The following terms are used in this documentation.

application

Cloud native software that can be installed into a Kubernetes cluster. Cloud native applications are designed to take advantage of cluster resources and scaling capabilities.

application catalog

A searchable collection of cloud native software applications that can be installed into a Kubernetes cluster.

application template

An application template contains the configuration options for a specific application. These are a set of Helm values. They can be extracted from an application catalog and viewed, saved to a file, or edited directly. The template can then be used to install the application using the provided configuration.

boot image

An Oracle Container Host for Kubernetes (OCK) Virtual Machine image in Qcow2 format. The boot image is used to create cluster nodes.

See also: "Oracle Container Host for Kubernetes (OCK) image".

bootstrap cluster

A bootstrap cluster is a Kubernetes cluster used to instantiate another cluster (the workload cluster). An existing cluster can be used as a bootstrap cluster by including the location of a kubeconfig file as an option with CLI commands. If no bootstrap cluster is available, the CLI instantiates an ephemeral cluster to act as a bootstrap cluster.

See also: "ephemeral cluster", "management cluster", and "workload cluster".

Bring Your Own provider

The Bring Your Own (byo) provider is used to create Kubernetes clusters using bare metal or other virtual instances not provided explicitly by Oracle CNE.

CLI

The Oracle CNE Command Line Interface (CLI). This is the command line tool used to create and manage Kubernetes clusters in Oracle CNE. The ocne command.

cluster configuration file

A set of configuration options in a YAML file that are applied to a specific Kubernetes cluster.

cluster API template

A file that contains all the information required to create a Kubernetes cluster using the Kubernetes Cluster API. The ocne cluster template command is used to create this file. Save and edit this template to create clusters using the Kubernetes Cluster API.

container registry

A repository of container images. For example, the Oracle Container Registry.

default configuration file

A YAML file used to set common, environment-specific values for CLI commands.

ephemeral cluster

A single node cluster created with the libvirt provider that's short-lived and is created and destroyed as needed by the CLI.

Kubernetes Cluster API

An API to provision, run, and maintain Kubernetes clusters. The API an be extended by providing Custom Resource Definitions (CRDs) to manage the infrastructure in a declarative way. The Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) provider is an implementation of the Kubernetes Cluster API.

libvirt provider

The libvirt provider can be used to provision Kubernetes clusters using Kernel-based Virtual Machines (KVM). The default KVM stack includes libvirt, and is included by default, with Oracle Linux. Libvirt is the default provider.

management cluster

A Kubernetes cluster that controls the life cycle of other clusters. The controllers that implement the Kubernetes Cluster API run inside a management cluster. A workload cluster can be its own management cluster. Management clusters can also be ephemeral clusters, or bootstrap clusters, depending on the context.

See also: "ephemeral cluster", "bootstrap cluster", and "workload cluster".

node

A single virtual or physical machine within a Kubernetes cluster.

Oracle Container Host for Kubernetes (OCK) image

A container image that contains the Oracle Linux OS and the Kubernetes software distribution. The image is used to create nodes in a Kubernetes cluster. The container image is available as a bootable Qcow2 image, and an OSTree based image. The image can be manipulated for custom installations.

OCI provider

The OCI (oci) provider is used to create Kubernetes clusters on OCI. The oci provider uses the Kubernetes Cluster API Provider for OCI to perform the deployment, which is an implementation of the Kubernetes Cluster API.

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure provider

The long name for the OCI provider. See "OCI provider".

OS console

An administration console to directly access a node's OS, for testing, and debugging purposes.

OSTree archive image

A version of the Oracle Container Host for Kubernetes (OCK) image that has been converted to an OSTree archive and served over HTTP. This image type is used to update cluster nodes and generate customized installations using the Bring Your Own provider.

See also: "Oracle Container Host for Kubernetes (OCK) image".

self-managed cluster

A Kubernetes workload cluster that also acts as a management cluster. When the cluster has been deployed by a bootstrap cluster, the Kubernetes Cluster API resources are migrated from the bootstrap cluster into the new self-managed cluster.

See also: "management cluster", and "bootstrap cluster".

UI

The Oracle CNE User Interface (UI) provides a web-based interface to manage the maintenance and installation of Kubernetes cluster resources, and cloud native applications. The UI runs in the Kubernetes cluster as a deployment named ui, in the ocne-system namespace.

workload cluster

A Kubernetes cluster whose lifecycle is controlled by a management cluster. A workload cluster might also be a management cluster.

See also: "management cluster".