Bootstrap for homelab K3s cluster with ArgoCD

This repository assumes a fairly fresh x86_64 server, probably Ubuntu 22.04 LTS, with a pool of unallocated IP addresses at it's disposal.

In this example, let's assume 192.168.0.200-192.168.0.250 is unallocated and can be used to provide ingress to services we will advertise from the kubernetes deployment.

Installation of Kubernetes (k3s)

Install K3s on the server:

curl -sfL https://get.k3s.io | sh -

Take a copy of the kubeconfig found in etc/rancher/k3s/k3s.yaml and modify the server field to reflect the remote IP address of the server you are configuring.

Store this somewhere, such as ~/.kube/lab.yaml and then configure kubectl to use it with export KUBECONFIG=~/.kube/lab.yaml.

Install Metallb, and ArgoCD

Install MetalLB:

helm repo add metallb https://metallb.github.io/metallb
helm install metallb metallb/metallb --namespace metallb-system --create-namespace
kubectl apply -f metallb/config.yaml # to adjust the pool of IP addresses that metallb can allocate, modify the addresses attribute in config.yaml

Install ArgoCD:

helm repo add argo https://argoproj.github.io/argo-helm
helm install argocd argo/argo-cd --namespace argocd --create-namespace -f argo/values.yaml

Access ArgoCD UI

Get the default admin password for ArgoCD from the secret:

kubectl -n argocd get secret argocd-initial-admin-secret -o jsonpath="{.data.password}" | base64 -d

Get the allocated IP address for the ingress that you defined:

alex@lab:~$ kubectl get ingress -n argocd
NAME                 CLASS     HOSTS           ADDRESS         PORTS   AGE
argocd-server        traefik   argo.asdfx.us   192.168.0.200   80      5d16h

Setup a DNS entry (or an entry in /etc/hosts) to configure your argo domain to point to the IP address for the ingress.

Uninstallation of K3s

You can completly uninstall k3s quickly and easily with:

sudo /usr/local/bin/k3s-uninstall.sh