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Using Custom RBAC resources

KubeDB (version 0.13.0 and higher) supports finer user control over role based access permissions provided to a MariaDB instance. This tutorial will show you how to use KubeDB to run MariaDB instance with custom RBAC resources.

Before You Begin

At first, you need to have a Kubernetes cluster, and the kubectl command-line tool must be configured to communicate with your cluster. If you do not already have a cluster, you can create one by using kind.

Now, install KubeDB cli on your workstation and KubeDB operator in your cluster following the steps here.

To keep things isolated, this tutorial uses a separate namespace called demo throughout this tutorial.

$ kubectl create ns demo
namespace/demo created

Note: YAML files used in this tutorial are stored in here folder in GitHub repository kubedb/docs.

Overview

KubeDB allows users to provide custom RBAC resources, namely, ServiceAccount, Role, and RoleBinding for MariaDB. This is provided via the spec.podTemplate.spec.serviceAccountName field in MariaDB crd. If this field is left empty, the KubeDB operator will create a service account name matching MariaDB crd name. Role and RoleBinding that provide necessary access permissions will also be generated automatically for this service account.

If a service account name is given, but there’s no existing service account by that name, the KubeDB operator will create one, and Role and RoleBinding that provide necessary access permissions will also be generated for this service account.

If a service account name is given, and there’s an existing service account by that name, the KubeDB operator will use that existing service account. Since this service account is not managed by KubeDB, users are responsible for providing necessary access permissions manually.

This guide will show you how to create custom Service Account, Role, and RoleBinding for a MariaDB instance named quick-postges to provide the bare minimum access permissions.

Custom RBAC for MariaDB

At first, let’s create a Service Acoount in demo namespace.

$ kubectl create serviceaccount -n demo md-custom-serviceaccount
serviceaccount/md-custom-serviceaccount created

It should create a service account.

$ kubectl get serviceaccount -n demo md-custom-serviceaccount -o yaml
apiVersion: v1
kind: ServiceAccount
metadata:
  creationTimestamp: "2021-03-18T04:38:59Z"
  name: md-custom-serviceaccount
  namespace: demo
  resourceVersion: "84669"
  selfLink: /api/v1/namespaces/demo/serviceaccounts/md-custom-serviceaccount
  uid: 788bd6c6-3eae-4797-b6ca-5722ef64c9dc
secrets:
- name: md-custom-serviceaccount-token-jnhvd

Now, we need to create a role that has necessary access permissions for the MariaDB instance named sample-mariadb.

$ kubectl apply -f https://github.com/kubedb/docs/raw/v2023.01.17/docs/guides/mariadb/custom-rbac/using-custom-rbac/examples/md-custom-role.yaml
role.rbac.authorization.k8s.io/md-custom-role created

Below is the YAML for the Role we just created.

apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: Role
metadata:
  name: md-custom-role
  namespace: demo
rules:
- apiGroups:
  - policy
  resourceNames:
  - maria-db
  resources:
  - podsecuritypolicies
  verbs:
  - use

This permission is required for MariaDB pods running on PSP enabled clusters.

Now create a RoleBinding to bind this Role with the already created service account.

$ kubectl create rolebinding md-custom-rolebinding --role=md-custom-role --serviceaccount=demo:md-custom-serviceaccount --namespace=demo
rolebinding.rbac.authorization.k8s.io/md-custom-rolebinding created

It should bind md-custom-role and md-custom-serviceaccount successfully.

SO, All required resources for RBAC are created.

$ kubectl get serviceaccount,role,rolebindings -n demo
NAME                                      SECRETS   AGE
serviceaccount/default                    1         38m
serviceaccount/md-custom-serviceaccount   1         36m

NAME                                            CREATED AT
role.rbac.authorization.k8s.io/md-custom-role   2021-03-18T05:13:27Z

NAME                                                          ROLE                  AGE
rolebinding.rbac.authorization.k8s.io/md-custom-rolebinding   Role/md-custom-role   79s

Now, create a MariaDB crd specifying spec.podTemplate.spec.serviceAccountName field to md-custom-serviceaccount.

$ kubectl apply -f https://github.com/kubedb/docs/raw/v2023.01.17/docs/guides/mariadb/custom-rbac/using-custom-rbac/examples/md-custom-db.yaml
mariadb.kubedb.com/sample-mariadb created

Below is the YAML for the MariaDB crd we just created.

apiVersion: kubedb.com/v1alpha2
kind: MariaDB
metadata:
  name: sample-mariadb
  namespace: demo
spec:
  version: "10.5.8"
  storageType: Durable
  podTemplate:
    spec:
      serviceAccountName: md-custom-serviceaccount
  storage:
    storageClassName: "standard"
    accessModes:
    - ReadWriteOnce
    resources:
      requests:
        storage: 1Gi
  terminationPolicy: WipeOut

Now, wait a few minutes. the KubeDB operator will create necessary PVC, StatefulSet, services, secret etc. If everything goes well, we should see that a pod with the name sample-mariadb-0 has been created.

Check that the statefulset’s pod is running

$ kubectl get pod -n demo sample-mariadb-0
NAME            READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
sample-mariadb-0   1/1     Running   0          2m44s

Check the pod’s log to see if the database is ready

$ kubectl logs -f -n demo sample-mariadb-0
2021-03-18 05:35:13+00:00 [Note] [Entrypoint]: Entrypoint script for MySQL Server 1:10.5.8+maria~focal started.
2021-03-18 05:35:13+00:00 [Note] [Entrypoint]: Switching to dedicated user 'mysql'
2021-03-18 05:35:13+00:00 [Note] [Entrypoint]: Entrypoint script for MySQL Server 1:10.5.8+maria~focal started.
2021-03-18 05:35:14+00:00 [Note] [Entrypoint]: Initializing database files
...
2021-03-18  5:35:22 0 [Note] Reading of all Master_info entries succeeded
2021-03-18  5:35:22 0 [Note] Added new Master_info '' to hash table
2021-03-18  5:35:22 0 [Note] mysqld: ready for connections.
Version: '10.5.8-MariaDB-1:10.5.8+maria~focal'  socket: '/run/mysqld/mysqld.sock'  port: 3306  mariadb.org binary distribution

Once we see mysqld: ready for connections. in the log, the database is ready.

Reusing Service Account

An existing service account can be reused in another MariaDB instance. No new access permission is required to run the new MariaDB instance.

Now, create MariaDB crd another-mariadb using the existing service account name md-custom-serviceaccount in the spec.podTemplate.spec.serviceAccountName field.

$ kubectl apply -f https://github.com/kubedb/docs/raw/v2023.01.17/docs/guides/mariadb/custom-rbac/using-custom-rbac/examples/md-custom-db-2.yaml
mariadb.kubedb.com/another-mariadb created

Below is the YAML for the MariaDB crd we just created.

apiVersion: kubedb.com/v1alpha2
kind: MariaDB
metadata:
  name: another-mariadb
  namespace: demo
spec:
  version: "10.5.8"
  storageType: Durable
  podTemplate:
    spec:
      serviceAccountName: md-custom-serviceaccount
  storage:
    storageClassName: "standard"
    accessModes:
    - ReadWriteOnce
    resources:
      requests:
        storage: 1Gi
  terminationPolicy: WipeOut

Now, wait a few minutes. the KubeDB operator will create necessary PVC, statefulset, services, secret etc. If everything goes well, we should see that a pod with the name another-mariadb has been created.

Check that the statefulset’s pod is running

$ kubectl get pod -n demo another-mariadb-0
NAME                READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
another-mariadb-0   1/1     Running   0          37s

Check the pod’s log to see if the database is ready

...
$ kubectl logs -f -n demo another-mariadb-0
2021-03-18 05:39:50+00:00 [Note] [Entrypoint]: Entrypoint script for MySQL Server 1:10.5.8+maria~focal started.
2021-03-18 05:39:50+00:00 [Note] [Entrypoint]: Switching to dedicated user 'mysql'
2021-03-18 05:39:50+00:00 [Note] [Entrypoint]: Entrypoint script for MySQL Server 1:10.5.8+maria~focal started.
2021-03-18 05:39:50+00:00 [Note] [Entrypoint]: Initializing database files
...
2021-03-18  5:39:59 0 [Note] mysqld: ready for connections.
Version: '10.5.8-MariaDB-1:10.5.8+maria~focal'  socket: '/run/mysqld/mysqld.sock'  port: 3306  mariadb.org binary distribution

mysqld: ready for connections. in the log signifies that the database is running successfully.

Cleaning up

To cleanup the Kubernetes resources created by this tutorial, run:

$ kubectl delete mariadb -n demo sample-mariadb
mariadb.kubedb.com "sample-mariadb" deleted
$ kubectl delete mariadb -n demo another-mariadb
mariadb.kubedb.com "another-mariadb" deleted
$ kubectl delete -n demo role md-custom-role
role.rbac.authorization.k8s.io "md-custom-role" deleted
$ kubectl delete -n demo rolebinding md-custom-rolebinding
rolebinding.rbac.authorization.k8s.io "md-custom-rolebinding" deleted
$ kubectl delete sa -n demo md-custom-serviceaccount
serviceaccount "md-custom-serviceaccount" deleted
$ kubectl delete ns demo
namespace "demo" deleted