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Running K3s on Raspberry Pi

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Introduction
Preparing Your Raspberry Pi Cluster
Installing K3s
Using Your K3s Cluster
Real-World Deployments
Advanced Topics
Final Project
Summary

Kubectl Basics

Learn the essential `kubectl` commands to interact with your K3s Kubernetes cluster from the command line.

By Kevin McAleer,    3 Minutes

Page last updated May 24, 2025

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With your K3s cluster up and running, it’s time to interact with it using kubectl — the command-line tool for managing Kubernetes.

This lesson will walk you through the basics of exploring and managing your cluster.

✅ Setting Up kubectl Access

On the master node, or from your development machine:

export KUBECONFIG=/etc/rancher/k3s/k3s.yaml

Or copy the config to your local system:

scp pi@pi-master:/etc/rancher/k3s/k3s.yaml ~/.kube/config

Replace pi@pi-master with your actual master node address.

Ensure correct file permissions:

chmod 600 ~/.kube/config

🔍 Inspecting the Cluster

List all nodes:

kubectl get nodes

List all running pods (across namespaces):

kubectl get pods -A

Check system components (K3s uses kube-system namespace):

kubectl get pods -n kube-system

🚀 Deploying a Simple App

Create a simple deployment:

kubectl create deployment hello-world --image=nginx

Expose it as a service:

kubectl expose deployment hello-world --port=80 --type=NodePort

Find the assigned NodePort:

kubectl get svc hello-world

Access it via any node’s IP and the port listed.

📁 Useful Commands

Command Description
kubectl get pods List all pods in the current namespace
kubectl describe pod <name> Show detailed info about a pod
kubectl logs <pod> View logs from a pod
kubectl exec -it <pod> -- bash Open a shell inside a pod (if it has bash)
kubectl delete pod <name> Delete a pod
kubectl apply -f <file.yaml> Apply resources from a YAML file

🧠 Pro Tips

  • Use -A to view resources across all namespaces

  • Add bash completion for kubectl:

    source <(kubectl completion bash)
  • Use kubectl get all to quickly see services, pods, deployments

🔍 Example: Get Details on Your Node

kubectl describe node pi-master

Look at:

  • Capacity
  • Allocated resources
  • Kubelet version
  • Taints and labels

✅ Summary

You now know how to:

  • Access your K3s cluster with kubectl
  • Deploy, expose, and interact with workloads
  • Use key commands to inspect cluster health

Next up: Dashboard and Monitoring

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