kube-tmuxp

Tool to generate tmuxp configs that help to switch between multiple Kubernetes contexts safely.

Introduction

When working with multiple Kubernetes clusters its painful to switch context using kubectl or kubectx. There are also possibilities of making unintentional changes.

kube-tmuxp solves this by using one preconfigured tmux session per Kubernetes cluster. Each tmux session contains only one Kubernetes context thus preventing accidental context switching inside a session. Contexts can be switched by switching tmux sessions. For example: [tmux prefix] + S.

Given a config similar to config.sample.yaml, kube-tmuxp generates:

• kube config (Kubernetes context) for each Kubernetes cluster under ~/.kube/configs
• tmuxp config for each Kubernetes cluster under ~/.tmuxp

The generated tmuxp configs can be used to start preconfigured tmux sessions.

Prerequisites

• gcloud
• kubectl
• tmux
• tmuxp

Install

Homebrew

brew tap thecasualcoder/stable
brew install kube-tmuxp

Manual

git clone https://github.com/thecasualcoder/kube-tmuxp.git
cd kube-tmuxp
make build
cp ./out/kube-tmuxp /usr/local/bin/kube-tmuxp

Generate kubeconfigs and tmuxp configs

• Copy the sample config (config.sample.yaml)

  cp config.sample.yaml ~/.kube-tmuxp.yaml
  

• Add your projects and clusters to the copied config

• Generate kubeconfigs and tmuxp configs

kube-tmuxp gen

Default config path is $HOME/.kube-tmuxp.yaml. If you are using a different path, then use the --config flag to specify that path. Refer kube-tmuxp --help for more details.

Generate kube-tmuxp config file for gcloud

$ kube-tmuxp gcloud-generate --help
Generates configs for kube-tmuxp based on gcloud account

Usage:
  kube-tmuxp gcloud-generate [flags]

Flags:
      --additional-envs strings   Additional envs to be populated
      --all-projects              Skip confirmation for projects
      --apply                    Directly create the tmuxp configs for selected projects
  -h, --help                     help for gcloud-generate
      --project-ids strings       Comma separated Project IDs to which the configurations need to be fetched

Examples:

1. Interactively select projects:

$ kube-tmuxp gcloud-generate
# this will prompt for the projectIDs selection. Type to filter and select using space
# fuzzy search will work

2. Specify projectIDs:

$ kube-tmuxp gcloud-generate --projectIDs project1,project2

3. For all projects:

$ kube-tmuxp gcloud-generate --allProjects

4. Use env variables in kube-tmuxp:

kube-tmuxp provides four envs: KUBETMUXP_CLUSTER_NAME, KUBETMUXP_CLUSTER_LOCATION, KUBETMUXP_CLUSTER_IS_REGIONAL, GCP_PROJECT_ID. We can pass additional envs also.

$ kube-tmuxp gcloud-generate --additionalEnvs 'NEW_KEY=new_value,NEW_ENV=$HOME,KUBE_CONFIG=$HOME/.kube/configs/$KUBETMUXP_CLUSTER_NAME'
# each tmux session will have 7 envs (4 predefined, 3 additionalEnvs passed as argument)

5. Directly create the kubeconfigs and tmuxp files (instead of kube-tmuxp config files):

$ kube-tmuxp gcloud-generate --apply

Start a session

tmuxp load my-context-name

Now you will be inside a tmux session preconfigured with Kubernetes context my-context-name.

Handy bash functions

Use the bash functions available here to switch, kill sessions easily. Special thanks to @jskswamy for writing these awesome functions.

Limitations

• Currently works for Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) only. However, it can be extended to work with any Kubernetes clusters. Feel free to submit a PR for this.