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System requirements#

Mirantis Launchpad is a static binary that works on the following operating systems:

  • Linux (x64)
  • MacOS (x64)
  • Windows (x64)

Important

The setup must meet MKE system requirements, in addition to the requirements for running Launchpad.

The following operating systems support MKE:

  • CentOS 7
  • Oracle Linux 7
  • Oracle Linux 8
  • Oracle Linux 9
  • Redhat Enterprise Linux 7
  • Redhat Enterprise Linux 8
  • Redhat Enterprise Linux 9
  • Rocky Linux 8
  • Rocky Linux 9
  • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12
  • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15
  • Ubuntu 18.04
  • Ubuntu 20.04
  • Ubuntu 22.04
  • Ubuntu 24.04
  • Ubuntu 26.04 (requires Launchpad 1.5.19 or later)
  • Windows Server 2022, 2019

Be aware that Launchpad does not support all OS platform patch levels. Refer to the Compatibility Matrix for your version of MCR for full OS platform support information.

Note

Ubuntu 26.04 hosts require an MCR version that supports Ubuntu 26.04. Set spec.mcr.channel to a channel that publishes MCR packages for Ubuntu 26.04. Otherwise, the MCR installation fails.

Hardware requirements#

Manager nodes Worker nodes
Minimum hardware requirements
  • 16 GB of RAM
  • 2 vCPUs
  • 25 GB of free disk space for the /var partition
 4 GB of RAM
Recommended hardware requirements
  • 24 - 32 GB of RAM
  • 4 vCPUs
  • 25 - 100 GB of free disk space

Note

Windows container images are typically larger than Linux container images, and thus it is necessary to provision more local storage for Windows nodes.

Permissions and privilege levels#

Launchpad remote management must have high privilege on your system, both to prepare the system for installation and to perform the installation. This level of access is necessary for package managent, and also to allow remote users to execute MCR docker commands.

Note

For security reasons, Launchpad should not be executed with root/admin user authentication on any machine.

Package Management#

Launchpad uses sudo commands to manage several packages through a system package manager, as detailed below:

  • Install the key components needed for installing Mirantis products:

    curl
    Used to retrieve the MCR installation script
    iptables/iputils
    MCR dependencies
    socat
    Enables Prometheus management in certain scenarios
    RHEL rh-amazon-rhui-client
    Used by AWS for various management tasks

  • Add remote users to the MCR group docker to allow docker commands.

  • Run the MCR installation script:

    • Add package repositories for the MCR packages.
    • Remove conflicting Docker-EE packages from the system.
    • Install MCR, through the system package manager.

  • Optional. Uninstall MCR, by removing installed packages.

  • Optional. Prune MCR installations during unintall, by deleting system folders created by MCR.

Remote management#

Launchpad connects through the use of a cryptographic network protocol (SSH on Linux systems, SSH or WinRM on Windows systems), and as such these must be set up on all host instances.

Note

Only passwordless sudo capable SSH Key-Based authentication is currently supported. On Windows the user must have administrator privileges.

OpenSSH#

OpenSSH is the open-source version of the Secure Shell (SSH) tools used by administrators of Linux and other non-Windows operating systems for cross-platform management of remote systems. It is included in Windows Server 2019.

  1. To enable SSH on Windows, you can run the following PowerShell snippets, modified for your specific configuration, on each Windows host.

    # Install OpenSSH
Add-WindowsCapability -Online -Name OpenSSH.Client~~~~0.0.1.0
Add-WindowsCapability -Online -Name OpenSSH.Server~~~~0.0.1.0
Start-Service sshd
Set-Service -Name sshd -StartupType 'Automatic'

# Configure ssh key authentication
mkdir c:\Users\Administrator\.ssh\
$sshdConf = 'c:\ProgramData\ssh\sshd_config'
(Get-Content $sshdConf).replace('#PubkeyAuthentication yes', 'PubkeyAuthentication yes') | Set-Content $sshdConf
(Get-Content $sshdConf).replace('Match Group administrators', '#Match Group administrators') | Set-Content $sshdConf
(Get-Content $sshdConf).replace('       AuthorizedKeysFile __PROGRAMDATA__/ssh/administrators_authorized_keys', '#       AuthorizedKeysFile __PROGRAMDATA__/ssh/administrators_authorized_keys') | Set-Content $sshdConf
restart-service sshd

  2. Transfer your SSH public key from your local machine to the host, using the following example but with your own values.

    # Transfer SSH Key to Server
scp ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub Administrator@1.2.1.2:C:\Users\Administrator\.ssh\authorized_keys
ssh --% Administrator@1.2.1.2 powershell -c $ConfirmPreference = 'None'; Repair-AuthorizedKeyPermission C:\Users\Administrator\.ssh\authorized_keys

WinRM#

As an alternative to SSH, WinRM can be used on Windows hosts.

Ports Used#

When installing an MKE cluster, a series of ports must be opened to incoming traffic.