What is NodeLocalDNS and How It Works

What is NodeLocalDNS? NodeLocalDNS is an optional feature in Kubernetes that improves DNS performance and reliability by running a small DNS caching server on each node. Instead of making every DNS request go across the network to the kube-dns or CoreDNS service, the request is handled locally on the node. This reduces DNS lookup latency and avoids overloading the shared cluster DNS service. Why Use NodeLocalDNS? 🧠 Faster DNS resolution — queries are resolved from local cache. 📉 Reduced load on kube-dns/CoreDNS — fewer round trips to the central service. 🌐 Better reliability — even if CoreDNS has a hiccup, cached results can still resolve. How NodeLocalDNS Works Here’s a simplified flow: ...

July 19, 2025 · 2 min · 288 words · John Cena

Kubernetes Explained in Simple Terms

What Is Kubernetes, Really? Imagine you’re running a lot of apps across many computers. How do you keep track of them all? How do you make sure that if one crashes, it restarts? What if you want to update one without breaking the others? That’s where Kubernetes comes in. Kubernetes (a.k.a. K8s) is an open-source system designed to help you deploy, manage, scale, and monitor containerized applications automatically. Think of it as the brains of your cloud-native app infrastructure. ...

July 17, 2025 · 2 min · 350 words · John Cena

What is kube-proxy and How It Works in Kubernetes

Introduction How does Kubernetes know where to send traffic for your services? That’s the job of kube-proxy. Whether you’re accessing a ClusterIP, NodePort, or LoadBalancer — kube-proxy is working behind the scenes to route traffic correctly. Let’s unpack how it works in a way that’s easy to understand. What is kube-proxy? kube-proxy is a network component that runs on every node in your Kubernetes cluster. It’s responsible for: Handling traffic for Kubernetes Services Managing IP rules and routing Forwarding requests to the right Pods kube-proxy acts like a traffic router inside your Kubernetes cluster. ...

July 16, 2025 · 2 min · 334 words · John Cena

Core Components of Kubernetes Explained Simply

Introduction If you’re just getting started with Kubernetes, its architecture can feel a bit overwhelming. Let’s break it down into understandable pieces. Kubernetes is like a well-organized team — and each component has a specific role. Control Plane vs Node Components Kubernetes is divided into two major layers: Control Plane – the brain of the cluster, makes decisions. Node Components – the workers, run the actual workloads. 🧠 Control Plane Components 1. API Server (kube-apiserver) The API server is the front door to your cluster. Everything — kubectl, dashboards, even internal components — talks to the cluster via this API. ...

July 14, 2025 · 2 min · 364 words · John Cena