Deploying multi-cluster Gateways

Autopilot Standard

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This page describes how to deploy Kubernetes Gateway resources for load balancing ingress traffic across multiple Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) clusters (or fleet). Before deploying multi-cluster Gateways, see Enabling multi-cluster Gateways to prepare your environment.

For deploying Gateways to load balance ingress traffic to just a single GKE cluster, see Deploying Gateways.

Multi-cluster Gateways

A multi-cluster Gateway is a Gateway resource that load balances traffic across multiple Kubernetes clusters. In GKE the gke-l7-global-external-managed-mc, gke-l7-regional-external-managed-mc, gke-l7-rilb-mc, and gke-l7-gxlb-mc GatewayClasses deploy multi-cluster Gateways that provide HTTP routing, traffic splitting, traffic mirroring, health-based failover, and more across different GKE clusters, Kubernetes Namespaces, and across different regions. Multi-cluster Gateways make managing application networking across many clusters and teams easy, secure, and scalable for infrastructure administrators.

This page introduces three examples to teach you how to deploy multi-cluster Gateways using the GKE Gateway controller:

• Example 1: An external, multi-cluster Gateway providing load balancing across two GKE clusters for internet traffic.
• Example 2: Blue-green, weight-based traffic splitting and traffic mirroring across two GKE clusters for internal VPC traffic.
• Example 3: A capacity-based Gateway to load-balance request to different backends based on their max capacity.

Each of the examples will use the same store and site applications to model a real-world scenario where an online shopping service and a website service are owned and operated by separate teams and deployed across a fleet of shared GKE clusters. Each of the examples highlights different topologies and use cases enabled by multi-cluster Gateways.

Multi-cluster Gateways require some environmental preparation before they can be deployed. Before proceeding, follow the steps in Enabling multi-cluster Gateways:

1. Deploy GKE clusters.

2. Register your clusters to a fleet.

3. Enable the multi-cluster Service and multi-cluster Gateway controllers.

Lastly, review the GKE Gateway controller limitations and known issues before using it in your environment.

Multi-cluster, multi-region, external Gateway

In this tutorial, you will create an external multi-cluster Gateway that serves external traffic across an application running in two GKE clusters.

In the following steps you:

1. Deploy the sample store application to the gke-west-1 and gke-east-1 clusters.
2. Configure Services on each cluster to be exported into your fleet (multi-cluster Services).
3. Deploy an external multi-cluster Gateway and an HTTPRoute to your config cluster (gke-west-1).

After the application and Gateway resources are deployed, you can control traffic across the two GKE clusters using path-based routing:

• Requests to /west are routed to store Pods in the gke-west-1 cluster.
• Requests to /east are routed to store Pods in thegke-east-1 cluster.
• Requests to any other path are routed to either cluster, according to its health, capacity, and proximity to the requesting client.

Deploying the demo application

1. Create the store Deployment and Namespace in all three of the clusters that were deployed in Enabling multi-cluster Gateways:

   kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/gke-networking-recipes/main/gateway/gke-gateway-controller/multi-cluster-gateway/store.yaml
   kubectl apply --context gke-west-2 -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/gke-networking-recipes/main/gateway/gke-gateway-controller/multi-cluster-gateway/store.yaml
   kubectl apply --context gke-east-1 -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/gke-networking-recipes/main/gateway/gke-gateway-controller/multi-cluster-gateway/store.yaml
   

   It deploys the following resources to each cluster:

   namespace/store created
   deployment.apps/store created
   

   All examples in this page use the app deployed in this step. Make sure that the app is deployed across all three clusters before trying any of the remaining steps. This example uses only clusters gke-west-1 and gke-east-1 , and gke-west-2 is used in another example.

Multi-cluster Services

Services are how Pods are exposed to clients. Because the GKE Gateway controller uses container-native load balancing, it does not use the ClusterIP or Kubernetes load balancing to reach Pods. Traffic is sent directly from the load balancer to the Pod IP addresses. However, Services still play a critical role as a logical identifier for Pod grouping.

Multi-cluster Services (MCS) is an API standard for Services that span clusters and its GKE controller provides service discovery across GKE clusters. The multi-cluster Gateway controller uses MCS API resources to group Pods into a Service that is addressable across or spans multiple clusters.

The multi-cluster Services API defines the following custom resources:

• ServiceExports map to a Kubernetes Service, exporting the endpoints of that Service to all clusters registered to the fleet. When a Service has a corresponding ServiceExport it means that the Service can be addressed by a multi-cluster Gateway.
• ServiceImports are automatically generated by the multi-cluster Service controller. ServiceExport and ServiceImport come in pairs. If a ServiceExport exists in the fleet, then a corresponding ServiceImport is created to allow the Service mapped to the ServiceExport to be accessed from across clusters.

Exporting Services works in the following way. A store Service exists in gke-west-1 which selects a group of Pods in that cluster. A ServiceExport is created in the cluster which allows the Pods in gke-west-1 to become accessible from the other clusters in the fleet. The ServiceExport will map to and expose Services that have the same name and Namespace as the ServiceExport resource.

apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
  name: store
  namespace: store
spec:
  selector:
    app: store
  ports:
  - port: 8080
    targetPort: 8080
---
kind: ServiceExport
apiVersion: net.gke.io/v1
metadata:
  name: store
  namespace: store

The following diagram shows what happens after a ServiceExport is deployed. If a ServiceExport and Service pair exist then the multi-cluster Service controller deploys a corresponding ServiceImport to every GKE cluster in the fleet. The ServiceImport is the local representation of the store Service in every cluster. This enables the client Pod in gke-east-1 to use ClusterIP or headless Services to reach the store Pods in gke-west-1. When used in this manner multi-cluster Services provide east-west load balancing between clusters without requiring an internal LoadBalancer Service. To use multi-cluster Services for cluster-to-cluster load balancing, see Configuring multi-cluster Services.

Multi-cluster Gateways also use ServiceImports, but not for cluster-to-cluster load balancing. Instead, Gateways use ServiceImports as logical identifiers for a Service that exists in another cluster or that stretches across multiple clusters. The following HTTPRoute references a ServiceImport instead of a Service resource. By referencing a ServiceImport, this indicates that it is forwarding traffic to a group of backend Pods that run across one or more clusters.

kind: HTTPRoute
apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1beta1
metadata:
  name: store-route
  namespace: store
  labels:
    gateway: multi-cluster-gateway
spec:
  parentRefs:
  - kind: Gateway
    namespace: store
    name: external-http
  hostnames:
  - "store.example.com"
  rules:
  - backendRefs:
    - group: net.gke.io
      kind: ServiceImport
      name: store
      port: 8080

The following diagram shows how the HTTPRoute routes store.example.com traffic to store Pods on gke-west-1 and gke-east-1. The load balancer treats them as one pool of backends. If the Pods from one of the clusters becomes unhealthy, unreachable, or has no traffic capacity, then traffic load is balanced to the remaining Pods on the other cluster. New clusters can be added or removed with the store Service and ServiceExport. This will transparently add or remove backend Pods without any explicit routing configuration changes.

Exporting Services

At this point, the application is running across both clusters. Next, you will expose and export the applications by deploying Services and ServiceExports to each cluster.

1. Apply the following manifest to the gke-west-1 cluster to create your store and store-west-1 Services and ServiceExports:

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f -
   apiVersion: v1
   kind: Service
   metadata:
     name: store
     namespace: store
   spec:
     selector:
       app: store
     ports:
     - port: 8080
       targetPort: 8080
   ---
   kind: ServiceExport
   apiVersion: net.gke.io/v1
   metadata:
     name: store
     namespace: store
   ---
   apiVersion: v1
   kind: Service
   metadata:
     name: store-west-1
     namespace: store
   spec:
     selector:
       app: store
     ports:
     - port: 8080
       targetPort: 8080
   ---
   kind: ServiceExport
   apiVersion: net.gke.io/v1
   metadata:
     name: store-west-1
     namespace: store
   EOF
   

2. Apply the following manifest to the gke-east-1 cluster to create your store and store-east-1 Services and ServiceExports:

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-east-1 -f -
   apiVersion: v1
   kind: Service
   metadata:
     name: store
     namespace: store
   spec:
     selector:
       app: store
     ports:
     - port: 8080
       targetPort: 8080
   ---
   kind: ServiceExport
   apiVersion: net.gke.io/v1
   metadata:
     name: store
     namespace: store
   ---
   apiVersion: v1
   kind: Service
   metadata:
     name: store-east-1
     namespace: store
   spec:
     selector:
       app: store
     ports:
     - port: 8080
       targetPort: 8080
   ---
   kind: ServiceExport
   apiVersion: net.gke.io/v1
   metadata:
     name: store-east-1
     namespace: store
   EOF
   

3. Verify that the correct ServiceExports have been created in the clusters.

   kubectl get serviceexports --context CLUSTER_NAME --namespace store
   

   Replace CLUSTER_NAME with gke-west-1 and gke-east-1. The output should resemble the following:

   # gke-west-1
   NAME           AGE
   store          2m40s
   store-west-1   2m40s
   
   # gke-east-1
   NAME           AGE
   store          2m25s
   store-east-1   2m25s
   

   This demonstrates that the store Service contains store Pods across both clusters while the store-west-1 and store-east-1 Services only contain store Pods on their respective clusters. These overlapping Services are used to target the Pods across multiple clusters or a subset of Pods on a single cluster.

4. After a few minutes verify that the accompanying ServiceImports have been automatically created by the multi-cluster Services controller across all clusters in the fleet.

   Note: The first MCS you create in your fleet can take up to 20 min to be fully operational. Exporting new services after the first one is created or adding endpoints to existing Multi-cluster Services is faster (up to a few minutes in some cases).

   kubectl get serviceimports --context CLUSTER_NAME --namespace store
   

   Replace CLUSTER_NAME with gke-west-1 and gke-east-1. The output should resemble the following:

   # gke-west-1
   NAME           TYPE           IP                  AGE
   store          ClusterSetIP   ["10.112.31.15"]    6m54s
   store-east-1   ClusterSetIP   ["10.112.26.235"]   5m49s
   store-west-1   ClusterSetIP   ["10.112.16.112"]   6m54s
   
   # gke-east-1
   NAME           TYPE           IP                  AGE
   store          ClusterSetIP   ["10.72.28.226"]    5d10h
   store-east-1   ClusterSetIP   ["10.72.19.177"]    5d10h
   store-west-1   ClusterSetIP   ["10.72.28.68"]     4h32m
   

   This demonstrates that all three Services are accessible from both clusters in the fleet. However, because there is only a single active config cluster per fleet, you can only deploy Gateways and HTTPRoutes that reference these ServiceImports in gke-west-1. When an HTTPRoute in the config cluster references these ServiceImports as backends, the Gateway can forward traffic to these Services no matter which cluster they are exported from.

Note: The Gateway controller does not use ServiceImports or the ClusterSetIP to perform routing, even though the ClusterSetIP can be used to load balance traffic directly between clusters for east-west use cases. ServiceImports are only used by Gateways for their service discovery information. All Gateway traffic flows directly from the load balancer to the Pod IP addresses without any kube-proxy load balancing.

Deploying the Gateway and HTTPRoute

Once the applications have been deployed, you can then configure a Gateway using the gke-l7-global-external-managed-mc GatewayClass. This Gateway creates an external Application Load Balancer configured to distribute traffic across your target clusters.

1. Apply the following Gateway manifest to the config cluster, gke-west-1 in this example:

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f -
   kind: Gateway
   apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1beta1
   metadata:
     name: external-http
     namespace: store
   spec:
     gatewayClassName: gke-l7-global-external-managed-mc
     listeners:
     - name: http
       protocol: HTTP
       port: 80
       allowedRoutes:
         kinds:
         - kind: HTTPRoute
   EOF
   

   Note: It might take several minutes (up to 10) for the Gateway to fully deploy and serve traffic.

   This Gateway configuration deploys external Application Load Balancer resources with the following namging convention: gkemcg1-NAMESPACE-GATEWAY_NAME-HASH.

   The default resources created with this configuration are:

   • 1 load balancer: gkemcg1-store-external-http-HASH
   • 1 public IP address: gkemcg1-store-external-http-HASH
   • 1 forwarding rule: gkemcg1-store-external-http-HASH
   • 2 backend services:
     • Default 404 backend service: gkemcg1-store-gw-serve404-HASH
     • Default 500 backend service: gkemcg1-store-gw-serve500-HASH
   • 1 Health check:
     • Default 404 health check: gkemcg1-store-gw-serve404-HASH
   • 0 routing rules (URLmap is empty)

   At this stage, any request to the GATEWAY_IP:80 will result in a default page displaying the following message: fault filter abort.

   Warning: In this example, we are deploying an external multi-cluster Gateway listening on port 80. If you are deploying an external multi-cluster Gateway for a production environment, you should ensure that you configure a set of features to properly secure your Gateway, depending on your context and your environment. To learn more about how to secure a multi-cluster Gateway, see Secure a Gateway, or how to apply Policies to a multi-cluster Gateway, see Configure Gateway resources using Policies.

2. Apply the following HTTPRoute manifest to the config cluster, gke-west-1 in this example:

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f -
   kind: HTTPRoute
   apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1beta1
   metadata:
     name: public-store-route
     namespace: store
     labels:
       gateway: external-http
   spec:
     hostnames:
     - "store.example.com"
     parentRefs:
     - name: external-http
     rules:
     - matches:
       - path:
           type: PathPrefix
           value: /west
       backendRefs:
       - group: net.gke.io
         kind: ServiceImport
         name: store-west-1
         port: 8080
     - matches:
       - path:
           type: PathPrefix
           value: /east
       backendRefs:
         - group: net.gke.io
           kind: ServiceImport
           name: store-east-1
           port: 8080
     - backendRefs:
       - group: net.gke.io
         kind: ServiceImport
         name: store
         port: 8080
   EOF
   

   At this stage, any request to the GATEWAY_IP:80 will result in a default page displaying the following message: fault filter abort.

   Once deployed, this HTTPRoute will configure the following routing behavior:

   • Requests to /west are routed to store Pods in the gke-west-1 cluster, because Pods selected by the store-west-1 ServiceExport only exist in the gke-west-1 cluster.
   • Requests to /east are routed to store Pods in thegke-east-1 cluster, because Pods selected by the store-east-1 ServiceExport only exist in the gke-east-1 cluster.
   • Requests to any other path are routed to store Pods in either cluster, according to its health, capacity, and proximity to the requesting client.
   • Requests to the GATEWAY_IP:80 will result in a default page displaying the following message: fault filter abort.

   

   Note that if all the Pods on a given cluster are unhealthy (or don't exist) then traffic to the store Service would only be sent to clusters that actually have store Pods. The existence of a ServiceExport and Service on a given cluster does not guarantee that traffic will be sent to that cluster. Pods must exist and be responding affirmatively to the load balancer health check or else the load balancer will just send traffic to healthy store Pods in other clusters.

   New resources are created with this configuration:

   • 3 backend services:
     • The store backend service: gkemcg1-store-store-8080-HASH
     • The store-east-1 backend service: gkemcg1-store-store-east-1-8080-HASH
     • The store-west-1 backend service: gkemcg1-store-store-west-1-8080-HASH
   • 3 Health checks:
     • The store health check: gkemcg1-store-store-8080-HASH
     • The store-east-1 health check: gkemcg1-store-store-east-1-8080-HASH
     • The store-west-1 health check: gkemcg1-store-store-west-1-8080-HASH
   • 1 routing rule in the URLmap:
     • The store.example.com routing rule:
     • 1 Host: store.example.com
     • Multiple matchRules to route to the new backend services

The following diagram shows the resources you've deployed across both clusters. Because gke-west-1 is the Gateway config cluster, it is the cluster in which our Gateway, HTTPRoutes, and ServiceImports are watched by the Gateway controller. Each cluster has a store ServiceImport and another ServiceImport specific to that cluster. Both point at the same Pods. This lets the HTTPRoute to specify exactly where traffic should go - to the store Pods on a specific cluster or to the store Pods across all clusters.

Note that this is a logical resource model, not a depiction of the traffic flow. The traffic path goes directly from the load balancer to backend Pods and has no direct relation to whichever cluster is the config cluster.

Validating deployment

You can now issue requests to our multi-cluster Gateway and distribute traffic across both GKE clusters.

1. Validate that the Gateway and HTTPRoute have been deployed successfully by inspecting the Gateway status and events.

   kubectl describe gateways.gateway.networking.k8s.io external-http --context gke-west-1 --namespace store
   

   Your output should look similar to the following:

   Name:         external-http
   Namespace:    store
   Labels:       <none>
   Annotations:  networking.gke.io/addresses: /projects/PROJECT_NUMBER/global/addresses/gkemcg1-store-external-http-laup24msshu4
                 networking.gke.io/backend-services:
                   /projects/PROJECT_NUMBER/global/backendServices/gkemcg1-store-gw-serve404-80-n65xmts4xvw2, /projects/PROJECT_NUMBER/global/backendServices/gke...
                 networking.gke.io/firewalls: /projects/PROJECT_NUMBER/global/firewalls/gkemcg1-l7-default-global
                 networking.gke.io/forwarding-rules: /projects/PROJECT_NUMBER/global/forwardingRules/gkemcg1-store-external-http-a5et3e3itxsv
                 networking.gke.io/health-checks:
                   /projects/PROJECT_NUMBER/global/healthChecks/gkemcg1-store-gw-serve404-80-n65xmts4xvw2, /projects/PROJECT_NUMBER/global/healthChecks/gkemcg1-s...
                 networking.gke.io/last-reconcile-time: 2023-10-12T17:54:24Z
                 networking.gke.io/ssl-certificates: 
                 networking.gke.io/target-http-proxies: /projects/PROJECT_NUMBER/global/targetHttpProxies/gkemcg1-store-external-http-94oqhkftu5yz
                 networking.gke.io/target-https-proxies: 
                 networking.gke.io/url-maps: /projects/PROJECT_NUMBER/global/urlMaps/gkemcg1-store-external-http-94oqhkftu5yz
   API Version:  gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1beta1
   Kind:         Gateway
   Metadata:
     Creation Timestamp:  2023-10-12T06:59:32Z
     Finalizers:
       gateway.finalizer.networking.gke.io
     Generation:        1
     Resource Version:  467057
     UID:               1dcb188e-2917-404f-9945-5f3c2e907b4c
   Spec:
     Gateway Class Name:  gke-l7-global-external-managed-mc
     Listeners:
       Allowed Routes:
         Kinds:
           Group:  gateway.networking.k8s.io
           Kind:   HTTPRoute
         Namespaces:
           From:  Same
       Name:      http
       Port:      80
       Protocol:  HTTP
   Status:
     Addresses:
       Type:   IPAddress
       Value:  34.36.127.249
     Conditions:
       Last Transition Time:  2023-10-12T07:00:41Z
       Message:               The OSS Gateway API has deprecated this condition, do not depend on it.
       Observed Generation:   1
       Reason:                Scheduled
       Status:                True
       Type:                  Scheduled
       Last Transition Time:  2023-10-12T07:00:41Z
       Message:               
       Observed Generation:   1
       Reason:                Accepted
       Status:                True
       Type:                  Accepted
       Last Transition Time:  2023-10-12T07:00:41Z
       Message:               
       Observed Generation:   1
       Reason:                Programmed
       Status:                True
       Type:                  Programmed
       Last Transition Time:  2023-10-12T07:00:41Z
       Message:               The OSS Gateway API has altered the "Ready" condition semantics and reservedit for future use.  GKE Gateway will stop emitting it in a future update, use "Programmed" instead.
       Observed Generation:   1
       Reason:                Ready
       Status:                True
       Type:                  Ready
     Listeners:
       Attached Routes:  1
       Conditions:
         Last Transition Time:  2023-10-12T07:00:41Z
         Message:               
         Observed Generation:   1
         Reason:                Programmed
         Status:                True
         Type:                  Programmed
         Last Transition Time:  2023-10-12T07:00:41Z
         Message:               The OSS Gateway API has altered the "Ready" condition semantics and reservedit for future use.  GKE Gateway will stop emitting it in a future update, use "Programmed" instead.
         Observed Generation:   1
         Reason:                Ready
         Status:                True
         Type:                  Ready
       Name:                    http
       Supported Kinds:
         Group:  gateway.networking.k8s.io
         Kind:   HTTPRoute
   Events:
     Type    Reason  Age                    From                   Message
     ----    ------  ----                   ----                   -------
     Normal  UPDATE  35m (x4 over 10h)      mc-gateway-controller  store/external-http
     Normal  SYNC    4m22s (x216 over 10h)  mc-gateway-controller  SYNC on store/external-http was a success
   

2. Once the Gateway has deployed successfully retrieve the external IP address from external-http Gateway.

   kubectl get gateways.gateway.networking.k8s.io external-http -o=jsonpath="{.status.addresses[0].value}" --context gke-west-1 --namespace store
   

   Replace VIP in the following steps with the IP address you receive as output.

3. Send traffic to the root path of the domain. This load balances traffic to the store ServiceImport which is across cluster gke-west-1 and gke-east-1. The load balancer sends your traffic to the closest region to you and you might not see responses from the other region.

   curl -H "host: store.example.com" http://VIP
   

   The output confirms that the request was served by Pod from the gke-east-1 cluster:

   {
     "cluster_name": "gke-east-1",
     "zone": "us-east1-b",
     "host_header": "store.example.com",
     "node_name": "gke-gke-east-1-default-pool-7aa30992-t2lp.c.agmsb-k8s.internal",
     "pod_name": "store-5f5b954888-dg22z",
     "pod_name_emoji": "⏭",
     "project_id": "agmsb-k8s",
     "timestamp": "2021-06-01T17:32:51"
   }
   

4. Next send traffic to the /west path. This routes traffic to the store-west-1 ServiceImport which only has Pods running on the gke-west-1 cluster. A cluster-specific ServiceImport, like store-west-1, enables an application owner to explicitly send traffic to a specific cluster, rather than letting the load balancer make the decision.

   curl -H "host: store.example.com" http://VIP/west
   

   The output confirms that the request was served by Pod from the gke-west-1 cluster:

   {
     "cluster_name": "gke-west-1", 
     "zone": "us-west1-a", 
     "host_header": "store.example.com",
     "node_name": "gke-gke-west-1-default-pool-65059399-2f41.c.agmsb-k8s.internal",
     "pod_name": "store-5f5b954888-d25m5",
     "pod_name_emoji": "🍾",
     "project_id": "agmsb-k8s",
     "timestamp": "2021-06-01T17:39:15",
   }
   

5. Finally, send traffic to the /east path.

   curl -H "host: store.example.com" http://VIP/east
   

   The output confirms that the request was served by Pod from the gke-east-1 cluster:

   {
     "cluster_name": "gke-east-1",
     "zone": "us-east1-b",
     "host_header": "store.example.com",
     "node_name": "gke-gke-east-1-default-pool-7aa30992-7j7z.c.agmsb-k8s.internal",
     "pod_name": "store-5f5b954888-hz6mw",
     "pod_name_emoji": "🧜🏾",
     "project_id": "agmsb-k8s",
     "timestamp": "2021-06-01T17:40:48"
   }
   

Blue-green, multi-cluster routing with Gateway

The gke-l7-global-external-managed-*, gke-l7-regional-external-managed-*, and gke-l7-rilb-* GatewayClasses have many advanced traffic routing capabilities including traffic splitting, header matching, header manipulation, traffic mirroring, and more. In this example, you'll demonstrate how to use weight-based traffic splitting to explicitly control the traffic proportion across two GKE clusters.

This example goes through some realistic steps that a service owner would take in moving or expanding their application to a new GKE cluster. The goal of blue-green deployments is to reduce risk through multiple validation steps which confirm that the new cluster is operating correctly. This example walks through four stages of deployment:

1. 100%-Header-based canary: Use HTTP header routing to send only test or synthetic traffic to the new cluster.
2. 100%-Mirror traffic: Mirror user traffic to the canary cluster. This tests the capacity of the canary cluster by copying 100% of the user traffic to this cluster.
3. 90%-10%: Canary a traffic split of 10% to slowly expose the new cluster to live traffic.
4. 0%-100%: Cutover fully to the new cluster with the option of switching back if any errors are observed.

This example is similar to the previous one, except it deploys an internal multi-cluster Gateway instead. This deploys an internal Application Load Balancer which is only privately accessible from within the VPC. You will use the clusters and same application that you deployed in the previous steps, except deploy them through a different Gateway.

Note: The same configurations could be applied to Gateways using external GatewayClasses (gke-l7-global-external-managed-,gke-l7-regional-external-managed-), except the gke-l7-gxlb GatewayClass that does not support advanced traffic management capabilities. To learn more about the different features supported with each GatewayClass, see GatewayClass capabilities.

Prerequisites

The following example builds on some of the steps in Deploying an external multi-cluster Gateway. Ensure that you have done the following steps before proceeding with this example:

1. Enabling multi-cluster Gateways

2. Deploying a demo application

   This example uses the gke-west-1 and gke-west-2 clusters that you already set up. These clusters are in the same region because the gke-l7-rilb-mc GatewayClass is regional and only supports cluster backends in the same region.

3. Deploy the Service and ServiceExports needed on each cluster. If you deployed Services and ServiceExports from the previous example then you already deployed some of these.

   kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/gke-networking-recipes/main/gateway/gke-gateway-controller/multi-cluster-gateway/store-west-1-service.yaml
   kubectl apply --context gke-west-2 -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/gke-networking-recipes/main/gateway/gke-gateway-controller/multi-cluster-gateway/store-west-2-service.yaml
   

   It deploys a similar set of resources to each cluster:

   service/store created
   serviceexport.net.gke.io/store created
   service/store-west-2 created
   serviceexport.net.gke.io/store-west-2 created
   

Configuring a proxy-only subnet

If you have not already done so, configure a proxy-only subnet for each region in which you are deploying internal Gateways. This subnet is used to provide internal IP addresses to the load balancer proxies and must be configured with a --purpose set to REGIONAL_MANAGED_PROXY only.

You must create a proxy-only subnet before you create Gateways that manage internal Application Load Balancers. Each region of a Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) network in which you use internal Application Load Balancers must have a proxy-only subnet.

The gcloud compute networks subnets create command creates a proxy-only a subnet.

gcloud compute networks subnets create SUBNET_NAME \
    --purpose=REGIONAL_MANAGED_PROXY \
    --role=ACTIVE \
    --region=REGION \
    --network=VPC_NETWORK_NAME \
    --range=CIDR_RANGE

Replace the following:

• SUBNET_NAME: the name of the proxy-only subnet.
• REGION: the region of the proxy-only subnet.
• VPC_NETWORK_NAME: the name of the VPC network that contains the subnet.
• CIDR_RANGE: the primary IP address range of the subnet. You must use a subnet mask no larger than /26 so that at least 64 IP addresses are available for proxies in the region. The recommended subnet mask is /23.

Deploying the Gateway

The following Gateway is created from the gke-l7-rilb-mc GatewayClass. This is a regional internal Gateway which can only target GKE clusters in the same region.

1. Apply the following Gateway manifest to the config cluster, gke-west-1 in this example:

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f -
   kind: Gateway
   apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1beta1
   metadata:
     name: internal-http
     namespace: store
   spec:
     gatewayClassName: gke-l7-rilb-mc
     listeners:
     - name: http
       protocol: HTTP
       port: 80
       allowedRoutes:
         kinds:
         - kind: HTTPRoute
   EOF
   

   Note: It might take several minutes (up to 10) for the Gateway to fully deploy and serve traffic.

2. Validate that the Gateway has come up successfully. You can filter for just the events from this Gateway with the following command:

   kubectl get events --field-selector involvedObject.kind=Gateway,involvedObject.name=internal-http --context=gke-west-1 --namespace store
   

   The Gateway deployment was successful if the output resembles the following:

   LAST SEEN   TYPE     REASON   OBJECT                  MESSAGE
   5m18s       Normal   ADD      gateway/internal-http   store/internal-http
   3m44s       Normal   UPDATE   gateway/internal-http   store/internal-http
   3m9s        Normal   SYNC     gateway/internal-http   SYNC on store/internal-http was a success
   

Header-based canary

Header-based canarying lets the service owner match synthetic test traffic that does not come from real users. This is an easy way of validating that the basic networking of the application is functioning without exposing users directly.

1. Apply the following HTTPRoute manifest to the config cluster, gke-west-1 in this example:

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f -
   kind: HTTPRoute
   apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1beta1
   metadata:
     name: internal-store-route
     namespace: store
     labels:
       gateway: internal-http
   spec:
     parentRefs:
     - kind: Gateway
       namespace: store
       name: internal-http
     hostnames:
     - "store.example.internal"
     rules:
     # Matches for env=canary and sends it to store-west-2 ServiceImport
     - matches:
       - headers:
         - name: env
           value: canary
       backendRefs:
         - group: net.gke.io
           kind: ServiceImport
           name: store-west-2
           port: 8080
     # All other traffic goes to store-west-1 ServiceImport
     - backendRefs:
       - group: net.gke.io
         kind: ServiceImport
         name: store-west-1
         port: 8080
   EOF
   

   Once deployed, this HTTPRoute configures the following routing behavior:

   • Internal requests to store.example.internal without the env: canary HTTP header are routed to store Pods on the gke-west-1 cluster
   • Internal requests to store.example.internal with the env: canary HTTP header are routed to store Pods on the gke-west-2 cluster

   

   Validate that the HTTPRoute is functioning correctly by sending traffic to the Gateway IP address.

2. Retrieve the internal IP address from internal-http.

   kubectl get gateways.gateway.networking.k8s.io internal-http -o=jsonpath="{.status.addresses[0].value}" --context gke-west-1 --namespace store
   

   Replace VIP in the following steps with the IP address you receive as output.

   Note: In the following steps send all requests to VIP from a client that has internal VPC connectivity and is in the same region as the GKE cluster (unless you have configured global access on your Gateway). You can create a VM in us-west1 and SSH to it for this purpose. This is necessary because the internal-http Gateway is an internal, regional load balancer. Also set the host header with store.example.internal so that DNS does not have to be configured for this example to work.

3. Send a request to the Gateway using the env: canary HTTP header. This will confirm that traffic is being routed to gke-west-2. Use a private client in the same VPC as the GKE clusters to confirm that requests are being routed correctly. The following command must be run on a machine that has private access to the Gateway IP address or else it will not function.

   curl -H "host: store.example.internal" -H "env: canary" http://VIP
   

   The output confirms that the request was served by a Pod from the gke-west-2 cluster:

   {
       "cluster_name": "gke-west-2", 
       "host_header": "store.example.internal",
       "node_name": "gke-gke-west-2-default-pool-4cde1f72-m82p.c.agmsb-k8s.internal",
       "pod_name": "store-5f5b954888-9kdb5",
       "pod_name_emoji": "😂",
       "project_id": "agmsb-k8s",
       "timestamp": "2021-05-31T01:21:55",
       "zone": "us-west1-a"
   }
   

Traffic mirror

This stage sends traffic to the intended cluster but also mirrors that traffic to the canary cluster.

Using mirroring is helpful to determine how traffic load will impact application performance without impacting responses to your clients in any way. It may not be necessary for all kinds of rollouts, but can be useful when rolling out large changes that could impact performance or load.

1. Apply the following HTTPRoute manifest to the config cluster, gke-west-1 in this example:

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f -
   kind: HTTPRoute
   apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1beta1
   metadata:
     name: internal-store-route
     namespace: store
     labels:
       gateway: internal-http
   spec:
     parentRefs:
     - kind: Gateway
       namespace: store
       name: internal-http
     hostnames:
     - "store.example.internal"
     rules:
     # Sends all traffic to store-west-1 ServiceImport
     - backendRefs:
       - name: store-west-1
         group: net.gke.io
         kind: ServiceImport
         port: 8080
       # Also mirrors all traffic to store-west-2 ServiceImport
       filters:
       - type: RequestMirror
         requestMirror:
           backendRef:
             group: net.gke.io
             kind: ServiceImport
             name: store-west-2
             port: 8080
   EOF
   

2. Using your private client, send a request to the internal-http Gateway. Use the /mirror path so you can uniquely identify this request in the application logs in a later step.

   curl -H "host: store.example.internal" http://VIP/mirror
   

3. The output confirms that the client received a response from a Pod in the gke-west-1 cluster:

   {
       "cluster_name": "gke-west-1", 
       "host_header": "store.example.internal",
       "node_name": "gke-gke-west-1-default-pool-65059399-ssfq.c.agmsb-k8s.internal",
       "pod_name": "store-5f5b954888-brg5w",
       "pod_name_emoji": "🎖",
       "project_id": "agmsb-k8s",
       "timestamp": "2021-05-31T01:24:51",
       "zone": "us-west1-a"
   }
   

   This confirms that the primary cluster is responding to traffic. You still need to confirm that the cluster you are migrating to is receiving mirrored traffic.

4. Check the application logs of a store Pod on the gke-west-2 cluster. The logs should confirm that the Pod received mirrored traffic from the load balancer.

   kubectl logs deployment/store --context gke-west-2 -n store | grep /mirror
   

5. This output confirms that Pods on the gke-west-2 cluster are also receiving the same requests, however their responses to these requests are not sent back to the client. The IP addresses seen in the logs are that of the load balancer's internal IP addresses which are communicating with your Pods.

   Found 2 pods, using pod/store-5c65bdf74f-vpqbs
   [2023-10-12 21:05:20,805] INFO in _internal: 192.168.21.3 - - [12/Oct/2023 21:05:20] "GET /mirror HTTP/1.1" 200 -
   [2023-10-12 21:05:27,158] INFO in _internal: 192.168.21.3 - - [12/Oct/2023 21:05:27] "GET /mirror HTTP/1.1" 200 -
   [2023-10-12 21:05:27,805] INFO in _internal: 192.168.21.3 - - [12/Oct/2023 21:05:27] "GET /mirror HTTP/1.1" 200 -
   

Traffic split

Traffic splitting is one of the most common methods of rolling out new code or deploying to new environments safely. The service owner sets an explicit percentage of traffic that is sent to the canary backends that is typically a very small amount of the overall traffic so that the success of the rollout can be determined with an acceptable amount of risk to real user requests.

Doing a traffic split with a minority of the traffic enables the service owner to inspect the health of the application and the responses. If all the signals look healthy, then they may proceed to the full cutover.

1. Apply the following HTTPRoute manifest to the config cluster, gke-west-1 in this example:

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f -
   kind: HTTPRoute
   apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1beta1
   metadata:
     name: internal-store-route
     namespace: store
     labels:
       gateway: internal-http
   spec:
     parentRefs:
     - kind: Gateway
       namespace: store
       name: internal-http
     hostnames:
     - "store.example.internal"
     rules:
     - backendRefs:
       # 90% of traffic to store-west-1 ServiceImport
       - name: store-west-1
         group: net.gke.io
         kind: ServiceImport
         port: 8080
         weight: 90
       # 10% of traffic to store-west-2 ServiceImport
       - name: store-west-2
         group: net.gke.io
         kind: ServiceImport
         port: 8080
         weight: 10
   EOF
   

2. Using your private client, send a continuous curl request to the internal- http Gateway.

   while true; do curl -H "host: store.example.internal" -s VIP | grep "cluster_name"; sleep 1; done
   

   The output will be similar to this, indicating that a 90/10 traffic split is occurring.

   "cluster_name": "gke-west-1",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-1",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-1",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-1",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-1",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-1",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-1",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-1",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-2",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-1",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-1",
   ...
   

Traffic cut over

The last stage of the blue-green migration is to fully cut over to the new cluster and remove the old cluster. If the service owner was actually onboarding a second cluster to an existing cluster then this last step would be different as the final step would have traffic going to both clusters. In that scenario a single store ServiceImport is recommended that has Pods from both gke-west-1 and gke-west-2 clusters. This allows the load balancer to make the decision of where traffic should go for an active-active application, based on proximity, health, and capacity.

1. Apply the following HTTPRoute manifest to the config cluster, gke-west-1 in this example:

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f -
   kind: HTTPRoute
   apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1beta1
   metadata:
     name: internal-store-route
     namespace: store
     labels:
       gateway: internal-http
   spec:
     parentRefs:
     - kind: Gateway
       namespace: store
       name: internal-http
     hostnames:
     - "store.example.internal"
     rules:
       - backendRefs:
         # No traffic to the store-west-1 ServiceImport
         - name: store-west-1
           group: net.gke.io
           kind: ServiceImport
           port: 8080
           weight: 0
         # All traffic to the store-west-2 ServiceImport
         - name: store-west-2
           group: net.gke.io
           kind: ServiceImport
           port: 8080
           weight: 100
   EOF
   

2. Using your private client, send a continuous curl request to the internal- http Gateway.

   while true; do curl -H "host: store.example.internal" -s VIP | grep "cluster_name"; sleep 1; done
   

   The output will be similar to this, indicating that all traffic is now going to gke-west-2.

   "cluster_name": "gke-west-2",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-2",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-2",
   "cluster_name": "gke-west-2",
   ...
   

This final step completes a full blue-green application migration from one GKE cluster to another GKE cluster.

Deploy capacity-based load balancing

The exercise in this section demonstrates global load balancing and Service capacity concepts by deploying an application across two GKE clusters in different regions. Generated traffic is sent at various request per second (RPS) levels to show how traffic is load balanced across clusters and regions.

The following diagram shows the topology that you will deploy and how traffic overflows between clusters and regions when traffic has exceeded Service capacity:

To learn more about traffic management, see GKE traffic management.

Prepare your environment

1. Follow Enabling multi-cluster Gateways to prepare your environment.

2. Confirm that the GatewayClass resources are installed on the config cluster:

   kubectl get gatewayclasses --context=gke-west-1
   

   The output is similar to the following:

   NAME                                  CONTROLLER                  ACCEPTED   AGE
   gke-l7-global-external-managed        networking.gke.io/gateway   True       16h
   gke-l7-global-external-managed-mc     networking.gke.io/gateway   True       14h
   gke-l7-gxlb                           networking.gke.io/gateway   True       16h
   gke-l7-gxlb-mc                        networking.gke.io/gateway   True       14h
   gke-l7-regional-external-managed      networking.gke.io/gateway   True       16h
   gke-l7-regional-external-managed-mc   networking.gke.io/gateway   True       14h
   gke-l7-rilb                           networking.gke.io/gateway   True       16h
   gke-l7-rilb-mc                        networking.gke.io/gateway   True       14h
   

Deploy an application

Deploy the sample web application server to both clusters:

kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/gke-networking-recipes/master/gateway/docs/store-traffic-deploy.yaml
kubectl apply --context gke-east-1 -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/gke-networking-recipes/master/gateway/docs/store-traffic-deploy.yaml

The output is similar to the following:

namespace/store created
deployment.apps/store created

Deploy a Service, Gateway, and HTTPRoute

1. Apply the following Service manifest to both gke-west-1 and gke-east-1 clusters:

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f -
   apiVersion: v1
   kind: Service
   metadata:
     name: store
     namespace: traffic-test
     annotations:
       networking.gke.io/max-rate-per-endpoint: "10"
   spec:
     ports:
     - port: 8080
       targetPort: 8080
       name: http
     selector:
       app: store
     type: ClusterIP
   ---
   kind: ServiceExport
   apiVersion: net.gke.io/v1
   metadata:
     name: store
     namespace: traffic-test
   EOF
   

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-east-1 -f -
   apiVersion: v1
   kind: Service
   metadata:
     name: store
     namespace: traffic-test
     annotations:
       networking.gke.io/max-rate-per-endpoint: "10"
   spec:
     ports:
     - port: 8080
       targetPort: 8080
       name: http
     selector:
       app: store
     type: ClusterIP
   ---
   kind: ServiceExport
   apiVersion: net.gke.io/v1
   metadata:
     name: store
     namespace: traffic-test
   EOF
   

   The Service is annotated with max-rate-per-endpoint set to 10 requests per seconds. With 2 replicas per cluster, each Service has 20 RPS of capacity per cluster.

   For more information on how to choose a Service capacity level for your Service, see Determine your Service's capacity.

2. Apply the following Gateway manifest to the config cluster, gke-west-1 in this example:

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f -
   kind: Gateway
   apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1beta1
   metadata:
     name: store
     namespace: traffic-test
   spec:
     gatewayClassName: gke-l7-global-external-managed-mc
     listeners:
     - name: http
       protocol: HTTP
       port: 80
       allowedRoutes:
         kinds:
         - kind: HTTPRoute
   EOF
   

   The manifest describes an external, global, multi-cluster Gateway that deploys an external Application Load Balancer with a publicly accessible IP address.

3. Apply the following HTTPRoute manifest to the config cluster, gke-west-1 in this example:

   cat << EOF | kubectl apply --context gke-west-1 -f -
   kind: HTTPRoute
   apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1beta1
   metadata:
     name: store
     namespace: traffic-test
     labels:
       gateway: store
   spec:
     parentRefs:
     - kind: Gateway
       namespace: traffic-test
       name: store
     rules:
     - backendRefs:
       - name: store
         group: net.gke.io
         kind: ServiceImport
         port: 8080
   EOF
   

   The manifest describes an HTTPRoute that configures the Gateway with a routing rule that directs all traffic to the store ServiceImport. The store ServiceImport groups the store Service Pods across both clusters and allows them to be addressed by the load balancer as a single Service.

   Note: It might take several minutes (up to 10) for the Gateway to fully deploy and serve traffic.

   You can check the Gateway's events after a few minutes to see if it has finished deploying:

   kubectl describe gateway store -n traffic-test --context gke-west-1
   

   The output is similar to the following:

   ...
   Status:
     Addresses:
       Type:   IPAddress
       Value:  34.102.159.147
     Conditions:
       Last Transition Time:  2023-10-12T21:40:59Z
       Message:               The OSS Gateway API has deprecated this condition, do not depend on it.
       Observed Generation:   1
       Reason:                Scheduled
       Status:                True
       Type:                  Scheduled
       Last Transition Time:  2023-10-12T21:40:59Z
       Message:               
       Observed Generation:   1
       Reason:                Accepted
       Status:                True
       Type:                  Accepted
       Last Transition Time:  2023-10-12T21:40:59Z
       Message:               
       Observed Generation:   1
       Reason:                Programmed
       Status:                True
       Type:                  Programmed
       Last Transition Time:  2023-10-12T21:40:59Z
       Message:               The OSS Gateway API has altered the "Ready" condition semantics and reservedit for future use.  GKE Gateway will stop emitting it in a future update, use "Programmed" instead.
       Observed Generation:   1
       Reason:                Ready
       Status:                True
       Type:                  Ready
     Listeners:
       Attached Routes:  1
       Conditions:
         Last Transition Time:  2023-10-12T21:40:59Z
         Message:               
         Observed Generation:   1
         Reason:                Programmed
         Status:                True
         Type:                  Programmed
         Last Transition Time:  2023-10-12T21:40:59Z
         Message:               The OSS Gateway API has altered the "Ready" condition semantics and reservedit for future use.  GKE Gateway will stop emitting it in a future update, use "Programmed" instead.
         Observed Generation:   1
         Reason:                Ready
         Status:                True
         Type:                  Ready
       Name:                    http
       Supported Kinds:
         Group:  gateway.networking.k8s.io
         Kind:   HTTPRoute
   Events:
     Type    Reason  Age                  From                   Message
     ----    ------  ----                 ----                   -------
     Normal  ADD     12m                  mc-gateway-controller  traffic-test/store
     Normal  SYNC    6m43s                mc-gateway-controller  traffic-test/store
     Normal  UPDATE  5m40s (x4 over 12m)  mc-gateway-controller  traffic-test/store
     Normal  SYNC    118s (x6 over 10m)   mc-gateway-controller  SYNC on traffic-test/store was a success
   

   This output shows that the Gateway has deployed successfully. It might still take a few minutes for traffic to start passing after the Gateway has deployed. Take note of the IP address in this output, as it is used in a following step.

Confirm traffic

Confirm that traffic is passing to the application by testing the Gateway IP address with a curl command:

curl GATEWAY_IP_ADDRESS

The output is similar to the following:

{
  "cluster_name": "gke-west-1",
  "host_header": "34.117.182.69",
  "pod_name": "store-54785664b5-mxstv",
  "pod_name_emoji": "👳🏿",
  "project_id": "project",
  "timestamp": "2021-11-01T14:06:38",
  "zone": "us-west1-a"
}

This output shows the Pod metadata, which indicates the region where the request was served from.

Verify traffic using load testing

To verify the load balancer is working, you can deploy a traffic generator in your gke-west-1 cluster. The traffic generator generates traffic at different levels of load to demonstrate the capacity and overflow capabilities of the load balancer. The following steps demonstrate three levels of load:

• 10 RPS, which is under the capacity for the store Service in gke-west-1.
• 30 RPS, which is over capacity for the gke-west-1 store Service and causes traffic overflow to gke-east-1.
• 60 RPS, which is over capacity for the Services in both clusters.

Configure dashboard

1. Get the name of the underying URLmap for your Gateway:

   kubectl get gateway store -n traffic-test --context=gke-west-1 -o=jsonpath="{.metadata.annotations.networking\.gke\.io/url-maps}"
   

   The output is similar to the following:

   /projects/PROJECT_NUMBER/global/urlMaps/gkemcg1-traffic-test-store-armvfyupay1t
   

2. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Metrics explorer page.

   Go to Metrics explorer

3. Under Select a metric, click CODE: MQL.

4. Enter the following query to observe traffic metrics for the store Service across your two clusters:

   fetch https_lb_rule
   | metric 'loadbalancing.googleapis.com/https/backend_request_count'
   | filter (resource.url_map_name == 'GATEWAY_URL_MAP')
   | align rate(1m)
   | every 1m
   | group_by [resource.backend_scope],
       [value_backend_request_count_aggregate:
           aggregate(value.backend_request_count)]
   

   Replace GATEWAY_URL_MAP with the URLmap name from the previous step.

5. Click Run query. Wait at least 5 minutes after deploying the load generator in the next section for the metrics to display in the chart.

Test with 10 RPS

1. Deploy a Pod to your gke-west-1 cluster:

   kubectl run --context gke-west-1 -i --tty --rm loadgen  \
       --image=cyrilbkr/httperf  \
       --restart=Never  \
       -- /bin/sh -c 'httperf  \
       --server=GATEWAY_IP_ADDRESS  \
       --hog --uri="/zone" --port 80  --wsess=100000,1,1 --rate 10'
   

   Replace GATEWAY_IP_ADDRESS with the Gateway IP address from the previous step.

   The output is similar to the following, indicating that the traffic generator is sending traffic:

   If you don't see a command prompt, try pressing enter.
   

   The load generator continuously sends 10 RPS to the Gateway. Even though traffic is coming from inside a Google Cloud region, the load balancer treats it as client traffic coming from the US West Coast. To simulate realistic client diversity, the load generator sends each HTTP request as a new TCP connection, which means traffic is distributed across backend Pods more evenly.

   The generator takes up to 5 minutes to generate traffic for the dashboard.

2. View your Metrics explorer dashboard. Two lines appear, indiciating how much traffic is load balanced to each of the clusters:

   

   You should see that us-west1-a is receiving approximately 10 RPS of traffic while us-east1-b is not receiving any traffic. Because the traffic generator is running in us-west1, all traffic is sent to the Service in the gke-west-1 cluster.

3. Stop the load generator using Ctrl+C, then delete the pod:

   kubectl delete pod loadgen --context gke-west-1
   

Test with 30 RPS

1. Deploy the load generator again, but configured to send 30 RPS:

   kubectl run --context gke-west-1 -i --tty --rm loadgen  \
       --image=cyrilbkr/httperf  \
       --restart=Never  \
       -- /bin/sh -c 'httperf  \
       --server=GATEWAY_IP_ADDRESS  \
       --hog --uri="/zone" --port 80  --wsess=100000,1,1 --rate 30'
   

   The generator takes up to 5 minutes to generate traffic for the dashboard.

2. View your Cloud Ops dashboard.

   

   You should see that approximately 20 RPS is being sent to us-west1-a and 10 RPS to us-east1-b. This indicates that the Service in gke-west-1 is fully utilized and is overflowing 10 RPS of traffic to the Service in gke-east-1.

3. Stop the load generator using Ctrl+C, then delete the Pod:

   kubectl delete pod loadgen --context gke-west-1
   

Test with 60 RPS

1. Deploy the load generator configured to send 60 RPS:

   kubectl run --context gke-west-1 -i --tty --rm loadgen  \
       --image=cyrilbkr/httperf  \
       --restart=Never  \
       -- /bin/sh -c 'httperf  \
       --server=GATEWAY_IP_ADDRESS  \
       --hog --uri="/zone" --port 80  --wsess=100000,1,1 --rate 60'
   

2. Wait 5 minutes and view your Cloud Ops dashboard. It should now show that both clusters are receiving roughly 30 RPS. Since all Services are overutilized globally, there is no traffic spillover and Services absorb all the traffic they can.

   

3. Stop the load generator using Ctrl+C, then delete the Pod:

   kubectl delete pod loadgen --context gke-west-1
   

Clean up

After completing the exercises on this page, follow these steps to remove resources and prevent unwanted charges incurring on your account:

1. Delete the clusters.

2. Unregister the clusters from the fleet if they don't need to be registered for another purpose.

3. Disable the multiclusterservicediscovery feature:

   gcloud container fleet multi-cluster-services disable
   

4. Disable Multi Cluster Ingress:

   gcloud container fleet ingress disable
   

5. Disable the APIs:

   gcloud services disable \
       multiclusterservicediscovery.googleapis.com \
       multiclusteringress.googleapis.com \
       trafficdirector.googleapis.com \
       --project=PROJECT_ID
   

Use multi-cluster Gateway with Shared VPC

A multi-cluster Gateway can also be deployed in a Shared VPC environment, with different topologies, depending on the use case.

The following table describes the supported multi-cluster Gateway topologies within a Shared VPC environment:

Scenario	Fleet host project	Config cluster	Workload clusters
1	Shared VPC host project	Shared VPC host project	Shared VPC host project
2	Shared VPC service project	Shared VPC service project (Same as fleet service project)	Shared VPC service project (Same as fleet service project)

Note: Multi-cluster Services can be deployed in different scenarios with a mix of Shared VPC host project and service projects. Multi-cluster Gateway does not support all topologies and require all clusters to be created in the same Shared VPC host project or service project.

To create multi-cluster Gateways in a Shared VPC environment, use the following steps:

1. Follow the steps to set up your multi-cluster Services with Shared VPC

2. Create your services and export them to the config cluster

3. If you plan to use an multi-cluster internal Gateway, create a proxy-only subnet

4. Create your multi-cluster external or internal Gateway and HTTPRoutes

Once you are done with these steps, you can validate your deployment, depending on your topology.

Troubleshooting

Proxy-only subnet for internal Gateway does not exist

If the following event appears on your internal Gateway, a proxy-only subnet does not exist for that region. To resolve this issue, deploy a proxy-only subnet.

generic::invalid_argument: error ensuring load balancer: Insert: Invalid value for field 'resource.target': 'regions/us-west1/targetHttpProxies/gkegw-x5vt-default-internal-http-2jzr7e3xclhj'. A reserved and active subnetwork is required in the same region and VPC as the forwarding rule.

No healthy upstream

Symptom:

The following issue might occur when you create a Gateway but cannot access the backend services (503 response code):

no healthy upstream

Reason:

This error message indicates that the health check prober cannot find healthy backend services. It is possible that your backend services are healthy but you might need to customize the health checks.

Workaround:

To resolve this issue, customize your health check based on your application's requirements (for example, /health) using a HealthCheckPolicy.

What's next

• Learn more about the Gateway controller.