Writing

In the last post, I explained the utility and purpose of Kubernetes Controllers. This post will explain how to build them, and how to think about designing them. We’ll go into Controller patterns, anti-patterns, and sharp edges of the model that you’re bound to run into. controller-runtime - use it. Or don’t, I don’t care. It’ll probably help though. You can absolutely build a controller from scratch using client-go (and sometimes that makes sense), but most of the time you should just get started with controller-runtime. It provides a batteries-included approach to handling typical Kubernetes controller patterns and gives you everything you need when it comes to things like leader election (you want HA, right?), metrics & events, caching, and even webhook setup and serving. When you just need to watch some resources and have your controller reconcile some state when the resource changes, controller-runtime is awesome. ...

Controllers aren’t just add-ons to Kubernetes - they’re fundamental to how the whole system works. They’re the caretakers of your cluster, overseeing and orchestrating processes to ensure your defined resources stay on track. Whether it’s maintaining pod replicas, managing rolling updates, or handling node lifecycles, controllers are there making sure things run smoothly. The Kubernetes documentation explains their job as follows: In Kubernetes, controllers are control loops that watch the state of your cluster, then make or request changes where needed. Each controller tries to move the current cluster state closer to the desired state. ...

Recently a friend asked for my recommendations for home gym equipment as they wanted to start building out theirs. Little do they know I’ve spent way too many hours thinking about this. My home gym is nothing special but it keeps me healthy, out of commercial gyms, and never leaves me wishing I had more equipment. I like to think that’s due to making the right choices on how to fill it. ...

in roughly chronological order… got convinced by friends to start a magic the gathering team. took it from 6 -> 20 people not everyone pictured got engaged to my college sweetheart and the love of my life been waiting a while for this one. took a trip to Japan where I played in 12+ magic tournaments, got invited to dinner with locals, and found my best man left to right: new tokyo magic friend, me, best man ...

Back in grad school I used to make some extra cash by coaching and writing articles about Hearthstone (an online collectible card game made by Blizzard). I primarily wrote “deck techs”, guides that explained how to play the most powerful and consistent decks that were dominating the scene. I loved this job, it was a surprisingly technical creative outlet and paid for the occasional treat meals at my favorite restaurant in St. Louis, Salt n Smoke. ...