Chainguard Container for kubernetes

Production-Grade Container Scheduling and Management

Chainguard Containers are regularly-updated, secure-by-default container images.

Download this Container Image

For those with access, this container image is available on cgr.dev:

docker pull cgr.dev/ORGANIZATION/kubernetes:latest

Be sure to replace the ORGANIZATION placeholder with the name used for your organization's private repository within the Chainguard Registry.

Usage

Kubernetes, often referred to as K8s, is an open-source platform that automates the deployment, scaling, and operation of containerized applications. It provides key features such as service discovery, load balancing, storage orchestration, and self-healing.

Kubernetes builds upon years of experience running production workloads at scale within Google, leveraging concepts from the Borg system. It has since grown into a robust, production-grade system hosted by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF).

For more information on how Kubernetes works and the community behind it, refer to:

• Kubernetes Documentation
• CNCF Kubernetes Project

Kubernetes Components

This image includes the following core Kubernetes components:

kube-scheduler:

Schedules pods to run on specific nodes based on resource availability and constraints. For more info

kube-proxy:

Manages network connectivity and load balancing between services. For more info

kube-controller-manager:

Runs various controllers that handle node management, pod replication, and more. For more info

kube-apiserver:

The central management entity that exposes the Kubernetes API, handles requests, and processes updates. For more info

Each component plays a critical role in managing the lifecycle and operation of a Kubernetes cluster. These components work together to ensure scalability, availability, and reliability of containerized applications.

kubernetes-pause:

Using the Chainguard kubernetes-pause image requires changing the containerd configuration on the nodes. If you've set up SSH access to the underlying nodes of the cluster, then you can edit the containerd configuration file directly.

If you don't have access to the nodes then you can use a plugin called kubectl-node-shell

In the containerd configuration on the node, the default sandbox_image needs to be replaced with the Chainguard pause image. Use the editor of your choice to replace the default pause image with the Chainguard pause image:

[plugins."io.containerd.grpc.v1.cri"]
sandbox_image = "cgr.dev/$ORGANIZATION/kubernetes-pause:latest"

After this, restart the containerd service:

sudo systemctl restart containerd

Checking the list of containers using the ctr command will show the pause container with the Chainguard pause image:

ctr -n k8s.io containers list

What are Chainguard Containers?

Chainguard Containers are minimal container images that are secure by default.

In many cases, the Chainguard Containers tagged as :latest contain only an open-source application and its runtime dependencies. These minimal container images typically do not contain a shell or package manager. Chainguard Containers are built with Wolfi, our Linux undistro designed to produce container images that meet the requirements of a more secure software supply chain.

The main features of Chainguard Containers include:

• Minimal design, without unnecessary software bloat
• Daily builds to ensure container images are up-to-date with available security patches
• High quality build-time SBOMs attesting to the provenance of all artifacts within the image
• Verifiable signatures provided by Sigstore
• Reproducible builds with Cosign and apko (read more about reproducibility)

For cases where you need container images with shells and package managers to build or debug, most Chainguard Containers come paired with a -dev variant.

Although the -dev container image variants have similar security features as their more minimal versions, they feature additional software that is typically not necessary in production environments. We recommend using multi-stage builds to leverage the -dev variants, copying application artifacts into a final minimal container that offers a reduced attack surface that won’t allow package installations or logins.

Learn More

To better understand how to work with Chainguard Containers, please visit Chainguard Academy and Chainguard Courses.

In addition to Containers, Chainguard offers VMs and Libraries. Contact Chainguard to access additional products.

Trademarks

This software listing is packaged by Chainguard. The trademarks set forth in this offering are owned by their respective companies, and use of them does not imply any affiliation, sponsorship, or endorsement by such companies.