Deploy OpenFaaS to Kubernetes

A foreword on security

These instructions are for a development environment. If you plan to expose OpenFaaS on the public Internet you need to enable basic authentication with a proxy such as Kong or Traefik at a minimum.

TLS is also highly recomended and freely available from LetsEncrypt.org.

Refer to the Kong and Traefik Integration Guides for instructions on using them with OpenFaaS.

OpenFaaS is Kubernetes-native using Deployments, Services and Secrets. For more detail check out the "faas-netes" repository.

If you already have a working Kubernetes 1.8 cluster you can skip to the Deploy OpenFaaS section.

Create a Kubernetes Cluster

If you do not already have a Kubernetes cluster follow this guide to deploy one so you can start evaluating OpenFaaS and building functions on your laptop or on a VM (cloud or on-prem).

Additional information on setting up Kubernetes.

We have a special guide for minikube here:

If you are not familiar with Helm you should continue to the Manual Deployment section.

Helm Chart

A Helm chart is provided faas-netes repository. Follow the link below then come back to this guide.

Manual Deployment

Deploy either a synchronous or asynchronous OpenFaaS stack, these steps assume you are running kubectl on a master host.

Standard vs Asynchronous

If you're using OpenFaaS for the first time we recommend deploying the synchronous stack.

Synchronous Stack

Normal non-async OpenFaaS deployments can be carried out as follows:

  1. Clone the Faas-Netes repository. 
    $ git clone https://github.com/openfaas/faas-netes
  2. Deploy the Synchnronous OpenFaaS stack. 
    $ cd faas-netes
$ kubectl apply -f ./faas.yml,monitoring.yml,rbac.yml

Asynchronous Stack

Alternatively OpenFaaS can be deployed with support for asynchronous invocation as follows:

Asynchronous Invocation

Asynchronous invocation works by queuing requests with NATS Streaming. See the Asynchronous function guide for more detail.

  1. Clone the Faas-Netes repository. 
    $ git clone https://github.com/openfaas/faas-netes
  2. Deploy the OpenFaaS stack with asynchronous invocation support. 
    $ cd faas-netes
$ kubectl apply -f ./faas.async.yml,nats.yml,monitoring.yml,rbac.yml

Asynchronous invocation works by queuing requests with NATS Streaming. An alternative implementation is available with Kafka in an open PR.

Further Reading

Asynchronous invocation works by queuing requests with NATS Streaming. See the Asynchronous function guide for more detail.

Connect to OpenFaaS

For simplicity the default configuration uses NodePorts rather than an IngressController (which is more complicated to setup) to expose access to the OpenFaaS API Gateway and Prometheus.

Service TCP port
API Gateway / UI 31112
Prometheus 31119

IngressController (Advanced Users)

If you're an advanced Kubernetes user, you can add an IngressController to your stack and remove the NodePort assignments.

API Gateway

OpenFaaS should complete its deployment within a few seconds (or minutes if on a poor WiFi connection), the API gateway will be pulled into your local Docker library and you will be able to access the UI at (where kubernetes-node-ip is the IP address or hostname of your Kubernetes node):

  • http://kubernetes-node-ip:31112

OpenFaaS API Gateway Dashboard

Prometheus

The Grafana dashboard linked to OpenFaaS will be accessible at:

  • http://kubernetes-node-ip:31119

3.0 Use OpenFaaS

After deploying OpenFaaS you can start using one of the guides or blog posts to create Serverless functions or test community functions.

You can also watch a complete walk-through of OpenFaaS on Kubernetes which demonstrates auto-scaling in action and how to use the Prometheus UI. Video walk-through.

Connect to the UI

Deployed

Deploy a function

There are currently no sample functions built into this stack, but we can deploy them quickly via the UI or FaaS-CLI.

Using the CLI

  • Install the CLI 
$ curl -sL cli.openfaas.com | sudo sh

Then clone some samples to deploy on your cluster.

$ git clone https://github.com/openfaas/faas-cli

Edit samples.yml and change your gateway URL from localhost:8080 to kubernetes-node-ip:31112.

i.e.

provider:  
  name: faas
  gateway: http://192.168.4.95:31112

Now deploy the samples: Learn about the CLI

$ faas-cli deploy -f samples.yml

The faas-cli also supports an override of --gateway http://... for example: Build your first Python function

$ faas-cli deploy -f samples.yml --gateway http://127.0.0.1:31112

List the functions:

$ faas-cli list -f samples.yml

or

$ faas-cli list  --gateway http://127.0.0.1:31112
Function                        Invocations     Replicas
inception                       0               1    
nodejs-echo                     0               1    
ruby-echo                       0               1    
shrink-image                    0               1    
stronghash                      2               1

Invoke a function:

$ echo -n Test | faas-cli invoke stronghash --gateway http://127.0.0.1:31112
c6ee9e33cf5c6715a1d148fd73f7318884b41adcb916021e2bc0e800a5c5dd97f5142178f6ae88c8fdd98e1afb0ce4c8d2c54b5f37b30b7da1997bb33b0b8a31  -
  • Learn about the CLI

Morning coffee with the OpenFaaS CLI

  • Build your first Python function

Your first serverless Python function with OpenFaaS

Use the UI 

$ git clone https://github.com/openfaas/faas-cli && \
  faas-cli deploy -f samples.yml

Using the UI

The UI is exposed on NodePort 31112.

Click "New Function" and fill it out with the following:

Field Value
Service nodeinfo
Image functions/nodeinfo:latest
fProcess node main.js
Network default

Test the function

Your function will appear after a few seconds and you can click "Invoke"

The function can also be invoked through the CLI:

$ echo -n "" | faas-cli invoke --gateway http://kubernetes-ip:31112 \
                               --name nodeinfo
$ echo -n "verbose" | faas-cli invoke --gateway http://kubernetes-ip:31112 \
                                      --name nodeinfo
$ echo -n "" | faas-cli invoke --gateway http://kubernetes-ip:31112 nodeinfo $ echo -n "verbose" | faas-cli invoke --gateway http://kubernetes-ip:31112 nodeinfo ```

Helm chart

A Helm chart is provided below with experimental support.