An Really Quick Introduction to Minikube
Tags: kubernetes, minikube, k8s, containers
Published: 2019-10-26 23:09:34

---
title: An Really Quick Introduction to Minikube
published: true
description: A quick introduction to Minikube. The basics to use Minikube in less than 5 minutes!
tags: kubernetes, minikube, k8s, containers
---
There's likely a million introductions to <a href="https://minikube.sigs.k8s.io/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Minikube</a>, but I wanted one of my own. Thus, here you go!  Minikube is basically <a href="https://kubernetes.io/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kubernetes</a> <em>light</em> that runs on your own machine. Albeit, it does this similarly to how Docker used to do it, via a virtual machine. Thus, you can do some things with it but if you want to get serious you'll still need to spool up a proper cluster somewhere as it will start to bog down your machine with any heavy workloads.
<h2>1: Minikube - Installing</h2>
Linux Direct:
<pre><code class="language-shell"> curl -LO https://storage.googleapis.com/minikube/releases/latest/minikube-linux-amd64 \
   && sudo install minikube-linux-amd64 /usr/local/bin/minikube</code></pre>
Linux Debian:
<pre><code class="language-shell"> curl -LO https://storage.googleapis.com/minikube/releases/latest/minikube-linux-amd64 \
   && sudo install minikube-linux-amd64 /usr/local/bin/minikube</code></pre>
Linux Red Hat:
<pre><code class="language-shell">curl -LO https://storage.googleapis.com/minikube/releases/latest/minikube-1.4.0.rpm \
 && sudo rpm -ivh minikube-1.4.0.rpm</code></pre>
<h2>2: Starting Minikube</h2>
<code>minikube start</code> will start a minikube instance, pulling images, resources, kubelets, kubeadm, dashboard, and all those resources.

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-16457" src="https://compositecode.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/00-starting.png" alt="00-starting" width="1173" height="336" />
<h2>3: Stopping Minikube</h2>
<code>minikube stop</code> brings the minikube service to a stop, allowing for restart later.

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-16459" src="https://compositecode.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/09-stopping-minikube.png" alt="09-stopping-minikube" width="1325" height="80" />
<h2>4. Deleting Minikube</h2>
<code>minikube delete</code> will delete the minikube. This will delete any of the content or related collateral that was running in the minikube.

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-16458" src="https://compositecode.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/01-delete.png" alt="01-delete" width="1431" height="81" />
<h2>5. Restarting after Delete</h2>
<code>minikube start</code> this is the way to restart a minikube instance after you've stopped the instance. It's also the way start a minikube, as shown above.

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-16460" src="https://compositecode.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/03-restarting-after-delete.png" alt="03-restarting-after-delete" width="1231" height="205" />
<h2>6. Starting a Named Minikube</h2>
If you want a named minikube instance, use the -p switch, with a command like <code>minikube start -p adrons-minikube</code>.

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-16461" src="https://compositecode.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/04-minikube-with-name.png" alt="04-minikube-with-name" width="1378" height="205" />
<h2>7. Starting & Using the Dashboard</h2>
To check out the dashboard, that pretty Google dashboard for Kubernetes, run <code>minikube dashboard</code> to bring that up.

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-16462" src="https://compositecode.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/05-starting-dashboard.png" alt="05-starting-dashboard" width="1878" height="213" />

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-16463" src="https://compositecode.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/06-minikube-dashboard.png" alt="06-minikube-dashboard.png" width="1701" height="1191" />
<h2>8. Status!</h2>
To get a quick update on the current state of the minikube instance just run <code>minikube status</code>.

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-16464" src="https://compositecode.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/07-other-minikube-commands.png" alt="07-other-minikube-commands" width="1346" height="294" />
<h2>9. Starting Minikube sans a Virtual Machine</h2>
This is, albeit I may be mistaken, this is a Linux only feature. Run <code>minikube start --vm-driver=none</code> and it'll kick off a minikube right there on your local machine.

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-16467" src="https://compositecode.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/09-minikube-no-vm-started.png" alt="09-minikube-no-vm-started.png" width="1815" height="703" />

<strong>References:</strong>
<ul>
	<li><a href="https://github.com/kubernetes/minikube" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Minikube Repo</a></li>
</ul>

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