Kubernetes deployment environment

Introduction

The NSP software can be deployed only in a supported version of Kubernetes environment. An NSP software bundle includes the latest supported version as of the NSP release date; an NSP system installation uses the bundled Kubernetes version.

An NSP system may be compatible with a Kubernetes version that is released after the NSP deployment. In such a case, you can upgrade the Kubernetes deployment environment without upgrading the NSP software, as described in Upgrading Kubernetes.

Upgrading Kubernetes

An NSP system upgrade typically includes an upgrade of the Kubernetes deployment environment. Each NSP system upgrade procedure has a link to To upgrade the NSP Kubernetes environment, which describes the upgrade process for a standalone or DR NSP deployment.

Supported upgrade schemes

A Kubernetes upgrade must be version-sequential, which means that you cannot upgrade directly from version A to version C and skip version B; you must first upgrade from version A to version B, and only then can you upgrade to version C.

Rather than performing a series of sequential Kubernetes upgrades, you can choose to uninstall your current Kubernetes environment and then install the new version.

Note: Performing a series of sequential upgrades preserves the NSP cluster data in the Kubernetes etcd database, while uninstalling Kubernetes deletes the etcd data.

Off-cycle upgrades

After an NSP installation or upgrade, if a new Kubernetes version is made available, you can choose to perform an “off-cycle” Kubernetes upgrade to the new version without upgrading the NSP software, if the NSP release supports the new Kubernetes version. See the Host Environment Compatibility Reference for NSP and CLM for information about the supported Kubernetes versions for various NSP releases.

See To upgrade the NSP Kubernetes environment for the upgrade steps.

Time estimates

A Kubernetes upgrade and a Kubernetes re-installation take different amounts of time to complete, as shown below; the values are based on a four-node NSP cluster:

• upgrade—40 minutes

• re-installation—30 minutes

The time estimates show that re-installation may save considerable time if multiple sequential upgrades are required, especially in a DR deployment.