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talos/website/content/docs/v0.10/Learn More/components.md
Andrey Smirnov 2ea20f598a feat: replace timed with time sync controller
This is a complete rewrite of time sync process.

Now the time sync process starts early at boot time, and it adapts to
configuration changes:

* before config is available, `pool.ntp.org` is used
* once config is available, configured time servers are used

Controller updates same time sync resource as other controllers had
dependency on, so they have a chance to wait for the time sync event.

Talos services which depend on time now wait on same resource instead of
waiting on timed health.

New features:

* time sync now sticks to the particular time server unless there's an
error from that server, and server is changed in that case, this
improves time sync accuracy

* time sync acts on config changes immediately, so it's possible to
reconfigure time sync at any time

* there's a new 'epoch' field in time sync resources which allows
time-dependent controllers to regenerate certs when there's a big enough
jump in time

Features to implement later:

* apid shouldn't depend on timed, it should be started early and it
should regenerate certs on time jump

* trustd should be updated in same way

Signed-off-by: Andrey Smirnov <smirnov.andrey@gmail.com>
2021-03-29 09:29:43 -07:00

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8.1 KiB
Markdown

---
title: "Components"
weight: 4
---
In this section, we discuss the various components that underpin Talos.
## Components
| Component | Description |
| ------------------------ | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| apid | When interacting with Talos, the gRPC API endpoint you interact with directly is provided by `apid`. `apid` acts as the gateway for all component interactions and forwards the requests to `machined`. |
| containerd | An industry-standard container runtime with an emphasis on simplicity, robustness, and portability. To learn more, see the [containerd website](https://containerd.io). |
| machined | Talos replacement for the traditional Linux init-process. Specially designed to run Kubernetes and does not allow starting arbitrary user services. |
| networkd | Handles all of the host level network configuration. The configuration is defined under the `networking` key |
| kernel | The Linux kernel included with Talos is configured according to the recommendations outlined in the [Kernel Self Protection Project](http://kernsec.org/wiki/index.php/Kernel_Self_Protection_Project). |
| trustd | To run and operate a Kubernetes cluster, a certain level of trust is required. Based on the concept of a 'Root of Trust', `trustd` is a simple daemon responsible for establishing trust within the system. |
| udevd | Implementation of `eudev` into `machined`. `eudev` is Gentoo's fork of udev, systemd's device file manager for the Linux kernel. It manages device nodes in /dev and handles all user space actions when adding or removing devices. To learn more, see the [Gentoo Wiki](https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Eudev). |
### apid
When interacting with Talos, the gRPC api endpoint you will interact with directly is `apid`.
Apid acts as the gateway for all component interactions.
Apid provides a mechanism to route requests to the appropriate destination when running on a control plane node.
We'll use some examples below to illustrate what `apid` is doing.
When a user wants to interact with a Talos component via `talosctl`, there are two flags that control the interaction with `apid`.
The `-e | --endpoints` flag specifies which Talos node ( via `apid` ) should handle the connection.
Typically this is a public-facing server.
The `-n | --nodes` flag specifies which Talos node(s) should respond to the request.
If `--nodes` is omitted, the first endpoint will be used.
> Note: Typically, there will be an `endpoint` already defined in the Talos config file.
> Optionally, `nodes` can be included here as well.
For example, if a user wants to interact with `machined`, a command like `talosctl -e cluster.talos.dev memory` may be used.
```bash
$ talosctl -e cluster.talos.dev memory
NODE TOTAL USED FREE SHARED BUFFERS CACHE AVAILABLE
cluster.talos.dev 7938 1768 2390 145 53 3724 6571
```
In this case, `talosctl` is interacting with `apid` running on `cluster.talos.dev` and forwarding the request to the `machined` api.
If we wanted to extend our example to retrieve `memory` from another node in our cluster, we could use the command `talosctl -e cluster.talos.dev -n node02 memory`.
```bash
$ talosctl -e cluster.talos.dev -n node02 memory
NODE TOTAL USED FREE SHARED BUFFERS CACHE AVAILABLE
node02 7938 1768 2390 145 53 3724 6571
```
The `apid` instance on `cluster.talos.dev` receives the request and forwards it to `apid` running on `node02`, which forwards the request to the `machined` api.
We can further extend our example to retrieve `memory` for all nodes in our cluster by appending additional `-n node` flags or using a comma separated list of nodes ( `-n node01,node02,node03` ):
```bash
$ talosctl -e cluster.talos.dev -n node01 -n node02 -n node03 memory
NODE TOTAL USED FREE SHARED BUFFERS CACHE AVAILABLE
node01 7938 871 4071 137 49 2945 7042
node02 257844 14408 190796 18138 49 52589 227492
node03 257844 1830 255186 125 49 777 254556
```
The `apid` instance on `cluster.talos.dev` receives the request and forwards it to `node01`, `node02`, and `node03`, which then forwards the request to their local `machined` api.
### containerd
[Containerd](https://github.com/containerd/containerd) provides the container runtime to launch workloads on Talos and Kubernetes.
Talos services are namespaced under the `system` namespace in containerd, whereas the Kubernetes services are namespaced under the `k8s.io` namespace.
### machined
A common theme throughout the design of Talos is minimalism.
We believe strongly in the UNIX philosophy that each program should do one job well.
The `init` included in Talos is one example of this, and we are calling it "`machined`".
We wanted to create a focused `init` that had one job - run Kubernetes.
To that extent, `machined` is relatively static in that it does not allow for arbitrary user-defined services.
Only the services necessary to run Kubernetes and manage the node are available.
This includes:
- containerd
- [kubelet](https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/overview/components/)
- networkd
- trustd
- udevd
### networkd
Networkd handles all of the host level network configuration.
The configuration is defined under the `networking` key.
By default, we attempt to issue a DHCP request for every interface on the server.
This can be overridden by supplying one of the following kernel arguments:
- `talos.network.interface.ignore` - specify a list of interfaces to skip discovery on
- `ip` - `ip=<client-ip>:<server-ip>:<gw-ip>:<netmask>:<hostname>:<device>:<autoconf>:<dns0-ip>:<dns1-ip>:<ntp0-ip>` as documented in the [kernel here](https://www.kernel.org/doc/Documentation/filesystems/nfs/nfsroot.txt)
- ex, `ip=10.0.0.99:::255.0.0.0:control-1:eth0:off:10.0.0.1`
### kernel
The Linux kernel included with Talos is configured according to the recommendations outlined in the Kernel Self Protection Project ([KSSP](http://kernsec.org/wiki/index.php/Kernel_Self_Protection_Project)).
### trustd
Security is one of the highest priorities within Talos.
To run a Kubernetes cluster, a certain level of trust is required to operate a cluster.
For example, orchestrating the bootstrap of a highly available control plane requires sensitive PKI data distribution.
To that end, we created `trustd`.
Based on a Root of Trust concept, `trustd` is a simple daemon responsible for establishing trust within the system.
Once trust is established, various methods become available to the trustee.
For example, it can accept a write request from another node to place a file on disk.
Additional methods and capabilities will be added to the `trustd` component to support new functionality in the rest of the Talos environment.
### udevd
Udevd handles the kernel device notifications and sets up the necessary links in `/dev`.