Product Introduction

A secret is a key-value pair that can store sensitive information such as passwords, tokens, and keys to help you lower the risk of information disclosure. You can create a secret object using kubectl in the console, and use a secret by mounting a volume, through environment variables, or in a container's run command.

Console Directions

Creating a secret

1. Log in to the TKE console and select Clusters in the left sidebar.
2. Select the ID of the cluster where you want to create a secret to enter the cluster management page.
3. Select Configuration Management -> Secret in the left sidebar to go to the Secret page, as shown below:
   
4. Click Create to go to the Create Secret page.
5. On the "Create Secret" page, set the following configurations based on your needs.
   
   • Name: enter a name.
   • Secret Type: select Opaque or Dockercfg based on your needs.
     • Opaque: suitable for storing key certificates and configuration files. The value will be base64-encoded.
     • Dockercfg: suitable for storing the authentication information of a private Docker Registry.
   • Effective Scope: select one from the following two options based on your needs.
     • All existing namespaces: exclude kube-system, kube-public, and new namespaces added hereafter.
     • Specific namespaces: you can specify one or more available namespaces in the current cluster.
   • Content: make configuration based on your secret type.
     • If the secret type is Opaque, set the variable name and value based on your needs.
     • If the secret type is Dockercfg:

              - Repository domain name: enter the domain name or IP as applicable.
                  - Username: enter the username for the third-party repository based on your needs.
                      - Password: enter the login password for the third-party repository based on your needs.

       If this is the first time that you log in to the system, an account will be created and related information will be written to the ~/.dockercrg file.

6. Click Create Secret to complete the creation.

Using a secret

Method 1: using a secret as a volume

1. Log in to the TKE console and select Clusters in the left sidebar.

2. Click the ID of the cluster where you want to deploy the workload to enter the cluster management page.

3. Under Workload, select a workload type to go to the corresponding information page.
   For example, select Workload -> DaemonSet to go to the DaemonSet page, as shown below:
   

4. Click Create to go to the Create Workload page.

5. Set the workload name, namespace, and other information as instructed. In "Volume", click Add Volume, as shown below:
   

6. Select Use Secret from the drop-down list, enter a name, and click Select Secret, as shown below:
   

7. In the pop-up Configure Secret window, configure the mounting point and click OK, as shown below:
   

   • Select a secret: select a secret based on your needs.
   • Options: select All or Specific keys.
   • Items: if you select Specific keys, you can mount the secret to a specific path by adding an item. For example, if the mounting point is /data/config and the sub-path is dev, it will finally be saved under /data/config/dev.

8. Click Create Workload to complete the creation.

Method 2: using a secret as an environmental variable

1. Log in to the TKE console and select Clusters in the left sidebar.

2. Click the ID of the cluster where you want to deploy a workload to enter the cluster management page.

3. Under Workload, select a workload type to go to the corresponding information page.
   For example, select Workload -> DaemonSet to go to the DaemonSet page, as shown below:
   

4. Click Create to go to the Create Workload page.

5. Set the workload name, namespace, and other information as instructed. In "Environment Variable" under "Containers in the pod", click Reference ConfigMap/Secret, as shown below:
   

6. Select Secret for the environment variable and select resources based on your needs, as shown below:
   

7. Click Create Workload to complete the creation.

Method 3: referencing a secret when using third-party image repositories

1. Log in to the TKE console and select Clusters in the left sidebar.
2. Click the ID of the cluster where you want to deploy the workload to enter the cluster management page.
3. Under Workload, select a workload type to go to the corresponding information page.
   For example, select Workload -> DaemonSet to go to the DaemonSet page, as shown below:
   
4. Click Create to go to the Create Workload page.
5. Set the workload name, namespace, and other information as instructed. Click Advanced Settings in the lower-left corner of the page.
6. Click Add under imagePullSecrets and select a dockercfg-type secret based on your needs, as shown below:
   
7. Click Create Workload to complete the creation.

Updating a secret

1. Log in to the TKE console and select Clusters in the left sidebar.
2. Select the ID of the cluster for which you want to update the YAML file to go to the cluster management page.
3. Select Configuration Management -> Secret to go to the Secret page, as shown below:
   
4. In the row of the secret for which you want to update the YAML file, click Edit YAML to go to the secret updating page.
5. On the "Update Secret" page, edit the YAML file and click Complete.

   To modify key-values, edit the parameter values of data in the YAML file and click Finish to complete the update.

kubectl Instructions

Creating a secret

Method 1: creating a secret with a specified file

1. Run the following commands to obtain the username and password of the pod:

   $ echo -n 'username' > ./username.txt
   $ echo -n 'password' > ./password.txt

2. Run the following kubectl command to create a secret.

   $ kubectl create secret generic test-secret --from-file=./username.txt --from-file=./password.txt
   secret "testSecret" created

3. Run the following command to view details about the secret:

   kubectl describe secrets/ test-secret

Method 2: manually creating a secret with a YAML file

To manually create a secret using a YAML file, you need to Base64-encode the data of the secret in advance.

apiVersion: v1
kind: Secret
metadata:
  name: test-secret
type: Opaque
data:
  username: dXNlcm5hbWU=  ## Generated by echo -n 'username' | base64
  password: cGFzc3dvcmQ= ## Generated by echo -n 'password' | base64

Using a secret

Method 1: using a secret as a volume

The following shows a YAML sample.

apiVersion: v1
 kind: Pod
 metadata:
   name: nginx
 spec:
   containers:
     - name: nginx
       image: nginx:latest
       volumeMounts:
        name: secret-volume
        mountPath: /etc/config
   volumes:
        name: secret-volume
        secret:
          name: test-secret ## Set the secret source
          ## items: ## Set the key mounting of the specified secret
          ##   key: username  ## Select the specified key
          ## path: group/user ## Mount to the specified subpath
          ## mode: 256 ## Set file permission
   restartPolicy: Never

Method 2: using a secret as an environmental variable

The following shows a YAML sample.

apiVersion: v1
 kind: Pod
 metadata:
   name: nginx
 spec:
   containers:
     - name: nginx
       image: nginx:latest
       env:
         - name: SECRET_USERNAME
           valueFrom:
             secretKeyRef:
               name: test-secret ## Set the filename of the source secret
               key: username ## Set the value source of the environment variable
   restartPolicy: Never

Method 3: referencing a secret when using third-party image repositories

The following shows a YAML sample.

apiVersion: v1
 kind: Pod
 metadata:
   name: nginx
 spec:
   containers:
     - name: nginx
       image: nginx:latest
   imagePullSecrets:
   - name: test-secret ## Set the filename of the source secret
   restartPolicy: Never