Interacting with Disconnected Spaces

Spaces management

Create a Space

To install an Upbound Space into a cluster, it's recommended you dedicate an entire Kubernetes cluster for the Space. You can use up space init to install an Upbound Space. Below is an example:

up space init "v1.9.0"

tip

For a full guide to get started with Spaces, read the quickstart guide:

You can also install the helm chart for Spaces directly. In order for a Spaces install to succeed, you must install some prerequisites first and configure them. This includes:

• UXP
• provider-helm and provider-kubernetes
• cert-manager

Furthermore, the Spaces chart requires a pull secret, which Upbound must provide to you.

helm -n upbound-system upgrade --install spaces \
  oci://xpkg.upbound.io/spaces-artifacts/spaces \
  --version "v1.9.0" \
  --set "ingress.host=your-host.com" \
  --set "clusterType=eks" \
  --set "account=your-upbound-account" \
  --wait

For a complete helm install tutorial, read the deployment guides for AWS, Azure, or GCP.

Upgrade a Space

To upgrade a Space from one version to the next, use up space upgrade. Spaces supports upgrading from version ver x.N.* to version ver x.N+1.*.

up space upgrade "v1.9.0"

You can also upgrade a Space by manually bumping the Helm chart version. Before upgrading, review the release notes for any breaking changes or special requirements:

1. Review the release notes for the target version in the Spaces Release Notes
2. Upgrade the Space by updating the helm chart version:

helm -n upbound-system upgrade spaces \
  oci://xpkg.upbound.io/spaces-artifacts/spaces \
  --version "v1.9.0" \
  --reuse-values \
  --wait

For major version upgrades or configuration changes, extract your current values and adjust:

# Extract current values to a file
helm -n upbound-system get values spaces > spaces-values.yaml

# Upgrade with modified values
helm -n upbound-system upgrade spaces \
  oci://xpkg.upbound.io/spaces-artifacts/spaces \
  --version "v1.9.0" \
  -f spaces-values.yaml \
  --wait

Downgrade a Space

To rollback a Space from one version to the previous, use up space upgrade. Spaces supports downgrading from version ver x.N.* to version ver x.N-1.*.

up space upgrade --rollback

You can also downgrade a Space manually using Helm by specifying an earlier version:

helm -n upbound-system upgrade spaces \
  oci://xpkg.upbound.io/spaces-artifacts/spaces \
  --version "v1.8.0" \
  --reuse-values \
  --wait

When downgrading, make sure to:

1. Check the release notes for specific downgrade instructions
2. Verify compatibility between the downgraded Space and any control planes
3. Back up any critical data before proceeding

Uninstall a Space

To uninstall a Space from a Kubernetes cluster, use up space destroy. A destroy operation uninstalls core components and orphans control planes and their associated resources.

up space destroy

Control plane management

You can manage control planes in a Space via the up CLI or the Spaces-local Kubernetes API. When you install a Space, it defines new a API type, kind: Controlplane, that you can use to create and manage control planes in the Space.

Create a control plane

To create a control plane in a Space using up, run the following:

up ctp create ctp1

You can also declare a new control plane like the example below and apply it to your Spaces cluster:

apiVersion: spaces.upbound.io/v1beta1
kind: ControlPlane
metadata:
  name: ctp1
  namespace: default
spec:
  writeConnectionSecretToRef:
    name: kubeconfig-ctp1
    namespace: default

This manifest:

• Creates a new control plane in the space called ctp1.
• Publishes the kubeconfig to connect to the control plane to a secret in the Spaces cluster, called kubeconfig-ctp1

Connect to a control plane

To connect to a control plane in a Space using up, run the following:

up ctx ./default/ctp1

The command changes your kubeconfig's current context to the control plane you specify. If you want to change your kubeconfig back to a previous context, run:

up ctx -

If you configured your control plane to publish connection details, you can also access it this way. Once the control plane is ready, use the secret (containing connection details) to connect to the API server of your control plane.

kubectl get secret <control-plane-connection-secret-name> -n default -o jsonpath='{.data.kubeconfig}' | base64 -d > /tmp/<ctp-name>.yaml

Reference the kubeconfig whenever you want to interact directly with the API server of the control plane (vs the Space's API server):

kubectl get providers --kubeconfig=/tmp/<ctp-name>.yaml

Configure a control plane

Spaces offers a built-in feature that allows you to connect a control plane to a Git source. This experience is like when a control plane runs in Upbound's SaaS environment. Upbound recommends using the built-in Git integration to drive configuration of your control planes in a Space.

Learn more in the Spaces Git integration documentation.

List control planes

To list all control planes in a Space using up, run the following:

up ctp list

Or you can use Kubernetes-style semantics to list the control plane:

kubectl get controlplanes

Delete a control plane

To delete a control plane in a Space using up, run the following:

up ctp delete ctp1

Or you can use Kubernetes-style semantics to delete the control plane:

kubectl delete controlplane ctp1