with managed DNS | false |
| INT_NETWORK | The IP space to use within this cluster | default |
| SUBNETWORK | The subnetwork to use within this cluster | default |
Run the script, by passing in your desired parameters. It can work with the
default parameters except for PROJECT which is required:
PROJECT=<gcloud project id> ./scripts/gke_bootstrap_script.sh up
The script can also be used to clean up the created GKE resources:
PROJECT=<gcloud project id> ./scripts/gke_bootstrap_script.sh down
With the cluster created, continue to creating the DNS entry.
Manual cluster creation
Two resources need to be created in GCP, a Kubernetes cluster and an external IP.
Creating the Kubernetes cluster
To provision the Kubernetes cluster manually, follow the GKE instructions.
- We recommend a cluster with at least 2 nodes, each with 4vCPU and 15GB of RAM.
- Make a note of the cluster’s region, it will be needed in the following step.
Creating the external IP
An external IP is required so that your cluster can be reachable. The external IP needs to be regional and in the same region as the cluster itself. A global IP or an IP outside the cluster’s region will not work.
To create a static IP run:
gcloud compute addresses create ${CLUSTER_NAME}-external-ip --region $REGION --project $PROJECT
To get the address of the newly created IP:
gcloud compute addresses describe ${CLUSTER_NAME}-external-ip --region $REGION --project $PROJECT --format='value(address)'
We will use this IP to bind with a DNS name in the next section.
DNS Entry
If you created your cluster manually or used the USE_STATIC_IP option with the scripted creation,
you’ll need a public domain with an A record wild card DNS entry pointing to the IP we just created.
Follow the Google DNS quickstart guide to create the DNS entry.
Next Steps
Continue with the installation of the chart after you have the cluster up and running, and the static IP and DNS entry ready.