Understanding Kubernetes Pods: Basics, Types, Networking, Storage, and Common Commands

1. Pod

A Pod is a group of containers; in Kubernetes, the smallest deployable unit is a Pod. Typically a Pod runs a single container, but it can host multiple containers that share resources, similar to peas in a pod.

The core of a Pod is to run containers, requiring a container runtime such as Docker.

2. Classification

Self‑created Pods: directly created Pods that disappear when deleted and are not automatically recreated.

Controller‑created Pods: Pods created by a controller (e.g., Deployment, ReplicaSet); if deleted, the controller will recreate them.

3. Number of Containers per Pod

The common pattern is one container per Pod, making a Pod a simple wrapper for a container, with Kubernetes managing Pods rather than individual containers.

Multiple containers can run in the same Pod when they need to cooperate; they share resources and can be treated as a single service unit.

4. Pod Network

Each Pod is assigned a unique IP address, and all containers in the Pod share the same network namespace, including IP and ports.

Containers within the same Pod can communicate via localhost .

5. Pod Storage

Volumes can be used to persist storage for a Pod, preventing data loss when containers restart.

All containers in a Pod can access the shared Volume.

Kubernetes system components themselves run as Pods; you can list them with kubectl get pod -n kube-system .

6. Command Recap

(1) View created resources: kubectl get pod,deploy

(2) Delete an nginx Pod (if created by a Deployment, a new Pod will be recreated automatically): kubectl delete pod POD_NAME -n NAMESPACE

(3) To delete a controller that created the Pod, delete the controller itself: kubectl delete deployment DEPLOYMENT_NAME -n NAMESPACE

(4) Run a Pod with a specific namespace: kubectl run hahashen-nginx-pod --image=nginx:1.20.0 --port=80 --namespace=tuoguan

(5) Export a Deployment manifest to a YAML file: kubectl create deployment hahashen-nginx-pod --image=nginx:1.20.0 --port=80 --dry-run=client -o yaml > nginx.yaml

(6) Deploy three replicas by editing the YAML (change replicas: 1 to replicas: 3 ) and apply: kubectl apply -f nginx.yaml

(7) View detailed information of Pods in a specific namespace: kubectl get pod -n dev -o wide

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