New Heptio-Supported Quick Start for Kubernetes on the AWS Cloud

February 2019 update -- This Quick Start is now available as Quick Start for Kubernetes by VMware, and is being maintained in collaboration with VMware.

AWS has published a new Quick Start that automatically deploys a Kubernetes cluster on the AWS Cloud in about 10 minutes.

Kubernetes is an orchestration platform for managing cloud workloads through containers such as Docker. With Kubernetes on the AWS Cloud, you gain the flexibility and security of the AWS infrastructure along with the powerful container deployment, scaling, and management capabilities of Kubernetes. The Quick Start was created by AWS in partnership with Heptio, to integrate solutions and services from both companies.

The Quick Start uses AWS CloudFormation templates to set up the following in your AWS account:
• A virtual private cloud (VPC) that includes two subnets (public and private)
• In the public subnet, a Linux bastion host and Elastic Load Balancing
• In the private subnet, a Kubernetes cluster on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS. The Quick Start sets up one EC2 instance for the master node and your choice of 1-20 EC2 instances in an Auto Scaling group for worker nodes
• kubeadm for cluster administration, and Docker for the container runtime
• Your choice of Calico or Weave for networking between pods
• Security group for SSH access from the bastion host and inter-node connectivity

You can use this environment to explore Kubernetes networking, scaling, and administration functions, and extend it for your production workloads. You can also deploy Kubernetes into your existing AWS infrastructure.

The Quick Start includes a deployment guide, which describes the reference architecture, provides step-by-step instructions for deploying Kubernetes on AWS, and discusses configuration settings and best practices. To get started, use the following resources:
- View architecture and details
- View the deployment guide
- Browse and launch other AWS Quick Start reference deployments