Introduction
Hey there! Welcome to the first post of my P4ndaLab series. I’m excited to share my journey building a Kubernetes homelab on a Raspberry Pi. This project stems from my belief that the best way to learn is by doing - getting your hands dirty and building something real.
What is P4ndaLab?
P4ndaLab is my personal homelab project focused on building a fully functional Kubernetes cluster on Raspberry Pi hardware. The goal? To create a learning environment where I can experiment with Kubernetes concepts, understand container orchestration, and eventually host my own applications and services.
I chose to start with a Raspberry Pi because I wanted to begin small and work with hardware I already own. This budget-friendly approach lets me dive in without any initial investment. As I progress through this project and if I enjoy it as much as I anticipate, I plan to upgrade to more suitable homelab hardware. But for now, this simple setup is more than sufficient to learn the core concepts and build a functional Kubernetes environment.
As with all my projects, this one follows my naming convention of P4nda, joining my collection of side projects under my P4ndaF4ce GitHub organization.
Why a Kubernetes Homelab?
You might be wondering, “Why go through all this trouble when you could just use a cloud provider?” Great question! Here’s why:
- Hands-on Learning: Nothing beats the learning experience of building a system from the ground up.
- Cost Efficiency: After the initial hardware investment, I can experiment without worrying about unexpected cloud bills.
- Complete Control: I have full control over every aspect of the infrastructure.
- Offline Capability: My lab works even when my internet doesn’t.
- Transferable Skills: What I learn here directly applies to professional Kubernetes deployments.
Project Roadmap: The Kubernetes Phase
For this blog series, I’ll be focusing on Phase 1 of my project: setting up a Kubernetes cluster on a Raspberry Pi. I’ve already completed some initial steps, but I’ll be documenting everything as I go. Here’s what’s covered in the Kubernetes phase:
1. Base Infrastructure Setup
- Operating system installation and configuration
- K3s (lightweight Kubernetes) installation
- Basic networking and SSH setup
2. Core Kubernetes Components
- Storage configuration with persistent volumes
- Load balancing with MetalLB
- Ingress controller setup (Traefik or Nginx)
- DNS configuration
3. Monitoring and Security
- Metrics collection with Prometheus
- Visualization with Grafana
- Network policies and RBAC implementation
- Certificate management
4. Advanced Features
- CI/CD pipeline integration
- Backup and restore solutions
- Service mesh implementation
How This Blog Series Will Work
I believe in a structured approach to learning. Each topic will be covered in two complementary posts:
- Theory Post: Explaining core concepts, architecture, and the “why” behind each component
- Hands-on Post: Step-by-step implementation in my P4ndaLab environment
This way, whether you’re interested in the concepts or the practical implementation (or both!), you’ll find value in following along.
My Setup
For transparency, here’s what I’m working with:
- Hardware: Raspberry Pi 4 with 8GB RAM
- Operating System: Ubuntu Server (64-bit)
- Network: Accessible via serverpi.local
- Storage: External USB SSD for persistent storage
What’s Coming Next
In the next post, I’ll dive into Kubernetes fundamentals - what it is, its architecture, and the key components we’ll be working with. Then, we’ll move on to our first hands-on post where I’ll walk through setting up the operating system and installing K3s on the Raspberry Pi.
I hope you’ll join me on this journey as I build, break, learn, and share my experiences with P4ndaLab. Whether you’re a Kubernetes novice or just interested in homelab projects, I think you’ll find something useful here.
Until next time, happy hacking!
Have questions or suggestions for the P4ndaLab project? Suggest your changes using the link at the top of the post under the title