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Getting started with consul
24 Aug 2024
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#consul
This is going to be a kata based learning, you may just follow the simple steps one after the other.
As a part of this tutorial, we will be using homebrew, kind, kubernetes, consul
Step 1: Install homebrew
Step 2: Install kind with homebrew
brew install kind
Step 3: Create a kubernetes(k8s) cluster with kind
kind create cluster
Step 4: Install consul-k8s cli with brew
brew tap hashicorp/tap # adding hasicorp repo
brew install hashicorp/tap/consul-k8s
Step 5: create a values.yaml file with below configuration
# Contains values that affect multiple components of the chart.
global:
# The main enabled/disabled setting.
# If true, servers, clients, Consul DNS and the Consul UI will be enabled.
enabled: true
# The prefix used for all resources created in the Helm chart.
name: consul
# The consul image version.
image: hashicorp/consul:1.16.0
# The name of the datacenter that the agents should register as.
datacenter: dc1
# Enables TLS across the cluster to verify authenticity of the Consul servers and
clients.
tls:
enabled: true
# Enables ACLs across the cluster to secure access to data and APIs.
acls:
# If true, automatically manage ACL tokens and policies for all Consul
components.
manageSystemACLs: true
# Exposes Prometheus metrics for the Consul service mesh and sidecars.
metrics:
enabled: true
# Enables Consul servers and clients metrics.
enableAgentMetrics: true
# Configures the retention time for metrics in Consul servers and clients.
agentMetricsRetentionTime: "1m"
# Configures values that configure the Consul server cluster.
server:
enabled: true
# The number of server agents to run. This determines the fault tolerance of the
cluster.
replicas: 1
# Contains values that configure the Consul UI.
ui:
enabled: true
# Defines the type of service created for the Consul UI (e.g. LoadBalancer,
ClusterIP, NodePort).
# NodePort is primarily used for local deployments.
service:
type: NodePort
# Enables displaying metrics in the Consul UI.
metrics:
enabled: true
# The metrics provider specification.
provider: "prometheus"
# The URL of the prometheus metrics server.
baseURL: http://prometheus-server.default.svc.cluster.local
# Configures and installs the automatic Consul Connect sidecar injector.
connectInject:
enabled: true
# Enables metrics for Consul Connect sidecars.
metrics:
defaultEnabled: true
Step 6: Install consul and proceed installation with y (ie., yes)
consul-k8s install -f values.yaml
Step 7: list all the pods in consul namespace
kubectl get pods -n consul
Step 8: list all the service in consul namespace
kubectl get svc -n consul
Step 9: Port forward the consul-ui service to access consul ui
kubectl port-forward svc/consul-ui 8501:443 -n consul
Step 10: Access consul UI with URL https://localhost:8501/ui/ Step 11: Install consul agent CLI
brew tap hashicorp/tap
brew install hashicorp/tap/consul
Step 12: Export Tokens
export CONSUL_HTTP_TOKEN=$(kubectl get --namespace consul secrets/consul-bootstrap-
acl-token --template= | base64 -d)
export CONSUL_HTTP_ADDR=https://127.0.0.1:8501
export CONSUL_HTTP_SSL_VERIFY=false
Step 13: Execute consul agent commands
consul catalog datacenters
consul catalog nodes
consul catalog services
Now that you have access to the UI and Command line to access consul, let us deal with what is consul?
Consul is an application which help in service discovery and service configuration. It helps in automated networking between services & applications and helps in securing the network.
We have seen how to perform a simple installation of consul in this tutorial and seen what is consul.
At this point, I like to leave you to explore more about consul by yourself.
Happy Learning.
Narendran is an awesome person. He lives in Cheanai, where he works on software engineering projects. In his spare time, Narendran likes to write blogs.