Quickstart: Manage resources with Config Controller

Learn how to create a Config Controller instance that comes pre-installed with Config Connector, Policy Controller, and Config Sync. Next, learn how to utilize your instance by completing the following tasks:

  • Use Config Connector to create and manage a Google Cloud resource.
  • Create a Policy Controller constraint to enforce a policy and detect a policy violation before it's deployed.
  • Set up GitOps by configuring Config Sync to sync from a sample repository that contains a Google Cloud resource.

Before you begin

  1. Sign in to your Google Cloud account. If you're new to Google Cloud, create an account to evaluate how our products perform in real-world scenarios. New customers also get $300 in free credits to run, test, and deploy workloads.
  2. Install the Google Cloud CLI.
  3. To initialize the gcloud CLI, run the following command:

    gcloud init
  4. Create or select a Google Cloud project.

    • Create a Google Cloud project:

      gcloud projects create PROJECT_ID

      Replace PROJECT_ID with a name for the Google Cloud project you are creating.

    • Select the Google Cloud project that you created:

      gcloud config set project PROJECT_ID

      Replace PROJECT_ID with your Google Cloud project name.

  5. Make sure that billing is enabled for your Google Cloud project.

  6. Enable the KRM, GKE, GKE Enterprise, Resource Manager, and Service Usage APIs:

    gcloud services enable krmapihosting.googleapis.com  container.googleapis.com  anthos.googleapis.com  cloudresourcemanager.googleapis.com  serviceusage.googleapis.com
  7. Install the Google Cloud CLI.
  8. To initialize the gcloud CLI, run the following command:

    gcloud init
  9. Create or select a Google Cloud project.

    • Create a Google Cloud project:

      gcloud projects create PROJECT_ID

      Replace PROJECT_ID with a name for the Google Cloud project you are creating.

    • Select the Google Cloud project that you created:

      gcloud config set project PROJECT_ID

      Replace PROJECT_ID with your Google Cloud project name.

  10. Make sure that billing is enabled for your Google Cloud project.

  11. Enable the KRM, GKE, GKE Enterprise, Resource Manager, and Service Usage APIs:

    gcloud services enable krmapihosting.googleapis.com  container.googleapis.com  anthos.googleapis.com  cloudresourcemanager.googleapis.com  serviceusage.googleapis.com

Create a Config Controller instance

  1. In the terminal, create an Autopilot Config Controller instance:

    gcloud anthos config controller create cc-example \
        --location=us-central1 \
        --full-management
    

    This operation can take up to 15 minutes to complete.

    The output is the following:

    Created instance [cc-example].
    Fetching cluster endpoint and auth data.
    kubeconfig entry generated for krmapihost-cc-example.
    
  2. To configure kubectl to communicate with the Config Controller endpoint, get the required authentication credentials and endpoint information:

    gcloud anthos config controller get-credentials cc-example \
        --location us-central1
    
  3. Verify that your instance was created by viewing the list of Config Controller instances:

    gcloud anthos config controller list --location=us-central1
    

    The output is the following:

    NAME                 LOCATION                 STATE
    cc-example           us-central1              RUNNING
    

Grant Config Controller required permission

In this section you give Config Controller permission to manage Google Cloud resources:

  1. Set an environment variable for your service account email:

    export SA_EMAIL="$(kubectl get ConfigConnectorContext -n config-control \
        -o jsonpath='{.items[0].spec.googleServiceAccount}' 2> /dev/null)"
    
  2. Create the policy binding:

    gcloud projects add-iam-policy-binding PROJECT_ID \
        --member "serviceAccount:${SA_EMAIL}" \
        --role "roles/owner" \
        --project PROJECT_ID
    

    Replace PROJECT_ID with your project ID.

    The output is similar to the following:

    Updated IAM policy for project [PROJECT_ID].
    auditConfigs:
    - auditLogConfigs:
      - logType: ADMIN_READ
      - logType: DATA_READ
      - logType: DATA_WRITE
      service: gkehub.googleapis.com
    # Remainder of output omitted
    

Use your Config Controller instance

The following sections introduce you to the ways that you can use your Config Controller instance.

Create a Google Cloud resource with Config Connector

With your Config Controller instance, you can take advantage of Config Connector to manage many Google Cloud services and resources using Kubernetes tooling and APIs. In this section, you use Config Controller to create a PubSubTopic resource.

To create a Pub/Sub topic using Config Connector, complete the following steps:

  1. Use Config Connector to enable the Pub/Sub API:

    1. Using your preferred text editor, create a file named enable-pubsub.yaml and copy the following YAML into it:

      # enable-pubsub.yaml
      apiVersion: serviceusage.cnrm.cloud.google.com/v1beta1
      kind: Service
      metadata:
        name: pubsub.googleapis.com
        namespace: config-control
      spec:
        projectRef:
          external: projects/PROJECT_ID
      

      Replace PROJECT_ID with your project ID.

    2. To enable the Pub/Sub API, apply the manifest to your cluster:

      kubectl apply -f enable-pubsub.yaml
      

      Enabling this API might take several minutes.

  2. Use Config Connector to create a Pub/Sub topic:

    1. Create a file named pubsub-topic.yaml and copy the following YAML into it:

      # pubsub-topic.yaml
      apiVersion: pubsub.cnrm.cloud.google.com/v1beta1
      kind: PubSubTopic
      metadata:
        annotations:
          cnrm.cloud.google.com/project-id: PROJECT_ID
        labels:
          label-one: "value-one"
        name: example-topic
        namespace: config-control
      
    2. Create the Pub/Sub topic:

      kubectl apply -f pubsub-topic.yaml
      
  3. Verify that Config Controller has created your resource in Google Cloud by viewing the list of Pub/Sub topics:

    gcloud pubsub topics list
    

    The output is similar to the following:

    ---
    name: projects/PROJECT_ID/topics/start-instance-event
    ---
    labels:
      label-one: value-one
      managed-by-cnrm: 'true'
    name: projects/PROJECT_ID/topics/example-topic
    

Enforce a policy with Policy Controller

Your Config Controller instance lets you use Policy Controller and Policy Controller constraints. As part of the Policy Controller installation, Config Controller automatically installs the constraint template library. You can use the templates in this library to enforce a variety of common security and compliance controls on your Config Controller instances.

In this section, you create a constraint by using the GCPStorageLocationConstraintV1 constraint template. This template lets you restrict the location you can create Cloud Storage buckets in. The constraint you create using this template restricts the location to us-central1. You might want to use this constraint to ensure your buckets are being created in a region that offers the best price and performance.

To create the constraint:

  1. Create a file named bucket-constraint.yaml and copy the following YAML into it:

    # bucket-constraint.yaml
    apiVersion: constraints.gatekeeper.sh/v1beta1
    kind: GCPStorageLocationConstraintV1
    metadata:
      name: storage-only-in-us-central1
    spec:
      match:
        kinds:
        - apiGroups:
          - storage.cnrm.cloud.google.com
          kinds:
          - StorageBucket
      parameters:
        locations:
        - us-central1
    
  2. Create the constraint:

    kubectl apply -f bucket-constraint.yaml
    

    The output is the following:

    gcpstoragelocationconstraintv1.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/storage-only-in-us-central1 created`
    
  3. Demonstrate that the constraint is working by trying to use Config Connector to create a StorageBucket resource in asia-southeast1:

    1. Create a file named asia-storage-bucket.yaml and copy the following YAML into it:

      # asia-storage-bucket.yaml
      apiVersion: storage.cnrm.cloud.google.com/v1beta1
      kind: StorageBucket
      metadata:
        name: bucket-in-disallowed-location
        namespace: config-control
      spec:
        location: asia-southeast1
      
    2. Try to create the Cloud Storage bucket:

      kubectl apply -f asia-storage-bucket.yaml
      

      The output is the following:

      Error from server (Forbidden): error when creating "STDIN": admission webhook "validation.gatekeeper.sh" denied the request: [storage-only-in-us-central1] Cloud Storage bucket <bucket-in-disallowed-location> uses a disallowed location <asia-southeast1>, allowed locations are ["us-central1"]
      

Set up GitOps with Config Sync

Config Sync is a GitOps service that lets you sync your Config Controller instance to configs, policies, and Google Cloud resources stored in a Git repository, OCI image, or Helm repository. Because Config Sync continuously reconciles the state of Config Controller with the configs in your source, you can help to ensure that your instances have consistent configuration.

In this section, you sync your Config Controller instance to a public GitHub repository. This repository contains another PubSubTopic resource. By syncing your instance from this repository, the resource is automatically created and applied to your instance. You might choose to create your resources using Config Sync (instead of applying the resource directly) if you want to use a GitOps workflow.

  1. To sync from GitHub, set up Cloud NAT. You need to do this because your Config Controller instance is backed by a private Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) Enterprise edition cluster and private cluster nodes don't have outbound internet access:

    1. Create a Cloud NAT router. You need this router to set up your NAT gateway.

      gcloud compute routers create cc-nat-router \
          --network default \
          --region us-central1
      

      The output is similar to the following:

      Creating router [cc-nat-router]...done.
      NAME           REGION       NETWORK
      cc-nat-router  us-central1  default
      
    2. Set up a NAT gateway on the router that you created in the previous step:

      gcloud compute routers nats create cc-nat-config \
          --router-region us-central1 \
          --router cc-nat-router \
          --nat-all-subnet-ip-ranges \
          --auto-allocate-nat-external-ips
      

      The output is the following:

      Creating NAT [cc-nat-config] in router [cc-nat-router]...done.
      
  2. To configure your Config Controller instance to sync from a sample repository, create a file named cc-rootsync.yaml and copy the following YAML into it:

    # cc-rootsync.yaml
    apiVersion: configsync.gke.io/v1beta1
    kind: RootSync
    metadata:
      name: root-sync
      namespace: config-management-system
    spec:
      sourceFormat: unstructured
      git:
        repo: https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/anthos-config-management-samples
        branch: main
        dir: config-controller-quickstart
        auth: none
    
  3. Apply the configuration:

    kubectl apply -f cc-rootsync.yaml
    

    After your instance is syncing from the repository, Config Sync creates the Pub/Sub topic and applies it to your Config Controller instance.

  4. Verify that Config Sync is syncing the Git repository to your Config Controller instance:

    nomos status --contexts gke_PROJECT_ID_us-central1_krmapihost-cc-example
    

    The output is similar to the following:

    *gke_PROJECT_ID_us-central1_krmapihost-cc-example
    --------------------
    <root>:root-sync                         https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/anthos-config-management-samples/config-controller-quickstart@main
    SYNCED @ 2023-01-10 18:31:02 +0000 UTC   715b4295d3eac07b057cce2543275c1ee104cad8
    Managed resources:
       NAMESPACE        NAME                                                               STATUS   SOURCEHASH
       config-control   pubsubtopic.pubsub.cnrm.cloud.google.com/pubsub-topic-sample-sync  Current   715b429
       config-control   service.serviceusage.cnrm.cloud.google.com/pubsub.googleapis.com   Current   715b429
    

    If you don't see this output, wait a couple of minutes and try again.

  5. Verify that Config Controller has created your resource:

    gcloud pubsub topics list
    

    The output is similar to the following:

    name: projects/PROJECT_ID/topics/start-instance-event
    ---
    labels:
      managed-by-cnrm: 'true'
    name: projects/PROJECT_ID/topics/sample-topic
    ---
    labels:
      managed-by-cnrm: 'true'
    name: projects/PROJECT_ID/topics/pubsub-topic-sample-sync
    ---
    labels:
      label-one: value-one
      managed-by-cnrm: 'true'
    name: projects/PROJECT_ID/topics/example-topic
    

    In this output, you can see the Pub/Sub you created in the Create a Config Controller instance section and the one you created by syncing your instance to a GitHub repository.

Clean up

To avoid incurring charges to your Google Cloud account for the resources used in this tutorial, either delete the project that contains the resources, or keep the project and delete the individual resources.

Delete the project

    Delete a Google Cloud project:

    gcloud projects delete PROJECT_ID

Delete the individual resources

  1. Delete the Config Connector PubSubTopic resource:

    kubectl delete -f pubsub-topic.yaml
    
  2. Delete the Policy Controller constraint:

    kubectl delete -f bucket-constraint.yaml
    
  3. Delete the NAT router:

    gcloud compute routers delete cc-nat-router \
        --project=PROJECT_ID \
        --region=us-central1
    

    Press y when prompted.

  4. Delete the Pub/Sub resource created by Config Sync:

    kubectl delete PubSubTopic pubsub-topic-sample-sync -n config-control
    
  5. Delete the RootSync resource:

    kubectl delete rootsync root-sync -n config-management-system
    
  6. Using your preferred text editor, delete all of the YAML files that you created:

    • enable-pubsub.yaml
    • pubsub-topic.yaml
    • bucket-constraint.yaml
    • asia-storage-bucket.yaml
    • cc-rootsync.yaml
  7. Delete the Config Controller instance:

    gcloud anthos config controller delete --location=us-central1 cc-example
    

    Press y when prompted.

What's next