TiDB Operator Overview

TiDB Operator is an automatic operation system for TiDB clusters in Kubernetes. It provides a full management life-cycle for TiDB including deployment, upgrades, scaling, backup, fail-over, and configuration changes. With TiDB Operator, TiDB can run seamlessly in the Kubernetes clusters deployed on a public or private cloud.

The corresponding relationship between TiDB Operator and TiDB versions is as follows:

Manage TiDB clusters using TiDB Operator

TiDB Operator provides several ways to deploy TiDB clusters in Kubernetes:

• For test environment:

  • Get Started using kind, Minikube, or the Google Cloud Shell

• For production environment:

  • On public cloud:
    • Deploy TiDB on AWS EKS
    • Deploy TiDB on GCP GKE (beta)
    • Deploy TiDB on Alibaba Cloud ACK

  • In an existing Kubernetes cluster:

    First install TiDB Operator in a Kubernetes cluster according to Deploy TiDB Operator in Kubernetes, then deploy your TiDB clusters according to Deploy TiDB in General Kubernetes.

    You also need to adjust the configuration of the Kubernetes cluster based on Prerequisites for TiDB in Kubernetes and configure the local PV for your Kubernetes cluster to achieve low latency of local storage for TiKV according to Local PV Configuration.

Before deploying TiDB on any of the above two environments, you can always refer to TiDB Cluster Configuration Document to customize TiDB configurations.

After the deployment is complete, see the following documents to use, operate, and maintain TiDB clusters in Kubernetes:

• Access the TiDB Cluster
• Scale TiDB Cluster
• Upgrade TiDB Cluster
• Change the Configuration of TiDB Cluster
• Back up and Restore a TiDB Cluster
• Automatic Failover
• Monitor a TiDB Cluster in Kubernetes
• View TiDB Logs in Kubernetes
• Maintain Kubernetes Nodes that Hold the TiDB Cluster

When a problem occurs and the cluster needs diagnosis, you can:

• See TiDB FAQs in Kubernetes for any available solution;
• See Troubleshoot TiDB in Kubernetes to shoot troubles.

TiDB in Kubernetes provides a dedicated command-line tool tkctl for cluster management and auxiliary diagnostics. Meanwhile, some of TiDB's tools are used differently in Kubernetes. You can:

• Use tkctl according to tkctl Guide;
• See Tools in Kubernetes to understand how TiDB tools are used in Kubernetes.

Finally, when a new version of TiDB Operator is released, you can refer to Upgrade TiDB Operator to upgrade to the latest version.