Using the metal provider extension with Gardener as operator

The core.gardener.cloud/v1beta1.CloudProfile resource declares a providerConfig field that is meant to contain provider-specific configuration. The core.gardener.cloud/v1beta1.Seed resource is structured similarly. Additionally, it allows configuring settings for the backups of the main etcd's data of shoot clusters control planes running in this seed cluster.

This document explains the necessary configuration for this provider extension.

CloudProfile resource

This section describes, how the configuration for CloudProfiles looks like for metal by providing an example CloudProfile manifest with minimal configuration that can be used to allow the creation of metal shoot clusters.

CloudProfileConfig

The cloud profile configuration contains information about the real machine image IDs in the metal environment. You have to map every version that you specify in .spec.machineImages[].versions here such that the metal extension knows the location of the OCI image artefact for every version you want to offer. For each machine image version an architecture field can be specified which specifies the CPU architecture of the machine on which given machine image can be used.

An example CloudProfileConfig for the metal extension looks as follows:

apiVersion: metal.provider.extensions.gardener.cloud/v1alpha1
kind: CloudProfileConfig
machineImages:
  - name: gardenlinux
    versions:
      - version: 1.0.0
        image: registry/images/gardenlinux:version-tag
        # architecture: amd64 # optional

Example CloudProfile manifest

Please find below an example CloudProfile manifest:

apiVersion: core.gardener.cloud/v1beta1
kind: CloudProfile
metadata:
  name: metal
spec:
  type: metal
  kubernetes:
    versions:
    - version: 1.34.0
    - version: 1.33.0
  machineImages:
    - name: gardenlinux
      versions:
        - version: 1.0.0
          cri:
            - name: containerd
  machineTypes:
    - name: x3-xlarge
      cpu: "4"
      gpu: "0"
      memory: 8Gi
      storage:
        class: standard
        type: default
        size: 20Gi     
      usable: true
      architecture: amd64 # optional
  volumeTypes:
    - name: general-purpose
      class: standard
      usable: true
    - name: io-optimized
      class: premium
      usable: true
  regions:
  - region: my-region
    names:
    - my-zone-a
    - my-zone-b
    - my-zone-c
  providerConfig:
    apiVersion: metal.provider.extensions.gardener.cloud/v1alpha1
    kind: CloudProfileConfig
    regionConfigs:
    - name: my-region
      server: https://metal-api-server
      certificateAuthorityData: >-
        abcd12345
    storageClasses:
      default:                 # default StorageClass for shoot
        name: default          # name of the StorageClass in the Shoot
        type: general-purpose  # name of the VolumeClass
      additional:              # additional StorageClasses for shoot
      - name: additional-sc    # name of the StorageClass in the Shoot
        type: general-purpose  # name of the VolumeClass
    machineImages:
      - name: gardenlinux
        versions:
          - version: 1.0.0
            image: registry/images/gardenlinux:version-tag
            architecture: amd64

Seed resource

This provider extension supports configuration for the Seed's .spec.provider.type field.

Please find below an example Seed manifest that configures Seed cluster.

---
apiVersion: core.gardener.cloud/v1beta1
kind: Seed
metadata:
  name: my-seed
spec:
  provider:
    type: metal
  ...

Shoot resource

This provider extension supports configuration for the Shoot cluster resource. .spec.provider.workers field is a list of worker groups. .spec.provider.networking.nodes field is the CIDR of the entire node network.

apiVersion: core.gardener.cloud/v1beta1
kind: Shoot
metadata:
  name: my-shoot
  namespace: my-namespace
spec:
  cloudProfileName: metal
  credentialsBindingName: my-credentials
  region: my-region
  networking:
    type: calico
    nodes: 10.1.0.0/16
  provider:
    infrastructureConfig:
      apiVersion: metal.provider.extensions.gardener.cloud/v1alpha1
      kind: InfrastructureConfig
    type: metal
    workers:
      - name: pool1
        machine:
          type: x3-xlarge
        volume:
          type: general-purpose
          size: 20Gi
        cri:
          name: containerd
        minimum: 1
        maximum: 1
        maxSurge: 1
        maxUnavailable: 0
        zones:
          - my-zone-a
          - my-zone-b
          - my-zone-c
  kubernetes:
    version: 1.34.0