Running Usenet Stack on Kubernetes

Some of the most common applications in a Usenet Stack are SABnzbd, Sonarr and Radarr. SABnzbd is a binary newsreader which handles download from Usenet. Sonarr acts a PVR for TV shows and Radarr is a fork of Sonarr is a PVR for Movies. This post will show to deploy a Usenet Stack on Kubernetes

I recently helped out a friend to get these apps deployed on Kubernetes and I published the YAML files. You can find the files on my Github repo but I will share them further down as well.

 

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Kubernetes with Mixed CPU Architecture

Creating a Raspberry Pi Kubernetes cluster is straight forward, however it becomes more complicated when you want to mix and match kubernetes nodes of different CPU architectures.

I recently deployed a new Kubernetes cluster in my home lab which initially consisted of two Ubuntu nodes running kubeadm and are  VMs on VMware ESXi. Last night I tried to add a Raspberry Pi  and ran into a couple of issues which I resolved and describe further down to save you some time.

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vSphere 6.5 is finally GA

Today, VMware finally announces vSphere 6.5 to be GA.

As I’m writing this post, I’m installing ESXi 6.5 GA in my lab:
ESXi 6.5 GA

vSphere 6.5 Release notes
http://pubs.vmware.com/Release_Notes/en/vsphere/65/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-65-release-notes.html#whatsnew

What’s New in VMware vSphere 6.5
http://www.vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/whitepaper/vsphere/vmw-white-paper-vsphr-whats-new-6-5.pdf

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vSphere HA – VM Monitoring

VM Monitoring comes with three different options. By default it is set to Disabled but you can vm monitoringenable either VM Monitoring Only or VM and Application Monitoring.

In either case, the VM uses VMware Tools to identify the state of the VM and its application and then reboot the VM if necessary.

What is the difference between VM Monitoring Only and VM and Application Monitoring?

VM Monitoring Only utilizes VMware Tools to check regularly for heartbeats and I/O activity from the VMware Tools process. Depending on the Monitoring Sensitivity setting, vSphere HA will  know how often to look for heartbeats and how often the VM should reboot.

VM and Application Monitoring also utilizes VMware Tools and can monitor the VM just like the VM Monitoring Only setting but it can also monitor the application, running on the VM. In order to enable Application Monitoring the application has to support VMware Application Monitoring or use the appropriate SDK.

At a minimum it is best practice to enable VM Monitoring Only to ensure maximum availability for your most important VMs. Note, this setting can be adjusted per VM via VM Overrides in the Cluster Settings

 

Finally in the Top 100 vBlogs

Today Eric Siebert from vSphere-land announced the final results of the Top vBlog 2016 competition.

For the readers who aren’t familiar with the Top vBlog competition, it is all about best content and frequency of content. Last year I wasn’t even on the list to be voted for. However, this year I made it on the list and I’m ranked 72 out of 321 blogs.

Not bad at all. I’m super excited and thankful for everyone who took the time to vote for me and my blog. You are the reason I’m sharing my stories and my knowledge.

A special thank you to Eric Siebert, who made this happen!

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