Kubernetes Cluster

In this guide, we describe how to deploy a Jmix application to a Kubernetes cluster. We’ll use the single-node Kubernetes cluster provided by minikube, which you can install on your development machine and test the deployment locally.

The guide focuses on what should be configured in the application in order to run on Kubernetes. You can complete the guide and prepare your application for such deployment without any previous knowledge of Kubernetes. However, to run real production deployments, you should be familiar with this technology.

Configure Your Application

Configure Image Building

The Spring Boot Gradle plugin provides the bootBuildImage task which builds your application and creates a Docker image with it. To specify the image name, add the following section to your build.gradle file:

bootBuildImage {
    imageName = 'mycompany/sample-app'
}

Configure Hazelcast

Jmix framework modules use various caches: JPA entity and query caches, pessimistic locks, dynamic attributes configuration, etc. When running in a cluster, a Jmix application requires coordination of caches between cluster nodes.

All Jmix caches support coordination through Hazelcast. In this guide, we’ll use Hazelcast in the embedded mode, together with the hazelcast-kubernetes plugin for auto-discovery in Kubernetes environment.

Follow the steps below to configure Hazelcast for coordination of caches in a Kubernetes cluster.

  1. Add the Hazelcast dependency to your build.gradle:

    implementation 'com.hazelcast:hazelcast'

  2. Specify Hazelcast as JCache provider by adding the following property to the application.properties file:

    spring.cache.jcache.provider = com.hazelcast.cache.HazelcastMemberCachingProvider

  3. Create hazelcast.yaml file in the resources root:

    hazelcast:
  network:
    join:
      multicast:
        enabled: false
      kubernetes:
        enabled: false
        service-name: sample-app-service

The hazelcast.network.join.kubernetes.service-name property must point to the application service defined in the application service configuration file.

Notice that the hazelcast.network.join.kubernetes.enabled property is set to false in this file. It’s done to be able to run your application locally without Kubernetes. The property is set to true when the application actually runs on Kubernetes, using the HZ_NETWORK_JOIN_KUBERNETES_ENABLED environment variable in the application service configuration file.

Create Kubernetes Configuration Files

Create k8s folder in the project root and add the files listed below to it.

Database Service Configuration

This file defines the PostgreSQL database service named sample-db-service.

k8s/db.yaml
apiVersion: v1
kind: ConfigMap
metadata:
  name: sample-db-config
data:
  db_user: root
  db_password: root
---
apiVersion: v1
kind: PersistentVolumeClaim
metadata:
  name: sample-db-pvclaim
spec:
  accessModes:
    - ReadWriteOnce
  resources:
    requests:
      storage: 1Gi
---
apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: sample-db
spec:
  replicas: 1
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: sample-db
  strategy: {}
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: sample-db
    spec:
      volumes:
        - name: sample-db-storage
          persistentVolumeClaim:
            claimName: sample-db-pvclaim
      containers:
      - image: postgres
        name: sample-db
        env:
          - name: POSTGRES_USER
            valueFrom:
              configMapKeyRef:
                name: sample-db-config
                key: db_user
          - name: POSTGRES_PASSWORD
            valueFrom:
              configMapKeyRef:
                name: sample-db-config
                key: db_password
          - name: PGDATA
            value: /var/lib/postgresql/data/pgdata
          - name: POSTGRES_DB
            value: sample
        ports:
          - containerPort: 5432
            name: sample-db
        volumeMounts:
          - name: sample-db-storage
            mountPath: /var/lib/postgresql/data
---
apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
  name: sample-db-service
spec:
  type: ClusterIP
  ports:
    - port: 5432
  selector:
    app: sample-db

Application Service Configuration

This file defines the application service named sample-app-service. It uses the mycompany/sample-app Docker image with our application.

k8s/app.yaml
apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: sample-app
spec:
  replicas: 1
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: sample-app
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: sample-app
    spec:
      containers:
        - image: mycompany/sample-app
          imagePullPolicy: IfNotPresent
          name: sample-app
          env:
            - name: DB_USER
              valueFrom:
                configMapKeyRef:
                  name: sample-db-config
                  key: db_user
            - name: DB_PASSWORD
              valueFrom:
                configMapKeyRef:
                  name: sample-db-config
                  key: db_password
            - name: DB_HOST
              value: sample-db-service
            - name: SPRING_PROFILES_ACTIVE
              value: k8s
            - name: HZ_NETWORK_JOIN_KUBERNETES_ENABLED
              value: "true"
          lifecycle:
            preStop:
              exec:
                command: [ "sh", "-c", "sleep 10" ]
          ports:
            - containerPort: 8080
            - containerPort: 5701
---
apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
  name: sample-app-service
spec:
  type: NodePort
  ports:
    - port: 8080
      name: sample-app-app
    - port: 5701
      name: sample-app-hazelcast
  selector:
    app: sample-app

Load-balancer Configuration

The Jmix User Interface expects that all requests from a user come to the same server. In a cluster environment with multiple servers it requires a load-balancer with sticky sessions. Below is the configuration of NGINX Ingress Controller with session affinity.

k8s/balancer.yaml
apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: Ingress
metadata:
  name: balancer
  annotations:
    nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/affinity: "cookie"
    nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/affinity-mode: "persistent"
    nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/session-cookie-hash: "sha1"
    nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/session-cookie-expires: "172800"
    nginx.ingress.kubernetes.io/session-cookie-max-age: "172800"
spec:
  defaultBackend:
    service:
      name: sample-app-service
      port:
        number: 8080
  rules:
    - http:
        paths:
          - backend:
              service:
                name: sample-app-service
                port:
                  number: 8080
            path: /
            pathType: Prefix

Hazelcast Access Control Confguration

k8s/hazelcast-rbac.yaml
apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: ClusterRole
metadata:
  name: hazelcast-cluster-role
rules:
  - apiGroups:
      - ""
    resources:
      - endpoints
      - pods
      - nodes
      - services
    verbs:
      - get
      - list

---

apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: ClusterRoleBinding
metadata:
  name: hazelcast-cluster-role-binding
roleRef:
  apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io
  kind: ClusterRole
  name: hazelcast-cluster-role
subjects:
  - kind: ServiceAccount
    name: default
    namespace: default

Set up Local Kubernetes

  1. Make sure Docker is running on your machine. The below command displays the Docker version:

    docker -v

    If the command fails, see Docker documentation for how to install and run Docker.

  2. Install Minikube as described in its installation instruction.

  3. Run Minikube:

    minikube start --vm-driver=virtualbox

  4. Enable Ingress Controller:

    minikube addons enable ingress

  5. Configure the Kubernetes command-line tool to use Minikube:

    kubectl config use-context minikube

  6. To open the Kubernetes dashboard in the web browser, run in a separate terminal:

    minikube dashboard

Build and Run Application

  1. Build Docker image:

    ./gradlew bootBuildImage

  2. Load the image into Minikube:

    minikube image load mycompany/sample-app:latest

  3. Apply Kubernetes configuration files:

    kubectl apply -f ./k8s

  4. To increase the number of application instances, use the following command:

    kubectl scale deployment sample-app --replicas=2

  5. Figure out the cluster IP address:

    minikube ip

    Use this address to open the application in the web browser, for example: http://192.168.99.100