Update Tanzu Workload Management

This is a brief guide on how to upgrade Tanzu Workload Management within the vSphere cluster.

Kubernetes Release and Patch Cycles

Kubernetes versions are specified as x.y.z following Semantic Versioning terminology, where x is the major version, y is the minor version, and z is the patch version. For example, v1.22.6 denotes a minor version 22 with patch level 6. Minor versions are released approximately every 3-4 months. In the meantime, there are several patches within the minor version.

The Kubernetes project maintains release branches for the last three minor versions (1.24, 1.23, 1.22). Since Kubernetes 1.19, newer versions receive patch support for about a year. So keeping the Kubernetes versions in Tanzu up to date is highly recommended.

Step 1 – Update vCenter

This step is not mandatory, but recommended. Updates on vCenter are often accompanied by a new Kubernetes versions. You can see notifications about updates in the vSphere Client.

31. January 202331. January 2023

Upgrade of a K3s Lightweight Kubernetes Cluster

K3s is a lightweight, highly available open source Kubernetes cluster platform designed for easy and resource-efficient installation. K3s is provided in a package of less than 60 MB. The package is optimized for ARM platforms and can therefore also be run on hardware such as a Raspberry Pi, or as a guest VM on ESXi-on-ARM.

Prerequisites and collection of information

K3s is a cluster solution. That is why the order in which the nodes are updated is important. The update starts on the master node. So first we need to find out which node has this role. The easiest way to do this is with a kubectl command:

kubectl get node

NAME STATUS ROLES AGE VERSION
k3node1.lab.local Ready master 2y43d v1.19.3+k3s3
k3node2.lab.local Ready none 2y42d v1.19.3+k3s3
k3node3.lab.local Ready none 2y42d v1.19.3+k3s3

From the output above we see my three K3s nodes with FQDN, status, role, age and version. So here k3node1 has the master role.

As an alternative, you can also execute the command in verbose mode:

kubectl get node -o wide

28. June 202227. June 2022

Project Arctic – Delivering Benefits of the Cloud to On-Prem Workloads

In the last few years we’ve seen a clear trend to adopt cloud strategies on customer side. Some already pusue a multi cloud strategy to get the most benefit from different offerings. But we may not forget, that infrastructure on-premises – the so called private cloud – is still the most common kind of virtual infrastructure. This is no surprise because on-premises infrastructure has without doubt some advantages. It’s not alone aspects of data privacy, data security and data sovereignty. There are also performance aspects such as low latency that keep customers from migration special workloads to the (public) cloud.

On the other hand there are some advantages of cloud offerings too. Such as flexible consumption, minimal maintenance, built in resilience, developer agility and the possibility to manage from anywhere.

To bridge the gap between on-premises needs and cloud based offerings, VMware has announced Project Arctic during VMworld 2021. Delivering benefits of the cloud to on-premises workloads.

Introducing vSphere+ and vSAN+

24. June 202224. June 2022

VMware NSX Legacy Load Balancing is Going Away – Migrate to Avi

VMware will be sunsetting the NSX native load balancers. Customers should be migrating to the currently supported NSX Advanced Load Balancer (Avi) which simplifies operations today while getting you ready for your multi-cloud and container strategies tomorrow. Avi works across all environments beyond the NSX framework, expanding use cases to public cloud, containers and app security while adding capabilities for GSLB, WAF and analytics. A migration tool will be available to make the migration of your existing configuration to the current technology easy and painless.