Using volume snapshots

Autopilot Standard

In Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE), you can use the Kubernetes volume snapshot feature for persistent volumes in your GKE clusters.

Volume snapshots let you create a copy of your volume at a specific point in time. You can use this copy to bring a volume back to a prior state or to provision a new volume.

From GKE version 1.17 or later, you can provision and attach volume snapshots with the following components:

Requirements

To use volume snapshots on GKE, you must meet the following requirements:

Use a CSI driver that supports snapshots. The in-tree persistent disk driver does not support snapshots.
- The Compute Engine persistent disk CSI driver is installed by default on new Linux clusters running GKE version 1.18.10-gke.2100 or later, or version 1.19.3-gke.2100 or later. You can also enable the Compute Engine persistent disk CSI driver on an existing cluster.
- You can also automatically deploy the Filestore CSI driver. For a list of all CSI drivers that support snapshots, see the "Other features" column in Drivers in the Kubernetes documentation.
Use control plane versions 1.17 or later. To use the Compute Engine persistent disk CSI Driver in a VolumeSnapshot, use GKE versions 1.17.6-gke.4 or later. To use the Filestore CSI Driver in a VolumeSnapshot, use GKE versions 1.21 or later.
Have an existing PersistentVolumeClaim to use for a snapshot. The PersistentVolume you use for a snapshot source must be managed by a CSI driver. You can verify that you're using a CSI driver by checking that the PersistentVolume spec has a csi section with driver: pd.csi.storage.gke.io or filestore.csi.storage.gke.io. If the PersistentVolume is dynamically provisioned by the CSI driver as described in the following sections, it's managed by the CSI driver.

Limitations

All restrictions for creating a disk snapshot on Compute Engine also apply to GKE.

Best practices

Be sure to follow best practices for Compute Engine disk snapshots when using volume snapshots on GKE.

Before you begin

Before you start, make sure you have performed the following tasks:

Enable the Google Kubernetes Engine API.

Enable Google Kubernetes Engine API

If you want to use the Google Cloud CLI for this task, install and then initialize the gcloud CLI.
Note: For existing gcloud CLI installations, make sure to set the compute/region and compute/zone properties. By setting default locations, you can avoid errors in gcloud CLI like the following: One of [--zone, --region] must be supplied: Please specify location.

Creating and using a volume snapshot

The examples in this document show you how to do the following tasks:

Create a PersistentVolumeClaim and Deployment.
Add a file to the PersistentVolume that the Deployment uses.
Create a VolumeSnapshotClass to configure the snapshot.
Create a volume snapshot of the PersistentVolume.
Delete the test file.
Restore the PersistentVolume to the snapshot you created.
Verify that the restoration worked.

To use a volume snapshot, you must complete the following steps:

Create a VolumeSnapshotClass object to specify the CSI driver and deletion policy for your snapshot.
Create a VolumeSnapshot object to request a snapshot of an existing PersistentVolumeClaim.
Reference the VolumeSnapshot in a PersistentVolumeClaim to restore a volume to that snapshot or create a new volume using the snapshot.

Create a PersistentVolumeClaim and a Deployment

To create the PersistentVolumeClaim object, save the following manifest as my-pvc.yaml:
```
apiVersion: v1
kind: PersistentVolumeClaim
metadata:
  name: my-pvc
spec:
  storageClassName: standard-rwo
  accessModes:
  - ReadWriteOnce
  resources:
    requests:
      storage: 1Gi
```
For spec.storageClassName, you can specify any storage class that uses a supported CSI driver. This example uses the standard-rwo storage class installed by default with the Compute Engine persistent disk CSI driver. For more information, refer to Using the Compute Engine persistent disk CSI driver.
Apply the manifest:
```
kubectl apply -f my-pvc.yaml
```

To create a Deployment, save the following manifest as my-deployment.yaml:

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: hello-app
spec:
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: hello-app
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: hello-app
    spec:
      containers:
      - name: hello-app
        image: google/cloud-sdk:slim
        args: [ "sleep", "3600" ]
        volumeMounts:
        - name: sdk-volume
          mountPath: /usr/share/hello/
      volumes:
      - name: sdk-volume
        persistentVolumeClaim:
          claimName: my-pvc

Apply the manifest:
```
kubectl apply -f my-deployment.yaml
```
Check the status of the Deployment:
```
kubectl get deployment hello-app
```
It might take some time for the Deployment to become ready. You can run the preceding command until you see an output similar to the following:
```
NAME        READY   UP-TO-DATE   AVAILABLE   AGE
hello-app   1/1     1            1           2m55s
```

Add a test file to the volume

List the Pods in the Deployment:

kubectl get pods -l app=hello-app

The output is similar to the following:

NAME                         READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
hello-app-6d7b457c7d-vl4jr   1/1     Running   0          2m56s

Create a test file in a Pod:

kubectl exec POD_NAME \
    -- sh -c 'echo "Hello World!" > /usr/share/hello/hello.txt'

Replace POD_NAME with the name of the Pod.

Verify that the file exists:

kubectl exec POD_NAME \
    -- sh -c 'cat /usr/share/hello/hello.txt'

The output is similar to the following:

Hello World!

Create a `VolumeSnapshotClass` object

Create a VolumeSnapshotClass object to specify the CSI driver and deletionPolicy for your volume snapshot. You can reference VolumeSnapshotClass objects when you create VolumeSnapshot objects.

Save the following manifest as volumesnapshotclass.yaml.
v1
Use the v1 API version for clusters running versions 1.21 or later.
```
apiVersion: snapshot.storage.k8s.io/v1
kind: VolumeSnapshotClass
metadata:
  name: my-snapshotclass
driver: pd.csi.storage.gke.io
deletionPolicy: Delete
```
v1beta1
Use the v1beta1 API version for clusters running versions 1.21 or earlier.
```
apiVersion: snapshot.storage.k8s.io/v1beta1
kind: VolumeSnapshotClass
metadata:
  name: my-snapshotclass
driver: pd.csi.storage.gke.io
deletionPolicy: Delete
```
In this example:
- The driver field is used by the CSI driver to provision the snapshot. In this example, pd.csi.storage.gke.io uses the Compute Engine persistent disk CSI Driver.
- ThedeletionPolicy field tells GKE what to do with the VolumeSnapshotContent object and the underlying snapshot when the bound VolumeSnapshot object is deleted. Specify Delete to delete the VolumeSnapshotContent object and the underlying snapshot. Specify Retain if you want to keep the VolumeSnapshotContent and the underlying snapshot.
To use a custom storage location, add a storage-locations parameter to the snapshot class. To use this parameter, your clusters must use version 1.21 or later.
```
apiVersion: snapshot.storage.k8s.io/v1
kind: VolumeSnapshotClass
metadata:
  name: my-snapshotclass
parameters:
  storage-locations: us-east2
driver: pd.csi.storage.gke.io
deletionPolicy: Delete
```

Apply the manifest:

kubectl apply -f volumesnapshotclass.yaml

Create a VolumeSnapshot

A VolumeSnapshot object is a request for a snapshot of an existing PersistentVolumeClaim object. When you create a VolumeSnapshot object, GKE automatically creates and binds it with a VolumeSnapshotContent object, which is a resource in your cluster like a PersistentVolume object.

Save the following manifest as volumesnapshot.yaml.

v1

Use the v1 API version for clusters running versions 1.21 or later.

apiVersion: snapshot.storage.k8s.io/v1
kind: VolumeSnapshot
metadata:
  name: my-snapshot
spec:
  volumeSnapshotClassName: my-snapshotclass
  source:
    persistentVolumeClaimName: my-pvc

v1beta1

Use the v1beta1 API version for clusters running versions 1.21 or earlier.

apiVersion: snapshot.storage.k8s.io/v1beta1
kind: VolumeSnapshot
metadata:
  name: my-snapshot
spec:
  volumeSnapshotClassName: my-snapshotclass
  source:
    persistentVolumeClaimName: my-pvc

Apply the manifest:
```
kubectl apply -f volumesnapshot.yaml
```
After you create a volume snapshot, GKE creates a corresponding VolumeSnapshotContent object in the cluster. This object stores the snapshot and bindings of VolumeSnapshot objects. You do not interact with VolumeSnapshotContents objects directly.

Confirm that GKE created the VolumeSnapshotContents object:

kubectl get volumesnapshotcontents

The output is similar to the following:

NAME                                               AGE
snapcontent-cee5fb1f-5427-11ea-a53c-42010a1000da   55s

After the volume snapshot content is created, the CSI driver you specified in the VolumeSnapshotClass creates a snapshot on the corresponding storage system. After GKE creates a snapshot on the storage system and binds it to a VolumeSnapshot object on the cluster, the snapshot is ready to use. You can check the status by running the following command:

kubectl get volumesnapshot \
  -o custom-columns='NAME:.metadata.name,READY:.status.readyToUse'

If the snapshot is ready to use, the output is similar to the following:

NAME               READY
my-snapshot        true

Delete the test file

Delete the test file that you created:

kubectl exec POD_NAME \
    -- sh -c 'rm /usr/share/hello/hello.txt'

Verify that the file no longer exists:

kubectl exec POD_NAME \
    -- sh -c 'cat /usr/share/hello/hello.txt'

The output is similar to the following:

cat: /usr/share/hello/hello.txt: No such file or directory

Restore the volume snapshot

You can reference a VolumeSnapshot in a PersistentVolumeClaim to provision a new volume with data from an existing volume or restore a volume to a state that you captured in the snapshot.

To reference a VolumeSnapshot in a PersistentVolumeClaim, add the dataSource field to your PersistentVolumeClaim.

In this example, you reference the VolumeSnapshot that you created in a new PersistentVolumeClaim and update the Deployment to use the new claim.

Save the following manifest as pvc-restore.yaml:

apiVersion: v1
kind: PersistentVolumeClaim
metadata:
  name: pvc-restore
spec:
  dataSource:
    name: my-snapshot
    kind: VolumeSnapshot
    apiGroup: snapshot.storage.k8s.io
  storageClassName: standard-rwo
  accessModes:
    - ReadWriteOnce
  resources:
    requests:
      storage: 1Gi

Apply the manifest:
```
kubectl apply -f pvc-restore.yaml
```

Update the my-deployment.yaml file to use the new PersistentVolumeClaim:

...
volumes:
- name: my-volume
  persistentVolumeClaim:
    claimName: pvc-restore

Apply the updated manifest:
```
kubectl apply -f my-deployment.yaml
```

Check that the snapshot restored successfully

Get the name of the new Pod that GKE creates for the updated Deployment:
```
 kubectl get pods -l app=hello-app
```

Verify that the test file exists:

   kubectl exec NEW_POD_NAME \
       -- sh -c 'cat /usr/share/hello/hello.txt'

Replace NEW_POD_NAME with the name of the new Pod that GKE created.

The output is similar to the following:

   Hello World!

Clean up

To avoid incurring charges to your Google Cloud account for the resources used on this page, follow these steps.

Delete the VolumeSnapshot:
```
kubectl delete volumesnapshot my-snapshot
```
Note: If a volume snapshot's VolumeSnapshotClass has deletionPolicy:Delete, the corresponding VolumeSnapshotContent and the physical snapshot on the storage system are also deleted. If it has a deletionPolicy:Retain, GKE retains the underlying snapshot.

Delete the VolumeSnapshotClass:

kubectl delete volumesnapshotclass my-snapshotclass

Delete the Deployment:
```
kubectl delete deployments hello-app
```
Delete the PersistentVolumeClaim objects:
```
kubectl delete pvc my-pvc pvc-restore
```

What's next

Read the Kubernetes Volume Snapshot documentation.
Learn about volume expansion.
Learn how to manually install a CSI driver.

Using volume snapshots

Requirements

Limitations

Best practices

Before you begin

Creating and using a volume snapshot

Create a PersistentVolumeClaim and a Deployment

Add a test file to the volume

Create a VolumeSnapshotClass object

v1

v1beta1

Create a VolumeSnapshot

v1

v1beta1

Delete the test file

Restore the volume snapshot

Check that the snapshot restored successfully

Clean up

What's next

Create a `VolumeSnapshotClass` object