Quickstart: Deploy an Azure Kubernetes Service cluster using PowerShell

Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) is a managed Kubernetes service that lets you quickly deploy and manage clusters. In this quickstart, you will:

• Deploy an AKS cluster using PowerShell.
• Run a multi-container application with a web front-end and a Redis instance in the cluster.

To learn more about creating a Windows Server node pool, see Create an AKS cluster that supports Windows Server containers.

This quickstart assumes a basic understanding of Kubernetes concepts. For more information, see Kubernetes core concepts for Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS).

Prerequisites

If you don't have an Azure subscription, create a trial subscription account before you begin.

If you're running PowerShell locally, install the Az PowerShell module and connect to your Azure account using the Connect-AzAccount -Environment AzureChinaCloud cmdlet. For more information about installing the Az PowerShell module, see Install Azure PowerShell.

If you have multiple Azure subscriptions, select the appropriate subscription ID in which the resources should be billed using the Set-AzContext cmdlet.

Set-AzContext -SubscriptionId 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000

Create a resource group

An Azure resource group is a logical group in which Azure resources are deployed and managed. When you create a resource group, you will be prompted to specify a location. This location is:

• The storage location of your resource group metadata.
• Where your resources will run in Azure if you don't specify another region during resource creation.

The following example creates a resource group named myResourceGroup in the chinaeast2 region.

Create a resource group using the New-AzResourceGroup cmdlet.

New-AzResourceGroup -Name myResourceGroup -Location chinaeast2

Output for successfully created resource group:

ResourceGroupName : myResourceGroup
Location          : chinaeast2
ProvisioningState : Succeeded
Tags              :
ResourceId        : /subscriptions/00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000/resourceGroups/myResourceGroup

Create AKS cluster

1. Generate an SSH key pair using the ssh-keygen command-line utility. For more details, see:

   • Quick steps: Create and use an SSH public-private key pair for Linux VMs in Azure
   • How to use SSH keys with Windows on Azure

2. Create an AKS cluster using the New-AzAksCluster cmdlet.

   The following example creates a cluster named myAKSCluster with one node.

   New-AzAksCluster -ResourceGroupName myResourceGroup -Name myAKSCluster -NodeCount 1
   

After a few minutes, the command completes and returns information about the cluster.

Connect to the cluster

To manage a Kubernetes cluster, use the Kubernetes command-line client, kubectl.

1. Install kubectl locally using the Install-AzAksKubectl cmdlet:

   Install-AzAksKubectl
   

2. Configure kubectl to connect to your Kubernetes cluster using the Import-AzAksCredential cmdlet. The following cmdlet downloads credentials and configures the Kubernetes CLI to use them.

   Import-AzAksCredential -ResourceGroupName myResourceGroup -Name myAKSCluster
   

3. Verify the connection to your cluster using the kubectl get command. This command returns a list of the cluster nodes.

   kubectl get nodes
   

   Output shows the single node created in the previous steps. Make sure the node status is Ready:

   NAME                       STATUS   ROLES   AGE     VERSION
   aks-nodepool1-31718369-0   Ready    agent   6m44s   v1.15.10
   

Run the application

A Kubernetes manifest file defines a cluster's desired state, such as which container images to run.

In this quickstart, you will use a manifest to create all objects needed to run the Azure Vote application. This manifest includes two Kubernetes deployments:

• The sample Azure Vote Python applications.
• A Redis instance.

Two Kubernetes Services are also created:

• An internal service for the Redis instance.
• An external service to access the Azure Vote application from the internet.

1. Create a file named azure-vote.yaml.

   • This file can be created using vi or nano as if working on a virtual or physical system

2. Copy in the following YAML definition:

   apiVersion: apps/v1
   kind: Deployment
   metadata:
     name: azure-vote-back
   spec:
     replicas: 1
     selector:
       matchLabels:
         app: azure-vote-back
     template:
       metadata:
         labels:
           app: azure-vote-back
       spec:
         nodeSelector:
           "kubernetes.io/os": linux
         containers:
         - name: azure-vote-back
           image: mcr.azk8s.cn/oss/bitnami/redis:6.0.8
           env:
           - name: ALLOW_EMPTY_PASSWORD
             value: "yes"
           resources:
             requests:
               cpu: 100m
               memory: 128Mi
             limits:
               cpu: 250m
               memory: 256Mi
           ports:
           - containerPort: 6379
             name: redis
   ---
   apiVersion: v1
   kind: Service
   metadata:
     name: azure-vote-back
   spec:
     ports:
     - port: 6379
     selector:
       app: azure-vote-back
   ---
   apiVersion: apps/v1
   kind: Deployment
   metadata:
     name: azure-vote-front
   spec:
     replicas: 1
     selector:
       matchLabels:
         app: azure-vote-front
     template:
       metadata:
         labels:
           app: azure-vote-front
       spec:
         nodeSelector:
           "kubernetes.io/os": linux
         containers:
         - name: azure-vote-front
           image: mcr.azk8s.cn/azuredocs/azure-vote-front:v1
           resources:
             requests:
               cpu: 100m
               memory: 128Mi
             limits:
               cpu: 250m
               memory: 256Mi
           ports:
           - containerPort: 80
           env:
           - name: REDIS
             value: "azure-vote-back"
   ---
   apiVersion: v1
   kind: Service
   metadata:
     name: azure-vote-front
   spec:
     type: LoadBalancer
     ports:
     - port: 80
     selector:
       app: azure-vote-front
   

3. Deploy the application using the kubectl apply command and specify the name of your YAML manifest:

   kubectl apply -f azure-vote.yaml
   

   Output shows the successfully created deployments and services:

   deployment.apps/azure-vote-back created
   service/azure-vote-back created
   deployment.apps/azure-vote-front created
   service/azure-vote-front created
   

Test the application

When the application runs, a Kubernetes service exposes the application front end to the internet. This process can take a few minutes to complete.

Monitor progress using the kubectl get service command with the --watch argument.

kubectl get service azure-vote-front --watch

The EXTERNAL-IP output for the azure-vote-front service will initially show as pending.

NAME               TYPE           CLUSTER-IP   EXTERNAL-IP   PORT(S)        AGE
azure-vote-front   LoadBalancer   10.0.37.27   <pending>     80:30572/TCP   6s

Once the EXTERNAL-IP address changes from pending to an actual public IP address, use CTRL-C to stop the kubectl watch process. The following example output shows a valid public IP address assigned to the service:

azure-vote-front   LoadBalancer   10.0.37.27   52.179.23.131   80:30572/TCP   2m

To see the Azure Vote app in action, open a web browser to the external IP address of your service.

Delete the cluster

To avoid Azure charges, clean up your unnecessary resources. Use the Remove-AzResourceGroup cmdlet to remove the resource group, container service, and all related resources.

Remove-AzResourceGroup -Name myResourceGroup

Get the code

Pre-existing container images were used in this quickstart to create a Kubernetes deployment. The related application code, Dockerfile, and Kubernetes manifest file are available on GitHub.

Next steps

In this quickstart, you deployed a Kubernetes cluster and then deployed a multi-container application to it.

To learn more about AKS, and walk through a complete code to deployment example, continue to the Kubernetes cluster tutorial.