Cluster Requirements

You can deploy Domino into a Kubernetes cluster that meets the following requirements.

See Domino Kubernetes Version Compatibility.

Caution

Domino depends on some Docker functionality (for managing certificate trust) that is not available in containerd without special configuration. Contact your Domino customer success team for guidance before replacing Docker with containerd.

When upgrading a cluster using a managed Kubernetes service:

Confirm that the version you’re upgrading to supports Docker runtime.
Configure the upgrade to use Docker runtime.

Some default upgrade paths on GKE and AKS automatically switch you to containerd unless you specify otherwise.

Cluster permissions

Domino needs permission to install and configure pods in the cluster through Helm. The Domino installer is delivered as a containerized Python utility that operates Helm through a kubeconfig that provides service account access to the cluster.

Namespaces

Domino creates one dedicated namespace for dedicated namespaces for Platform nodes, one for Compute nodes, and one for installer metadata and secrets.

Nodes

The recommended node requirements for Domino are four platform nodes and two compute nodes.

If you are upgrading to 5.0 or higher, and the platform cluster does not support autoscaling, you must increase the number of nodes to support the increased node requirements (two platform nodes and two compute nodes).

Storage requirements

Storage classes

Domino requires at least two storage classes.

Dynamic block storage

Domino requires high performance block storage for the following types of data:
- Ephemeral volumes attached to user execution
- High performance databases for Domino application object data
This storage must be backed by a storage class with the following properties:
- Supports dynamic provisioning
- Can be mounted on any node in the cluster
- SSD-backed recommended for fast I/O
- Capable of provisioning volumes of at least 100GB
- Underlying storage provider can support ReadWriteOnce semantics
By default, this storage class is named dominodisk.

In AWS, EBS is used to back this storage class. The following is an example configuration for a compatible EBS storage class:
```
apiVersion: storage.k8s.io/v1
kind: StorageClass
metadata:
  name: domino-compute-storage
provisioner: kubernetes.io/aws-ebs
parameters:
  type: gp2
  fsType: ext4
```
In GCP, compute engine persistent disks are used to back this storage class. The following is an example configuration for a compatible GCEPD storage class:
```
apiVersion: storage.k8s.io/v1
kind: StorageClass
metadata:
  name: dominodisk
parameters:
  replication-type: none
  type: pd-standard
provisioner: kubernetes.io/gce-pd
reclaimPolicy: Delete
volumeBindingMode: WaitForFirstConsumer
```
Long term shared storage

Domino needs a separate storage class for long term storage for:
- Project data uploaded or created by users
- Domino Datasets
- Docker images
- Domino backups
This storage needs to be backed by a storage class with the following properties:
- Dynamically provisions Kubernetes PersistentVolume
- Can be accessed in ReadWriteMany mode from all nodes in the cluster
- Uses a VolumeBindingMode of Immediate
In AWS, these storage requirements are handled by a class that is backed by EFS for Domino Datasets, and a class that is backed by S3 for project data, backups, and Docker images.

In GCP, these storage requirements are handled by a Cloud Filestore volume mounted as NFS.

By default, this storage class is named dominoshared.

Native

For shared storage, Domino requires a native cloud provider object store for a few resources and services:

Blob Storage. For AWS, the blob storage must be backed by S3 (see Blob storage). For other infrastructure, the dominoshared storage class is used.
Logs. For AWS, the log storage must be backed by S3 (see Blob storage). For others, the dominoshared storage class is used.
Backups. For all supported cloud providers, storage for backups are backed by the native blob store. For on-prem, backups is backed by the dominoshared storage class.
- AWS: S3
- Azure: Azure Blob Storage
- GCP: GCP Cloud Storage
Datasets. For AWS, Datasets storage must be backed by EFS (see Datasets storage). For other infrastructure, the dominoshared storage class is used.

On-Prem

In on-premises environments, both dominodisk and dominoshared can be backed by NFS. In some cases, host volumes can be used (and even preferred). Host volumes are preferred for the Git, Postgres, and MongoDB. Postgres and MongoDB provide state replication. Host volumes can be used for Runs, but not preferred since we want leverage files cached in block storage that can move between nodes. If host volumes are used for Runs, file caching must be disabled and you will potentially expect slow start up executions for large Projects.

Summary

The following table summarizes the storage requirements and options.

Service

Type

Comments

Storage Class

AWS

Azure

GCP

On-Prem

Block storage

Ephemeral

dominodisk

Azure Disk Storage

GCP Persistent Disk

NFS or Host Volumes

Blob Storage

Shared storage

Long-Term

dominoshared

Native

N/A

N/A

N/A

NFS

N/A

Logs

Shared storage

Long-Term

dominoshared

Native

N/A

N/A

N/A

NFS

N/A

Backups

Shared storage

Long-Term

dominoshared

Native

N/A

N/A

Azure Blob Storage

N/A

GCP Cloud Storage

NFS

N/A

Block storage

Long-Term

dominoshared

Azure Disk Storage

GCP Persistent Disk

NFS or Host Volumes

Container Images

Shared storage

Long-Term

dominoshared

Native

Azure Disk Storage

Azure Blob Storage

GCP Persistent Disk

GCP Cloud Storage

NFS

NFS

Datasets

Shared storage

Long-Term

dominoshared

Native

N/A

EFS

N/A

N/A

NFS

N/A

Postgres

Block storage

Replication

dominodisk

Azure Disk Storage

GCP Persistent Disk

NFS or Host Volumes

Block storage

Replication

dominodisk

Azure Disk Storage

GCP Persistent Disk

NFS or Host Volumes

Default for Services

Block storage

Elasticsearch, RabbitMQ, Redis, and so on

dominodisk

Azure Disk Storage

GCP Persistent Disk

NFS or Host Volumes

Node pool requirements

Domino requires a minimum of two node pools, one to host the Domino Platform and one to host Compute workloads. Additional optional pools can be added to provide specialized execution hardware for some Compute workloads.

Platform pool requirements
- Boot Disk: 128GB
- Min Nodes: 4
- Max Nodes: 4
- Spec: 8 CPU / 32GB
- Labels: dominodatalab.com/node-pool: platform
- Tags:
  - kubernetes.io/cluster/{{ cluster_name }}: owned
  - k8s.io/cluster-autoscaler/enabled: true #Optional for autodiscovery
  - k8s.io/cluster-autoscaler/{{ cluster_name }}: owned #Optional for autodiscovery
Compute pool requirements
- Boot Disk: 400GB
- Recommended Min Nodes: 1
- Max Nodes: Set as necessary to meet demand and resourcing needs
- Recommended min spec: 8 CPU / 32GB
- Enable Autoscaling: Yes
- Labels: domino/build-node: true, dominodatalab.com/node-pool: default
- Tags:
  - k8s.io/cluster-autoscaler/node-template/label/dominodatalab.com/node-pool: default
  - kubernetes.io/cluster/{{ cluster_name }}: owned
  - k8s.io/cluster-autoscaler/node-template/label/domino/build-node: true
  - k8s.io/cluster-autoscaler/enabled: true #Optional for autodiscovery
  - k8s.io/cluster-autoscaler/{{ cluster_name }}: owned #Optional for autodiscovery
Optional GPU compute pool
- Boot Disk: 400GB
- Recommended Min Nodes: 0
- Max Nodes: Set as necessary to meet demand and resourcing needs
- Recommended min Spec: 8 CPU / 16GB / One or more NVIDIA GPU Device
- Nodes must be pre-configured with appropriate NVIDIA driver, NVIDIA-docker2 and set the default docker runtime to nvidia. For example, EKS GPU optimized AMI.
- Labels: dominodatalab.com/node-pool: default-gpu, nvidia.com/gpu: true
- Tags:
  - k8s.io/cluster-autoscaler/node-template/label/dominodatalab.com/node-pool: default-gpu
  - kubernetes.io/cluster/{{ cluster_name }}: owned
  - k8s.io/cluster-autoscaler/enabled: true #Optional for autodiscovery
  - k8s.io/cluster-autoscaler/{{ cluster_name }}: owned #Optional for autodiscovery

Cluster networking

To manage secure communication between pods, Domino relies on Kubernetes network policies. You must use a networking solution that supports the Kubernetes NetworkPolicy resource. One such solution is Calico.

Ingress and SSL

Domino must be configured to serve from a specific FQDN, and DNS for that name must resolve to the address of an SSL-terminating load balancer with a valid certificate.

Important

The load balancer must target incoming connections on ports 80 and 443 to port 80 on all nodes in the Platform pool. This load balancer must support websocket connections.

Health checks for this load balancer must use HTTP on port 80 and check for 200 responses from a path of /health on the nodes.

Note	Domino continues to support environments with subdomains. If you are using subdomains for your Domino deployment and need best-practice information, contact your Account Manager. However, Domino recommends that you do not use them for improved security.

NTP

To support SSO protocols, TLS connections to external services, intra-cluster TLS when using Istio, and to avoid general interoperability issues, the nodes in your Kubernetes cluster must have a valid Network Time Protocol (NTP) configuration. This will allow for successful TLS validation and operation of other time-sensitive protocols.