Install Istio on the Alibaba Cloud Kubernetes Container Service

Follow this guide to install and configure an Istio mesh in the Alibaba Cloud Kubernetes Container Service using the Application Catalog module.

This guide installs the current release version of Istio and deploys the Bookinfo sample application.

Prerequisites

  • You have an available Alibaba Cloud Kubernetes cluster. Otherwise, create a Kubernetes cluster quickly and easily in the Container Service console.

  • Ensure kubectl works fine for your Kubernetes cluster.

  • You can create a namespace to deploy Istio components. The following example creates the istio-system namespace:

$ kubectl create namespace istio-system
  • You installed a service account for Tiller. To install one if you haven’t, run the following command:
Zip
$ kubectl create -f @install/kubernetes/helm/helm-service-account.yaml@
  • You installed Tiller on your cluster. To install Tiller with the service account if you haven’t, run the following command:
$ helm init --service-account tiller

Deploy Istio via the Application Catalog

  • Log on to the Alibaba Cloud Container Service console.
  • Click Application Catalog in the left navigation pane.
  • Select the ack-istio in the right panel.
Istio
Istio

Customize the installation with parameters

The following table explains the default configuration options shipped with the Helm chart:

ParameterDescriptionDefault
global.hubSpecifies the images hub for Istioregistry.cn-hangzhou.aliyuncs.com/aliacs-app-catalog
global.tagSpecifies the TAG for most images used by Istio0.8
global.proxy.imageSpecifies the proxy image nameproxyv2
global.imagePullPolicySpecifies the image pull policyIfNotPresent
global.controlPlaneSecurityEnabledSpecifies whether control plane mTLS is enabledfalse
global.mtls.enabledSpecifies whether mTLS is enabled by default between servicesfalse
global.mtls.mtlsExcludedServicesList of FQDNs to exclude from mTLS-kubernetes.default.svc.cluster.local
global.rbacEnabledSpecifies whether to create Istio RBAC rules or nottrue
global.refreshIntervalSpecifies the mesh discovery refresh interval10s
global.arch.amd64Specifies the scheduling policy for amd64 architectures2
global.arch.s390xSpecifies the scheduling policy for s390x architectures2
global.arch.ppc64leSpecifies the scheduling policy for ppc64le architectures2

The Parameters tab exposes the per-service options.

Uninstalling

  1. Visit the Release section of the Alibaba Cloud Container Service console.

  2. Select the release where you wish to uninstall Istio.

  3. Click the Delete button to remove all the deployed Istio artifacts.