Dumb Question - What does the operator add?

[jfmatth]

Hi All,
(sorry for the dumb question)

I love operators, but I'm unclear on what benefits this one does?

If I go through the Quickstart Guide for the operator, it refers me to the Deploy the sample App.

But in the end, all I see the operator doing is attaching the sidecar proxy? I'm still required to create and bind all the various services and roles, correct?

I'm sure it does more, i'm just not getting it.

Any response is appreciated 😄

[hessjcg]

Hi @jfmatth,

Not a dumb question. You have assessed this correctly. The operator's only purpose is to look for workloads that match the selectors and configure the auth proxy sidecar in a consistent, stable and secure way. This is especially helpful when managing a Kubernetes cluster that runs lots of applications, each configured by a different team.

The main advantage of the operator is that it encodes the best practices for configuring Cloud SQL Proxy sidecar containers, and allows you to apply those best practices across the workloads in your kubernetes cluster. When you upgrade the operator, it will also upgrade the proxy image and container configuration on those workloads.

However, if you are deploying only a few applications in your kubernetes cluster, it may be more straightforward to follow the Proxy K8s Sidecar Example and add the sidecar container directly in your configuration.

The operator does not help set up roles and permissions. This also requires intricate configuration, especially for workload identity federation. I can imagine how the operator could help make the WIF and Cloud SQL configuration easier. I created a new feature request: #706

Hope that helps. I'm going to close the question. Feel free to reopen it if you have further comments.

-Jonathan

[jfmatth]

@hessjcg Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!

This totally helps us understand what and when to use each of these tools. Great explanation and I hope others benefit from my question 😄

Have a great week, and thank you again.

J