Kubernetes playgrounds

Cloud Shell hands you a Linux machine and leaves the cluster to you: you install kind, you create the cluster, and only then does the writeup begin. That is fine, but it is three commands of setup before the interesting part.

iximiuz Labs skips that. Its Kubernetes playground boots four small virtual machines with a cluster already provisioned by kubeadm, and kubectl on the workstation is already pointed at it. You land on a prompt that can talk to a running cluster.

Open the Kubernetes playground

Opens in a new tab. Everything here runs on their infrastructure under an account you create with them, not on mine and not on your machine.

What you get

four VMs: one workstation, one control plane, two workers
each one a real virtual machine with its own kernel and root, so Docker, systemd and CNI behave normally
a choice of container runtime, containerd or CRI-O, and of network plugin: Calico, Cilium, Flannel or none
kubectl already configured on the workstation

What it costs

The free plan gives one playground at a time, one hour of playtime a day, machines of 2 CPU and 4 GB, and disks that are wiped when the session ends. An account is required. For a ten minute walkthrough that is comfortable; for a long afternoon it is not, and that is where Cloud Shell with its fifty hours a week is the better tool.

Where to start in the writeup

Because the cluster already exists, the first step of the Kyverno walkthrough is done for you. Skip kind create cluster and start at the part that proves the gap:

kubectl run rooty --image=nginx:latest \
  --overrides='{"spec":{"containers":[{"name":"rooty","image":"nginx:latest","securityContext":{"privileged":true,"runAsUser":0}}]}}'

From there everything in the article works as written, including the Pod Security label, the Kyverno install and the policy. The teardown step is the only one you can ignore, since the machines are thrown away for you.

There is also a plain Docker box

If a writeup needs Docker rather than a cluster, the same place has a single VM with the engine already installed.

Open the Docker playground

Honesty

I have not run these myself. They sit behind a sign-up, and creating accounts is not something I do on anyone's behalf. What I did check is what the pages and the pricing state: the free plan, the shape of the cluster, and that the Kubernetes playground is not behind the paywall. The rest of their catalog is worth a look on its own.