Manually deploy gateways
Use Istio Helm charts to configure and deploy an Istio control plane and gateways in each workload cluster.
Overview
Review the following information about the Istio control plane and gateway setup in this guide:
- This installation guide installs a production-level Solo distribution of Istio, a hardened Istio enterprise image. For more information, see About the Solo distribution of Istio.
- In multicluster setups, one ingress gateway for north-south traffic is deployed to each workload cluster. To learn about your gateway options, such as creating a global load balancer to route to each gateway IP address or registering each gateway IP address in one DNS entry, see the gateway deployment patterns page.
- The east-west gateways in this architecture allow the Gloo Mesh Gateway in one cluster to route incoming traffic requests to services in another cluster. If you have a single-cluster Gloo Mesh Gateway setup, the east-west gateway deployment is not required.
Istio 1.22 is supported only as patch version 1.22.1-patch0
and later. Do not use patch versions 1.22.0 and 1.22.1, which contain bugs that impact several Gloo Mesh Gateway routing features that rely on virtual destinations. Additionally, in Istio 1.22.0-1.22.3, the ISTIO_DELTA_XDS
environment variable must be set to false
. For more information, see this upstream Istio issue. Note that this issue is resolved in Istio 1.22.4.
Gloo Mesh Gateway version 2.6 supports Istio version 1.21. However, a bug was identified when upgrading from Istio version 1.20 or lower to Istio version 1.21 and later while being on Gloo Mesh Gateway version 2.6. This bug can lead to disabled JWT authentication and authorization policies that fail close, which means that the gateway rejects requests as unauthenticated on any route that is protected by a JWT policy. Note that this bug will be fixed in a future 2.6 patch release. Do not upgrade to Istio version 1.21 and later until this patch is available. For more information, see the release notes.
Istio 1.20 is supported only as patch version 1.20.1-patch1
and later. Do not use patch versions 1.20.0 and 1.20.1, which contain bugs that impact several Gloo Mesh Gateway features that rely on Istio ServiceEntries.
If you have multiple external services that use the same host and plan to use Istio 1.20, 1.21, or 1.22, you must use patch versions 1.20.7, 1.21.3, or 1.22.1-patch0 or later to ensure that the Istio service entry that is created for those external services is correct.
Step 1: Set up tools
Set up the following tools and environment variables.
Review Supported versions to choose the Solo distribution of Istio that you want to use, and save the version information in the following environment variables.
REPO
: The repo key for the Solo distribution of Istio that you can get by logging in to the Support Center and reviewing the Istio images built by Solo.io support article.ISTIO_IMAGE
: The version that you want to use with thesolo
tag, such as1.22.4-solo
. You can optionally append other tags of Solo distributions of Istio as needed.REVISION
: Take the Istio major and minor versions and replace the periods with hyphens, such as1-22
.
ISTIO_VERSION
: The version of Istio that you want to install, such as1.22.4
.
export REPO=<repo-key> export ISTIO_IMAGE=1.22.4-solo export REVISION=1-22 export ISTIO_VERSION=1.22.4
Install
istioctl
, the Istio CLI tool.curl -L https://istio.io/downloadIstio | ISTIO_VERSION=${ISTIO_VERSION} sh - cd istio-$ISTIO_VERSION export PATH=$PWD/bin:$PATH
Add and update the Helm repository for Istio.
helm repo add istio https://istio-release.storage.googleapis.com/charts helm repo update
Step 2: Prepare the cluster environment
Prepare the workload cluster for Istio installation, including installing the Istio custom resource definitions (CRDs).
Save the name and kubeconfig context of a workload cluster in the following environment variables. Each time you repeat the steps in this guide, you change these variables to the next workload cluster’s name and context.
export CLUSTER_NAME=<remote-cluster> export REMOTE_CONTEXT=<remote-cluster-context>
Ensure that the Istio operator CRD (
istiooperators.install.istio.io
) is not managed by the Gloo Platform CRD Helm chart.kubectl get crds -A --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT | grep istiooperators.install.istio.io
- If the CRD does not exist on your cluster, you disabled it during the Gloo Mesh installation. Continue to the next step.
- If the CRD exists on your cluster, follow these steps to remove the Istio operator CRD from the
gloo-platform-crds
Helm release:- Update the Helm repository for Gloo Platform.
helm repo add gloo-platform https://storage.googleapis.com/gloo-platform/helm-charts helm repo update
- Upgrade your
gloo-platform-crds
Helm release in the workload cluster by including the--set installIstioOperator=false
flag.helm upgrade gloo-platform-crds gloo-platform/gloo-platform-crds \ --kube-context $REMOTE_CONTEXT \ --namespace=gloo-mesh \ --set installIstioOperator=false
- Update the Helm repository for Gloo Platform.
Install the Istio CRDs.
helm upgrade --install istio-base istio/base \ -n istio-system \ --version $ISTIO_VERSION \ --kube-context $REMOTE_CONTEXT \ --create-namespace
Create the
istio-config
namespace. This namespace serves as the administrative root namespace for Istio configuration.kubectl create namespace istio-config --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT
OpenShift only: Deploy the Istio CNI plug-in, and elevate the
istio-system
service account permissions.- Install the CNI plug-in, which is required for using Istio in OpenShift.
helm install istio-cni istio/cni \ --namespace kube-system \ --kube-context $REMOTE_CONTEXT \ --version $ISTIO_VERSION \ --set cni.cniBinDir=/var/lib/cni/bin \ --set cni.cniConfDir=/etc/cni/multus/net.d \ --set cni.cniConfFileName="istio-cni.conf" \ --set cni.chained=false \ --set cni.privileged=true
- Elevate the permissions of the following service accounts that will be created. These permissions allow the to make use of a user ID that is normally restricted by OpenShift. For more information, see the Istio on OpenShift documentation.
oc adm policy add-scc-to-group anyuid system:serviceaccounts:istio-system --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT oc adm policy add-scc-to-group anyuid system:serviceaccounts:istio-config --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT oc adm policy add-scc-to-group anyuid system:serviceaccounts:istio-ingress --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT oc adm policy add-scc-to-group anyuid system:serviceaccounts:istio-eastwest --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT
- Create a NetworkAttachmentDefinition custom resource for the
istio-ingress
project. If you plan to create the Istio gateways in a different namespace, such asistio-gateways
, make sure to create the NetworkAttachmentDefinition in that namespace instead.cat <<EOF | oc create -n istio-ingress --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT -f - apiVersion: "k8s.cni.cncf.io/v1" kind: NetworkAttachmentDefinition metadata: name: istio-cni EOF
- Install the CNI plug-in, which is required for using Istio in OpenShift.
Step 3: Deploy the Istio control plane
Deploy an Istio control plane in your workload cluster. The provided Helm values files are configured with production-level settings; however, depending on your environment, you might need to edit settings to achieve specific Istio functionality.
Prepare a Helm values file for the
istiod
control plane. You can further edit the file to provide your own details for production-level settings.Download an example file,
istiod.yaml
, and update the environment variables with the values that you previously set.curl -0L https://raw.githubusercontent.com/solo-io/gloo-mesh-use-cases/main/gloo-mesh/istio-install/manual-helm/istiod.yaml > istiod.yaml envsubst < istiod.yaml > istiod-values.yaml
Optional: Trust domain validation is disabled by default in the profile that you downloaded in the previous step. If you have a multicluster mesh setup and you want to enable trust domain validation, add all the clusters that are part of your mesh in the
meshConfig.trustDomainAliases
field, excluding the cluster that you currently prepare for the istiod installation. For example, let’s say you have 3 clusters that belong to your mesh:cluster1
,cluster2
, andcluster3
. When you install istiod incluster1
, you set the following values for your trust domain:... meshConfig: trustDomain: cluster1 trustDomainAliases: ["cluster2","cluster3"]
Then, when you move on to install istiod in
cluster2
, you settrustDomain: cluster2
andtrustDomainAliases: ["cluster1","cluster3"]
. You repeat this step for all the clusters that belong to your service mesh. Note that as you add or delete clusters from your service mesh, you must make sure that you update thetrustDomainAliases
field for all of the clusters.If you plan to run multiple revisions of Istio in your cluster and usediscoverySelectors
in each revision to discover the resources in specific namespaces, enable theglooMgmtServer.extraEnvs.IGNORE_REVISIONS_FOR_VIRTUAL_DESTINATION_TRANSLATION
environment variable on the Gloo management server. For more information, see Multiple Istio revisions in the same cluster.
Create the
istiod
control plane in your cluster.helm upgrade --install istiod-$REVISION istio/istiod \ --version $ISTIO_VERSION \ --namespace istio-system \ --kube-context $REMOTE_CONTEXT \ --wait \ -f istiod-values.yaml
After the installation is complete, verify that the Istio control plane pods are running.
kubectl get pods -n istio-system --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT
Example output for 2 replicas:
NAME READY STATUS RESTARTS AGE istiod-1-22-7b96cb895-4nzv9 1/1 Running 0 30s istiod-1-22-7b96cb895-r7l8k 1/1 Running 0 30s
Step 4 (multicluster setups): Deploy the Istio east-west gateway
If you have a multicluster setup, deploy an Istio east-west gateway into each cluster in addition to the ingress gateway. In Gloo Mesh Gateway, the east-west gateways allow the ingress gateway in one cluster to route incoming traffic requests to services in another cluster.
Prepare a Helm values file for the Istio east-west gateway. This sample command downloads an example file,
eastwest-gateway.yaml
, and updates the environment variables with the values that you previously set. You can further edit the file to provide your own details for production-level settings.curl -0L https://raw.githubusercontent.com/solo-io/gloo-mesh-use-cases/main/gloo-mesh/istio-install/manual-helm/eastwest-gateway.yaml > eastwest-gateway.yaml envsubst < eastwest-gateway.yaml > eastwest-gateway-values.yaml
Create the east-west gateway.
helm upgrade --install istio-eastwestgateway-$REVISION istio/gateway \ --version $ISTIO_VERSION \ --create-namespace \ --namespace istio-eastwest \ --kube-context $REMOTE_CONTEXT \ --wait \ -f eastwest-gateway-values.yaml
Verify that the east-west gateway pods are running and the load balancer service is assigned an external address.
kubectl get pods -n istio-eastwest --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT kubectl get svc -n istio-eastwest --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT
Example output:
NAME READY STATUS RESTARTS AGE istio-eastwestgateway-1-22-7f6f8f7fc7-ncrzq 1/1 Running 0 11s istio-eastwestgateway-1-22-7f6f8f7fc7-ncrzq 1/1 Running 0 48s NAME TYPE CLUSTER-IP EXTERNAL-IP PORT(S) AGE istio-eastwestgateway-1-22 LoadBalancer 10.96.166.166 <externalip> 15021:32343/TCP,80:31685/TCP,443:30877/TCP,31400:31030/TCP,15443:31507/TCP,15012:30668/TCP,15017:30812/TCP 13s
AWS clusters only: For the Elastic Load Balancer (ELB) instance that is automatically created for you to back the east-west gateway service, verify that the health check shows a healthy state. Gloo Mesh configures the east-west gateway to listen on HTTPS port 15443. However, when the ELB is created, the first port that is defined in the Kubernetes service manifest is used to perform the health check. This port might be different from the port that Gloo Mesh configures. For your ELB health check to pass, you might need to configure the load balancer to run the health check on port 15443.
Step 5: Deploy the Istio ingress gateway
Deploy Istio ingress gateways to allow incoming traffic requests to your apps.
Prepare a Helm values file for the Istio ingress gateway. This sample command downloads an example file,
ingress-gateway.yaml
, and updates the environment variables with the values that you previously set. You can further edit the file to provide your own details for production-level settings.curl -0L https://raw.githubusercontent.com/solo-io/gloo-mesh-use-cases/main/gloo-mesh/istio-install/manual-helm/ingress-gateway.yaml > ingress-gateway.yaml envsubst < ingress-gateway.yaml > ingress-gateway-values.yaml
Create the ingress gateway.
helm upgrade --install istio-ingressgateway-$REVISION istio/gateway \ --version $ISTIO_VERSION \ --create-namespace \ --namespace istio-ingress \ --kube-context $REMOTE_CONTEXT \ --wait \ -f ingress-gateway-values.yaml
Verify that the ingress gateway pods are running and the load balancer service is assigned an external address.
kubectl get pods -n istio-ingress --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT kubectl get svc -n istio-ingress --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT
Example output:
NAME READY STATUS RESTARTS AGE istio-ingressgateway-1-22-665d46686f-nhh52 1/1 Running 0 106s istio-ingressgateway-1-22-665d46686f-tlp5j 1/1 Running 0 2m1s NAME TYPE CLUSTER-IP EXTERNAL-IP PORT(S) AGE istio-ingressgateway-1-22 LoadBalancer 10.96.252.49 <externalip> 15021:32378/TCP,80:30315/TCP,443:32186/TCP,31400:30313/TCP,15443:31632/TCP 2m2s
AWS clusters only: For the Elastic Load Balancer (ELB) instance that is automatically created for you to back the ingress gateway service, verify that the health check shows a healthy state. Gloo Mesh configures the ingress gateway to listen on HTTPS port 15443. However, when the ELB is created, the first port that is defined in the Kubernetes service manifest is used to perform the health check. This port might be different from the port that Gloo Mesh configures. For your ELB health check to pass, you might need to configure the load balancer to run the health check on port 15443.Optional for OpenShift: Expose the load balancer by using an OpenShift route.
oc -n istio-ingress expose svc istio-ingressgateway-1-22 --port=http2 --context $REMOTE_CONTEXT
Step 6 (multicluster setups): Repeat steps 2 - 5
If you have a multicluster Gloo Mesh setup, repeat steps 2 - 5 for each workload cluster that you want to install Istio on. Remember to change the cluster name and context variables each time you repeat the steps.
export CLUSTER_NAME=<remote-cluster>
export REMOTE_CONTEXT=<remote-cluster-context>
Next steps
- If you haven’t already, install Gloo Mesh Gateway so that Gloo can manage your Istio resources. You don’t need to directly configure any Istio resources going forward.
- Review how Gloo Mesh custom resources are automatically translated into Istio resources.
- Apply Gloo policies to manage the security and resiliency of your service mesh environment.