Getting Started

Verified against the source at commit 56169b71 (near release v0.13.0). Commands assume a Linux host with make, kubectl, and a kind-capable container runtime.

Prerequisites

A Kubernetes cluster to host the operator. For local work, the repo's make tilt-up creates a kind cluster.
An Ironic backend. The ironic provisioner is the production default; deploy it via the Ironic Standalone Operator (IrSO) or the ironic-deployment/ kustomize bases.
At least one server with a supported BMC reachable over IPMI or Redfish, and a network or virtual media boot path. The fixture backend can stand in for hardware during development.

Install

The development workflow uses the repository Makefile (source 1, source 6).

bash

git clone https://github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator
cd baremetal-operator
make install

A first working setup

Install the CRDs into the cluster.
bash
```
make install
```
Deploy the controller with kustomize, then run it locally with the ironic plugin loaded. The ironic backend must be deployed separately (IrSO or the ironic-deployment/ bases).
bash
```
make deploy
make run
```

Create a minimal BareMetalHost. A working host needs a BMC address, a credentials secret, the boot NIC MAC (the host NIC, not the BMC), and online: true (source 6).

yaml

apiVersion: metal3.io/v1alpha1
kind: BareMetalHost
metadata:
  name: node-0
spec:
  online: true
  bootMACAddress: 00:11:22:33:44:55
  bmc:
    address: redfish://192.168.1.10/redfish/v1/Systems/1
    credentialsName: node-0-bmc-secret

Verify it works

Check the host's status. The State column reflects the provisioning state machine (registering, inspecting, available, provisioning, provisioned).

bash

kubectl get bmh

The short names bmh and bmhost are defined on the CRD (apis/metal3.io/v1alpha1/baremetalhost_types.go:855-:863), along with the printed columns for Status, State, BMC, Online, and Error.

Where to go next

The Metal3 Book covers production deployment, the Ironic backend, and BMC configuration.
Unit tests assume envtest and run with make unit (plain go test will not work). End-to-end tests use libvirt VMs and a BMC emulator via ./hack/ci-e2e.sh.
For building Kubernetes clusters on bare metal, see cluster-api-provider-metal3 (described in Adoption & Ecosystem).

Getting Started ​

Prerequisites ​

Install ​

A first working setup ​

Verify it works ​