Running Nomad for a Home Server

One of the points I'd highlight in this post is just how good the combination of nomad, consul, and consul-template is. Even when nomad lacks some sort of first-class integration that k8s might have, the combination of being able to dynamically generate configuration files using consul-template plus nomad automatically populating the consul catalog means that you can do almost anything, and without much hassle. I use consul-template in the homelab to dynamically wrangle nginx, iptables, and dnsmasq, and it continues to work well years after I initially set it up.

I often wish I had the luxury of relying on vault+consul+nomad in all the environments I operate in.

Loops and conditionals in HCL could still use some real work though. They are still clunky to work with.

Choosing k8s is just the first step - you have to deal with what 'distribution' of k8s to use, upgrades, pages of yaml, secrets stored in plaintext by default...

Once you've got Nomad running, it just works.

I help people move to Nomad, my email is in my profile if you want to chat :)

I agree that you probably don't need Kubernetes, and perhaps yeah it could be considered complex.

But I think it's the right fit for most developers/doers & over time most operators too. Kubernetes is not Kubernetes. Kubernetes is some base machinery, yes, but it's also a pattern, for writing controllers/operators that take Kubernetes Objects and turn them into things. Take a Postgres object and let postgres-operator turn it into a running, healing, backing-up replicated postgres cluster. Take a SQS object and let ACK turn it into a real SQS. Take a PersistentVolume and with Rook turn it into a Ceph store.

Kubernetes & cloud native in general proposes that you should have working models for the state of your world. In addition to the out-of-the-box machinery you get for running containers (deployment-sets), exposing them (services), &c, you get this pattern. You get other folks building operators/controllers that implement this pattern[1]. You get a consistent, powerful, extensible way of building.

Nothing else comes close. There's nothing remotely as interesting in the field right now. The Cult of Easy is loud & bitterly angry about Kubernetes, hates it's "complexity", but what is actually complex is having a dozen different operational environments for different tools & systems. What is actually complex is operating systems yourself, rather than having operators to maintain systems. Kubernetes has some initial costs, it can feel daunting, but it is radically simpler in the long run because _it has a paradigm,_ an all inclusive paradigm that all systems can fit into, and the autonomic behaviors this paradigm supports radically transfer operational complexity from human to computer, across that broad/all-inclusive range of systems.

There's a lot of easier this/harder that. No one tries to pitch Nomad or anything else as better, as deeper, as being more consistent, having a stronger core. Every article you hear on an alternative to Kubernetes is 98% "this was easier". I think those people, largely, miss the long game, the long view. A system that can adapt, that operationally can serve bigger & bigger scopes, ought to pay dividends to you as years go by. Kubernetes may take you longer to get going. But it is time enormously well spent, that will increase your capability & mastery of the world, & bring you together with others building radically great systems whether at home[2][3] or afar. It will be not just a way of running infrastructure, but help you re-think how you develop, and how to expose your own infrastructure & ideas more consistently, more clearly, in the new pattern language of autonomic machines that we have only just begun to build together.

I encourage the bold explorers out there, learn Kubernetes, run Kubernetes. And to those of you pitching other things, please, I want you to talk up your big game better, tell me late-game scenarios, tell me how your system & I are going to grow together, advance each other.

[1] https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/architecture/controller/...

[2] https://github.com/onedr0p/home-cluster

[3] https://github.com/k8s-at-home/awesome-home-kubernetes

And if you follow the link in the third sentence, the image at the top of the README also answers your question.