Hyperledger on Kubernetes - How can Kubernetes be aware of Chaincode container

Question

I have been playing around with Hyperledger to make it run on Kubernetes. And I was successful to do so. The only thing which I was not happy with the solution/work-around for the container that was spun up when chaincode is instantiated by the peer.

Kubernetes is simply not aware of this container as it was not started by Kubernetes and by the peer. And to make the peer and chaincode talk to each other I had to update the docker daemon running on the kubernetes node with dns server ip address of the kube-dns service.

Is it possible to instantiate a chaincode in a way where kubernetes is aware of the container of the chaincode. And also chaincode container is able to talk to peer in a seamless fashion rather than updating docker daemon process of the node within kubernetes cluster

Answer 1

I have been investigating the same issue you are having. One alternative to using the docker daemon on your kubernetes node is spinning up a new container in your Pod using DnD (Docker in docker) technique. In this way you can successfully instantiate the chaincode container in a natural way (you will be able to use KubeDNS for example) as it will be sharing the same network space as the kubernetes Pod. I couldn't find any tutorial on the internet showing the implementation of this theory but if you find one (or do it yourself) please share it on this thread.

Thank you

Reference: https://medium.com/kokster/simpler-setup-for-hyperledger-fabric-on-kubernetes-using-docker-in-docker-8346f70fbe80