Learn Kubernetes by Playing the “Game of Pods”

The “Game of Pods” is a set of fun challenges that can help students get started learning Kubernetes and to practice real world examples of cloud native application deployment on a real Kubernetes cluster.

The “Game of Pods” makes learning and practicing Kubernetes fun through a set of challenges that must be solved to win the game. Users are sent on quests that require them to diagnose common web server problems, fix broken clusters, deploy applications, and complete other tasks related to troubleshooting Kubernetes or data center security issues.

1) In order to get started, go to the website address: https://kodekloud.com/p/game-of-pods

Background:

The “Game of Pods” consists of two data centers: “WestOS” and “EastOS.

Choose one of the two sides to begin. Then click on the game icons for your territory to reveal the quests that must be completed to save your data center from ruin and win the game.

2) Quest icons show outstanding issues with your data center that need to be repaired or new client tasks that need implemented. Click through the quest icons to begin the game.

These quests are designed to replicate common examples of Kubernetes deployments to give students the practical experience of completing common DevOps tasks.

Next: Fix problems on the game board to restore your data centers to order. Accept the challenge and begin the process of resolving the issues involved with your initial quest.

3) After clicking on the “fix” button, the game will open a command line window with a live connection to a Kubernetes cluster hosted on a web server.

Next: Open the challenge/quiz portal in a new window.

4) You will receive a quest to deploy a web server architecture stack for a particular software distribution, for example: Drupal with MySQL.

Next: Set up an example volume with storage allocation for the partition with the code:

Volume Name: drupal-mysql-pv
Storage: 5Gi
Access modes: ReadWriteOnce

In order to do this, you will need to enter the correct commands into the terminal interface:

5) For example, one of the tasks require you to use the command line terminal to create the directory on the Worker Nodes. You will need to configure drupal-pv at the following location:

hostPath = /drupal-data

After creating the host path, build the application YAML for the kubernetes cluster.

6) Create the persistent storage volume for Drupal on the web server cluster using YAML with the following commands:

Then test your work by clicking on the “Check” button in the game-board.

Note: Feedback is instant, allowing you to correct any mistakes.

7) Complete all of the tasks on the quest until each of the icons on the game-board have turned green. You will then be able to complete the challenge and move onto the next quest.

8) Access the application on the host port: NodePort 30095

Check the IP address in the command line terminal in order to bring the installed application up in a new web browser tab.

9) Configure and install the Drupal CMS application with a new MySQL database as required.

Note: It is not necessary to complete the CMS installation on the test server to finish the quest. Once the application is up, you are good!

10) Complete the task for your first “Game of Pods” quest. Tweet your followers and leave feedback for the KodeKloud website through a short rating survey.

Note: Users who complete the game quest are given the magic chant to fix the cluster on the original map board. After entering the magic chant, you can proceed to undertake the next quest challenge to repair your data center and win the game.

Summary:

For the “Game of Pods” challenges, each quest is different. Some challenges include broken applications where the user must use command line tools to fix issues. Sometimes there is a broken Kubernetes cluster that needs to be fixed. In other examples, you may need to bootstrap resources on a server with Kubernetes to get applications up and running. Complete the different challenges on the board to lead your data center team to victory.

Check out courses on Kubernetes at KodeKloud and get certified in Kubernetes administration.

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