clusteradm

clusteradm is the command-line tool for Open Cluster Management (OCM), providing a unified interface to manage multi-cluster Kubernetes environments from the command line.

Overview

Open Cluster Management (OCM) is a CNCF sandbox project that enables end-to-end visibility and control across your Kubernetes clusters using a powerful hub-agent architecture. OCM provides:

• Cluster Lifecycle Management: Register, manage, and monitor multiple Kubernetes clusters
• Application Distribution: Deploy and manage applications across multiple clusters
• Policy & Governance: Enforce security policies and compliance across your fleet
• Add-on Extensibility: Extend functionality with a rich ecosystem of add-ons

clusteradm serves as the primary CLI tool for interacting with OCM, enabling administrators to:

• Initialize hub clusters and register managed clusters
• Deploy and manage multi-cluster applications
• Configure policies and governance
• Manage cluster sets and placements
• Install and configure add-ons

Quick Start

Installation

From install script:

curl -L https://raw.githubusercontent.com/open-cluster-management-io/clusteradm/main/install.sh | bash

From Go:

go install open-cluster-management.io/clusteradm/cmd/clusteradm@latest

From releases:

Download the latest binary from GitHub Releases and add it to your $PATH.

From source:

Go 1.24+ is required to build from source.

git clone https://github.com/open-cluster-management-io/clusteradm.git
cd clusteradm
make build
./bin/clusteradm

Basic Usage

Set up a multi-cluster environment in three steps:

# 1. Initialize the hub cluster
kubectl config use-context <hub-cluster-context>
clusteradm init

# 2. Join a managed cluster to the hub
kubectl config use-context <managed-cluster-context>
clusteradm join --hub-token <token> --hub-apiserver <hub-api-url> --cluster-name <cluster-name>

# 3. Accept the managed cluster on the hub
kubectl config use-context <hub-cluster-context>
clusteradm accept --clusters <cluster-name>

After each command, clusteradm provides the next command to execute, making the process seamless.

Commands

clusteradm organizes commands into logical groups for different aspects of cluster management.

General Commands

Command	Description
create	Create OCM resources (placements, cluster sets, sample apps, work)
delete	Delete OCM resources (cluster sets, tokens, work)
get	Display OCM resources (clusters, hub info, tokens, placements, work, add-ons)
install	Install hub add-ons
uninstall	Uninstall hub add-ons
upgrade	Upgrade cluster manager or klusterlet
version	Display clusteradm and cluster version information

Registration Commands

Command	Description
init	Initialize a hub cluster
join	Join a cluster to the hub as a managed cluster
accept	Accept cluster join requests on the hub
unjoin	Remove a cluster from the hub
clean	Clean up OCM components from the hub cluster

Cluster Management Commands

Command	Description
addon	Manage add-ons (enable, disable, create)
clusterset	Manage cluster sets (bind, unbind, set)
proxy	Access managed clusters through the cluster proxy

Logging and Debugging

Get detailed logs by setting the klog flag:

# Basic logging
clusteradm <command> -v 2 > logfile.log

# Verbose logging to file
clusteradm <command> -v 99 --logtostderr=false --log-file=debug.log

Detailed Command Reference

Cluster Lifecycle

Initialize a Hub Cluster

clusteradm init [--use-bootstrap-token]

Deploys OCM hub components and returns the join command for managed clusters.

Note: Do not run init against a multicluster-controlplane instance. Use clusteradm get token --use-bootstrap-token instead.

Get Join Token

clusteradm get token [--use-bootstrap-token]

Retrieves the latest token for joining managed clusters.

Join a Managed Cluster

clusteradm join --hub-token <token> --hub-apiserver <hub-url> --cluster-name <name> \
  [--ca-file <ca-file>] [--force-internal-endpoint-lookup]

Installs the klusterlet agent on a managed cluster.

Options:

• --ca-file: Provide a custom CA file for hub verification
• --force-internal-endpoint-lookup: Required for clusters behind NAT (e.g., kind clusters)

Accept Cluster Registration

clusteradm accept --clusters <cluster1>,<cluster2>,...

Approves cluster join requests on the hub.

Remove a Managed Cluster

clusteradm unjoin --cluster-name <cluster-name>

Removes klusterlet components from a managed cluster.

Add-on Management

Install Hub Add-ons

# Install specific add-ons
clusteradm install hub-addon --names argocd
clusteradm install hub-addon --names governance-policy-framework

Enable Add-ons on Managed Clusters

clusteradm addon enable --names <addon-name> --namespace <namespace> --clusters <clusters>

# Examples
clusteradm addon enable --names argocd --namespace argocd --clusters cluster1,cluster2
clusteradm addon enable --names governance-policy-framework --namespace open-cluster-management-agent-addon --clusters cluster1

Cluster Sets and Placement

Create Cluster Sets

clusteradm create clusterset <clusterset-name>

Bind Clusters to Sets

clusteradm clusterset bind <clusterset-name> --clusters <cluster1>,<cluster2>

Create Placements

clusteradm create placement <placement-name> --clusters <cluster1>,<cluster2>

Application Deployment

Create Sample Applications

clusteradm create sampleapp <app-name>

Creates and deploys sample applications using Argo CD ApplicationSets.

Cluster Proxy

Access managed clusters through the cluster proxy:

clusteradm proxy health --cluster-name <cluster-name>
clusteradm proxy kubectl --cluster-name <cluster-name> -- <kubectl-args>

Version Bundles

clusteradm uses version bundles to ensure compatibility between OCM components. You can:

• Use the default bundle: clusteradm init
• Specify a version: clusteradm init --bundle-version v0.16.0
• Override component versions: clusteradm init --bundle-version-overrides /path/to/overrides.json

Example override file:

{
  "ocm": "v0.16.1",
  "app_addon": "v0.16.0",
  "policy_addon": "v0.16.0",
  "multicluster_controlplane": "v0.7.0"
}

Examples

Multi-cluster Application Deployment

# 1. Create a cluster set
clusteradm create clusterset production

# 2. Bind clusters to the set
clusteradm clusterset bind production --clusters web-cluster,api-cluster

# 3. Create a placement for the application
clusteradm create placement web-app-placement --clusterset production

# 4. Deploy using ManifestWork or Argo CD
clusteradm create work my-web-app --clusters web-cluster,api-cluster

Policy Enforcement

# 1. Install policy framework
clusteradm install hub-addon --names governance-policy-framework

# 2. Enable on managed clusters
clusteradm addon enable --names governance-policy-framework \
  --namespace open-cluster-management-agent-addon \
  --clusters cluster1,cluster2

# 3. Enable config policy controller
clusteradm addon enable --names config-policy-controller \
  --namespace open-cluster-management-agent-addon \
  --clusters cluster1,cluster2

Contributing

We welcome contributions! Please see our Contributing Guide for details on:

• Code contribution process
• Development environment setup
• Testing guidelines
• Community guidelines

Community & Support

Get Connected

• Website: open-cluster-management.io
• Slack: #open-cluster-mgmt on Kubernetes Slack
• Mailing List: [email protected]
• YouTube: OCM Community
• Community Meetings: Calendar

License

This project is licensed under the Apache License 2.0.

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Built by the Open Cluster Management community