# Kubernetes

Welcome to the Backstage Kubernetes frontend plugin!

This plugin exposes information about your entity-specific Kubernetes objects with a desire to provide value to the service owner, rather than just a Kubernetes cluster administrator.

It will elevate the visibility of errors where identified, and provide drill down about the deployments, pods, and other objects for a service.

It directly interfaces with the [Kubernetes Backend Plugin (`@backstage-plugin-kubernetes-backend`)](https://github.com/backstage/backstage/tree/master/plugins/kubernetes-backend).

## Introduction

See our announcement blog post [New Backstage feature: Kubernetes for Service Owners](https://backstage.io/blog/2021/01/12/new-backstage-feature-kubernetes-for-service-owners) to learn more about the motivation behind developing the plugin.

## Setup & Configuration

This plugin must be installed in a Backstage app, along with its peer backend plugin.

```bash
# From your Backstage root directory
yarn --cwd packages/app add @backstage/plugin-kubernetes
```

Once installed, the plugin is automatically available in your app through the default feature discovery. For more details and alternative installation methods, see [installing plugins](https://backstage.io/docs/frontend-system/building-apps/installing-plugins).

It requires configuration in the Backstage `app-config.yaml` to connect to a Kubernetes API control plane.

In addition, configuration of an entity's `catalog-info.yaml` helps identify which specific Kubernetes object(s) should be presented on a specific entity catalog page.

For more information, see the [formal documentation about the Kubernetes feature in Backstage](https://backstage.io/docs/features/kubernetes/overview).

### Enabling the entity content tab

Enable the Kubernetes entity content extension in your `app-config.yaml`:

```yaml
app:
  extensions:
    - entity-content:kubernetes/kubernetes
```

Now, the extension appears on your entity page as one of the tabs, which is called `KUBERNETES`.
By default, the tab will only appear on entities that are Components or Resources. You can override
that behavior by providing a config block to the extension, like so:

```yaml
app:
  extensions:
    - entity-content:kubernetes/kubernetes:
        config:
          filter:
            kind:
              $in:
                - component
                - api
                - resource
                - system
```

## Getting started

Your plugin has been added to the example app in this repository, meaning you'll be able to access it by running `yarn start` in the root directory, and then navigating to [/kubernetes](http://localhost:3000/catalog/default/component/:component-name/kubernetes).

You can also serve the plugin in isolation by running `yarn start` in the plugin directory.
This method of serving the plugin provides quicker iteration speed and a faster startup and hot reloads.
It is only meant for local development, and the setup for it can be found inside the [/dev](./dev) directory.