OpenTofu Lima Kubernetes

Fully automated Lima VM and Kubernetes cluster provisioning using OpenTofu Infrastructure as Code. This project creates a complete Kubernetes development environment with Ubuntu 24.04, Kubernetes 1.33.x, and pre-deployed sample applications.

Prerequisites

OpenTofu (>= 1.0)
Lima
macOS (Lima requirement)

Quick Start

Deploy everything with OpenTofu:
```
tofu init
tofu apply
```

Access your ready cluster:

lima kubectl get nodes
lima kubectl get pods -A

Access sample applications:

# Add hostnames to /etc/hosts
echo "127.0.0.1 nginx.local hello.local" | sudo tee -a /etc/hosts

# Access applications
curl http://nginx.local:8080
curl http://hello.local:8080

That's it! OpenTofu automatically:

✅ Creates Lima VM with Ubuntu 24.04
✅ Installs Docker, kubectl, kind, helm
✅ Provisions 4-node Kubernetes 1.33.1 cluster
✅ Installs NGINX ingress controller
✅ Deploys sample applications
✅ Validates cluster readiness

Configuration

Variables

Customize your deployment by setting variables:

# Create terraform.tfvars
cat > terraform.tfvars << EOF
vm_name = "my-k8s-cluster"
cpus = 6
memory = "8GiB"
disk_size = "60GiB"
k8s_version = "v1.33.1"
arch = "aarch64"  # or "x86_64"
docker_enabled = true
EOF

Available Variables

Variable	Description	Default	Type
`vm_name`	Name of the Lima VM	`k8s-dev`	string
`cpus`	Number of CPUs	`4`	number
`memory`	Memory allocation	`6GiB`	string
`disk_size`	Disk size	`50GiB`	string
`k8s_version`	Kubernetes version	`v1.33.1`	string
`arch`	Architecture	`aarch64`	string
`docker_enabled`	Enable Docker	`true`	bool

Usage

VM Management

# Start VM
limactl start k8s-dev

# Stop VM  
limactl stop k8s-dev

# Access VM shell
limactl shell k8s-dev

# List VMs
limactl list

# Delete VM
limactl delete k8s-dev

Kubernetes Operations

# Use kubectl through Lima
lima kubectl get pods

# Apply example manifests
lima kubectl apply -f examples/manifests/

# Port forward
lima kubectl port-forward service/nginx-example-service 8080:80

# Access with ingress (add to /etc/hosts)
echo "127.0.0.1 nginx.local hello.local" | sudo tee -a /etc/hosts
curl http://nginx.local
curl http://hello.local

Docker Operations

# Build images in Lima VM
lima docker build -t myapp .

# Run containers
lima docker run -d --name myapp -p 8080:80 myapp

# Docker Compose
lima docker-compose up -d

Examples

Deploy Additional Applications

# Sample applications are automatically deployed during provisioning
# Check deployment status
lima kubectl get deployments,services,ingress -n development

# View application logs
lima kubectl logs -f deployment/nginx-example -n development
lima kubectl logs -f deployment/hello-world -n development

Access Applications

Applications are automatically deployed and accessible via ingress:

# Add hostnames (already included in OpenTofu output)
echo "127.0.0.1 nginx.local hello.local" | sudo tee -a /etc/hosts

# Access applications
curl http://nginx.local:8080    # Nginx example
curl http://hello.local:8080    # Hello World app

# Or open in browser
open http://nginx.local:8080
open http://hello.local:8080

Architecture

This fully automated setup provides:

Lima VM: Ubuntu 24.04 ARM64 VM with 4 CPUs, 6GB RAM, 50GB disk
Kind Cluster: 4-node Kubernetes 1.33.1 cluster (1 control-plane + 3 workers)
Ingress Controller: NGINX ingress with port forwarding (80→8080, 443→8443)
Metrics Server: Resource monitoring with kind compatibility
Development Namespace: Pre-configured with sample applications
Complete Toolchain: Docker, kubectl, kind v0.24.0, helm pre-installed
OpenTofu Integration: Full Infrastructure as Code automation

Troubleshooting

VM Issues

# Check VM status
limactl list

# View VM logs
limactl shell k8s-dev -- sudo journalctl -f

# Restart VM
limactl stop k8s-dev && limactl start k8s-dev

Kubernetes Issues

# Check cluster health
lima kubectl get nodes
lima kubectl get pods --all-namespaces

# View cluster events  
lima kubectl get events --sort-by='.lastTimestamp'

# Check ingress controller
lima kubectl get pods -n ingress-nginx

Complete Reset

# Destroy everything
tofu destroy

# Remove Lima VM manually if needed
limactl delete k8s-dev

Cleanup

To remove all resources:

tofu destroy

This will stop and delete the Lima VM and clean up all generated files.

Contributing

Fork the repository
Create your feature branch
Test your changes
Submit a pull request

License

MIT License - see LICENSE file for details.

idvoretskyi/opentofu-lima-k8s