Installation options
Learn about your options for installing Gloo Mesh Core in your environment.
Deployment modes
Choose whether you want to deploy Gloo Mesh Core in one cluster, or across multiple clusters.
Single cluster mode
Gloo Mesh Core is fully functional when the control plane (management server) and data plane (agent and service mesh) both run within the same cluster. You can easily install both the control and data plane components by using one installation process. If you choose to install the components in separate processes, ensure that you use the same name for the cluster during both processes.
Multicluster mode
A multicluster Gloo Mesh Core setup consists of one management cluster that you install the Gloo control plane (management server) in, and one or more workload clusters that serve as the data plane (agent and service mesh). By running the control plane in a dedicated management cluster, you can ensure that no workload pods consume cluster resources that might impede management processes. Many guides throughout the documentation use one management cluster and two workload clusters as an example setup.
Sidecar deployment options
You can deploy some Gloo components as either standalone pods or as sidecar containers to other component pods. Deploying components as sidecars can help reduce the amount of compute resources required to run Gloo Mesh Core.
The following components can be deployed either as standalone pods or as sidecars. For more information about the installed components, review the Gloo Mesh Core architecture.
| Component deployed as a sidecar | Main component pod | Installation setting |
|---|---|---|
| Gloo agent | Gloo management server | glooAgent.runAsSidecar: trueNote that the agent is available as a sidecar only in single-cluster environments. |
| Gloo insights engine | Gloo management server | glooInsightsEngine.runAsSidecar: true |
| Gloo analyzer |
| glooAnalyzer.runAsSidecar: true |
Installation methods
After you decide on a single or multicluster environment, choose whether to use the meshctl CLI or Helm charts to install Gloo Mesh Core.
CLI install profiles
Gloo packages profiles in the meshctl CLI for quick Gloo Mesh Core installations. Profiles provide basic Helm settings for a minimum installation, and are suitable for testing setups. Because the profiles provide standard setups, they can also be useful starting points for building a customized and robust set of Helm installation values.
In your meshctl install and meshctl cluster register commands, you can specify a Gloo Mesh Core profile in the --profiles flag. Note that any values you specify in --set flags have highest merge priority.
| Profile | Use case | Deployed components |
|---|---|---|
gloo-core-single-cluster | Install all Gloo Mesh Core components into a single-cluster Kubernetes setup. | Gloo management server, Gloo UI, Gloo insights engine, Gloo OpenTelemetry (OTel) gateway, Gloo agent, Gloo analyzer, Gloo OTel collector agents, Prometheus, Redis |
gloo-core-mgmt | In a multicluster Kubernetes setup, install the Gloo Mesh Core control plane in a dedicated cluster. | Gloo management server, Gloo UI, Gloo insights engine, Gloo OTel gateway, Prometheus, Redis |
gloo-core-agent | In a multicluster Kubernetes setup, register a workload cluster that runs an Istio service mesh with the control plane. | Gloo agent, Gloo analyzer, Gloo OTel collector agents |
You can review the settings in a profile by running curl https://storage.googleapis.com/gloo-platform/helm-profiles/2.5.0-beta2/<profile>.yaml > profile-values.yaml.
To set up Gloo Mesh Core with these profiles, see the quickstart guide.
Helm charts
To extensively customize the settings of your Gloo Mesh Core installation, you can use the gloo-platform and gloo-platform-crds Helm charts.
Installation Helm chart
All components for a full Gloo Mesh Core installation are available in the gloo-platform Helm chart.
You can see all possible fields that you can set for the chart by running the following command.
helm show values gloo-platform/gloo-platform --version v2.5.0-beta2 > all-values.yaml
For more information about each field, see the Helm values documentation. To set up Gloo Mesh Core with Helm, see the advanced installation guide.
CRD Helm chart
All CRDs that are required for a Gloo Mesh Core installation are available in the gloo-platform-crds Helm chart.
By default, this Helm chart installs all CRDs that are available in Gloo Platform, including CRDs that you can use only if you have a Gloo Mesh Enterprise or Gloo Mesh Gateway license. To install only the CRDs that are relevant to Gloo Mesh Core, set installEnterpriseCrds to false. To see all CRD installation options, see the Helm values documentation.
If you already installed the chart, you can run kubectl get crds -A | grep gloo.solo.io to see the installed CRDs.