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Setting up ExternalDNS for Services on Gandi

This tutorial describes how to setup ExternalDNS for usage within a Kubernetes cluster using Gandi.

Make sure to use >=0.7.7 version of ExternalDNS for this tutorial.

Creating a Gandi DNS zone (domain)

Create a new DNS zone where you want to create your records in. Let’s use example.com as an example here. Make sure the zone uses

Creating Gandi API Key

Generate an API key on your account (click on “Security”).

The environment variable GANDI_KEY will be needed to run ExternalDNS with Gandi.

Deploy ExternalDNS

Connect your kubectl client to the cluster you want to test ExternalDNS with.
Then apply one of the following manifests file to deploy ExternalDNS.

Manifest (for clusters without RBAC enabled)

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: external-dns
spec:
  replicas: 1
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: external-dns
  strategy:
    type: Recreate
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: external-dns
    spec:
      containers:
      - name: external-dns
        image: registry.k8s.io/external-dns/external-dns:v0.13.4
        args:
        - --source=service # ingress is also possible
        - --domain-filter=example.com # (optional) limit to only example.com domains; change to match the zone created above.
        - --provider=gandi
        env:
        - name: GANDI_KEY
          value: "YOUR_GANDI_API_KEY"

Manifest (for clusters with RBAC enabled)

apiVersion: v1
kind: ServiceAccount
metadata:
  name: external-dns
---
apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1beta1
kind: ClusterRole
metadata:
  name: external-dns
rules:
- apiGroups: [""]
  resources: ["services","endpoints","pods"]
  verbs: ["get","watch","list"]
- apiGroups: ["extensions","networking.k8s.io"]
  resources: ["ingresses"] 
  verbs: ["get","watch","list"]
- apiGroups: [""]
  resources: ["nodes"]
  verbs: ["list","watch"]
---
apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1beta1
kind: ClusterRoleBinding
metadata:
  name: external-dns-viewer
roleRef:
  apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io
  kind: ClusterRole
  name: external-dns
subjects:
- kind: ServiceAccount
  name: external-dns
  namespace: default
---
apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: external-dns
spec:
  replicas: 1
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: external-dns
  strategy:
    type: Recreate
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: external-dns
    spec:
      serviceAccountName: external-dns
      containers:
      - name: external-dns
        image: registry.k8s.io/external-dns/external-dns:v0.13.4
        args:
        - --source=service # ingress is also possible
        - --domain-filter=example.com # (optional) limit to only example.com domains; change to match the zone created above.
        - --provider=gandi
        env:
        - name: GANDI_KEY
          value: "YOUR_GANDI_API_KEY"

Deploying an Nginx Service

Create a service file called ‘nginx.yaml’ with the following contents:

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: nginx
spec:
  replicas: 1
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: nginx
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: nginx
    spec:
      containers:
      - image: nginx
        name: nginx
        ports:
        - containerPort: 80
---
apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
  name: nginx
  annotations:
    external-dns.alpha.kubernetes.io/hostname: my-app.example.com
spec:
  selector:
    app: nginx
  type: LoadBalancer
  ports:
    - protocol: TCP
      port: 80
      targetPort: 80

Note the annotation on the service; use the same hostname as the Gandi Domain. Make sure that your Domain is configured to use Live-DNS.

ExternalDNS uses this annotation to determine what services should be registered with DNS. Removing the annotation will cause ExternalDNS to remove the corresponding DNS records.

Create the deployment and service:

$ kubectl create -f nginx.yaml

Depending where you run your service it can take a little while for your cloud provider to create an external IP for the service.

Once the service has an external IP assigned, ExternalDNS will notice the new service IP address and synchronize the Gandi DNS records.

Verifying Gandi DNS records

Check your Gandi Dashboard to view the records for your Gandi DNS zone.

Click on the zone for the one created above if a different domain was used.

This should show the external IP address of the service as the A record for your domain.

Cleanup

Now that we have verified that ExternalDNS will automatically manage Gandi DNS records, we can delete the tutorial’s example:

$ kubectl delete service -f nginx.yaml
$ kubectl delete service -f externaldns.yaml

Additional options

If you’re using organizations to separate your domains, you can pass the organization’s ID in an environment variable called GANDI_SHARING_ID to get access to it.

Last update: March 27, 2023
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