Contribute to K8s docs

• 1: Suggesting content improvements
• 2: Contributing new content
• 2.1: Opening a pull request
• 2.2: Documenting a feature for a release
• 2.3: Submitting blog posts and case studies
• 3: Reviewing changes
• 3.1: Reviewing pull requests
• 3.2: Reviewing for approvers and reviewers
• 4: Localizing Kubernetes documentation
• 5: Participating in SIG Docs
• 5.1: Roles and responsibilities
• 5.2: PR wranglers
• 6: Documentation style overview
• 6.1: Documentation Content Guide
• 6.2: Documentation Style Guide
• 6.3: Diagram Guide
• 6.4: Writing a new topic
• 6.5: Page content types
• 6.6: Content organization
• 6.7: Custom Hugo Shortcodes
• 7: Reference Docs Overview
• 7.1: Contributing to the Upstream Kubernetes Code
• 7.2: Quickstart
• 7.3: Generating Reference Documentation for the Kubernetes API
• 7.4: Generating Reference Documentation for kubectl Commands
• 7.5: Generating Reference Pages for Kubernetes Components and Tools
• 7.6:
• 8: Advanced contributing
• 9: Viewing Site Analytics

1 - Suggesting content improvements

If you notice an issue with Kubernetes documentation or have an idea for new content, then open an issue. All you need is a GitHub account and a web browser.

In most cases, new work on Kubernetes documentation begins with an issue in GitHub. Kubernetes contributors then review, categorize and tag issues as needed. Next, you or another member of the Kubernetes community open a pull request with changes to resolve the issue.

Opening an issue

If you want to suggest improvements to existing content or notice an error, then open an issue.

1. Click the Create an issue link on the right sidebar. This redirects you to a GitHub issue page pre-populated with some headers.
2. Describe the issue or suggestion for improvement. Provide as many details as you can.
3. Click Submit new issue.

After submitting, check in on your issue occasionally or turn on GitHub notifications. Reviewers and other community members might ask questions before they can take action on your issue.

Suggesting new content

If you have an idea for new content, but you aren't sure where it should go, you can still file an issue. Either:

• Choose an existing page in the section you think the content belongs in and click Create an issue.
• Go to GitHub and file the issue directly.

How to file great issues

Keep the following in mind when filing an issue:

• Provide a clear issue description. Describe what specifically is missing, out of date, wrong, or needs improvement.
• Explain the specific impact the issue has on users.
• Limit the scope of a given issue to a reasonable unit of work. For problems with a large scope, break them down into smaller issues. For example, "Fix the security docs" is too broad, but "Add details to the 'Restricting network access' topic" is specific enough to be actionable.
• Search the existing issues to see if there's anything related or similar to the new issue.
• If the new issue relates to another issue or pull request, refer to it either by its full URL or by the issue or pull request number prefixed with a # character. For example, Introduced by #987654.
• Follow the Code of Conduct. Respect your fellow contributors. For example, "The docs are terrible" is not helpful or polite feedback.

2 - Contributing new content

This section contains information you should know before contributing new content.

Figure - Contributing new content preparation

The figure above depicts the information you should know prior to submitting new content. The information details follow.

Contributing basics

• Write Kubernetes documentation in Markdown and build the Kubernetes site using Hugo.
• Kubernetes documentation uses CommonMark as its flavor of Markdown.
• The source is in GitHub. You can find Kubernetes documentation at /content/en/docs/. Some of the reference documentation is automatically generated from scripts in the update-imported-docs/ directory.
• Page content types describe the presentation of documentation content in Hugo.
• You can use Docsy shortcodes or custom Hugo shortcodes to contribute to Kubernetes documentation.
• In addition to the standard Hugo shortcodes, we use a number of custom Hugo shortcodes in our documentation to control the presentation of content.
• Documentation source is available in multiple languages in /content/. Each language has its own folder with a two-letter code determined by the ISO 639-1 standard . For example, English documentation source is stored in /content/en/docs/.
• For more information about contributing to documentation in multiple languages or starting a new translation, see localization.

Before you begin

Sign the CNCF CLA

All Kubernetes contributors must read the Contributor guide and sign the Contributor License Agreement (CLA) .

Pull requests from contributors who haven't signed the CLA fail the automated tests. The name and email you provide must match those found in your git config, and your git name and email must match those used for the CNCF CLA.

Choose which Git branch to use

When opening a pull request, you need to know in advance which branch to base your work on.

If you're still not sure which branch to choose, ask in #sig-docs on Slack.

Languages per PR

Limit pull requests to one language per PR. If you need to make an identical change to the same code sample in multiple languages, open a separate PR for each language.

Tools for contributors

The doc contributors tools directory in the kubernetes/website repository contains tools to help your contribution journey go more smoothly.

2.1 - Opening a pull request

To contribute new content pages or improve existing content pages, open a pull request (PR). Make sure you follow all the requirements in the Before you begin section.

If your change is small, or you're unfamiliar with git, read Changes using GitHub to learn how to edit a page.

If your changes are large, read Work from a local fork to learn how to make changes locally on your computer.

Changes using GitHub

If you're less experienced with git workflows, here's an easier method of opening a pull request. The figure below outlines the steps and the details follow.

Figure - Steps for opening a PR using GitHub

1. On the page where you see the issue, select the pencil icon at the top right. You can also scroll to the bottom of the page and select Edit this page.

2. Make your changes in the GitHub markdown editor.

3. Below the editor, fill in the Propose file change form. In the first field, give your commit message a title. In the second field, provide a description.

   Note: Do not use any GitHub Keywords in your commit message. You can add those to the pull request description later.

4. Select Propose file change.

5. Select Create pull request.

6. The Open a pull request screen appears. Fill in the form:

   • The Subject field of the pull request defaults to the commit summary. You can change it if needed.
   • The Body contains your extended commit message, if you have one, and some template text. Add the details the template text asks for, then delete the extra template text.
   • Leave the Allow edits from maintainers checkbox selected.
   Note: PR descriptions are a great way to help reviewers understand your change. For more information, see Opening a PR.

7. Select Create pull request.

Addressing feedback in GitHub

Before merging a pull request, Kubernetes community members review and approve it. The k8s-ci-robot suggests reviewers based on the nearest owner mentioned in the pages. If you have someone specific in mind, leave a comment with their GitHub username in it.

If a reviewer asks you to make changes:

1. Go to the Files changed tab.
2. Select the pencil (edit) icon on any files changed by the pull request.
3. Make the changes requested.
4. Commit the changes.

If you are waiting on a reviewer, reach out once every 7 days. You can also post a message in the #sig-docs Slack channel.

When your review is complete, a reviewer merges your PR and your changes go live a few minutes later.

Work from a local fork

If you're more experienced with git, or if your changes are larger than a few lines, work from a local fork.

Make sure you have git installed on your computer. You can also use a git UI application.

The figure below shows the steps to follow when you work from a local fork. The details for each step follow.

Fork the kubernetes/website repository

1. Navigate to the kubernetes/website repository.
2. Select Fork.

Create a local clone and set the upstream

3. In a terminal window, clone your fork and update the Docsy Hugo theme:

   git clone git@github.com/<github_username>/website
   cd website
   git submodule update --init --recursive --depth 1
   

4. Navigate to the new website directory. Set the kubernetes/website repository as the upstream remote:

   cd website
   
   git remote add upstream https://github.com/kubernetes/website.git
   

5. Confirm your origin and upstream repositories:

   git remote -v
   

   Output is similar to:

   origin	git@github.com:<github_username>/website.git (fetch)
   origin	git@github.com:<github_username>/website.git (push)
   upstream	https://github.com/kubernetes/website.git (fetch)
   upstream	https://github.com/kubernetes/website.git (push)
   

6. Fetch commits from your fork's origin/main and kubernetes/website's upstream/main:

   git fetch origin
   git fetch upstream
   

   This makes sure your local repository is up to date before you start making changes.

   Note: This workflow is different than the Kubernetes Community GitHub Workflow. You do not need to merge your local copy of main with upstream/main before pushing updates to your fork.

Create a branch

1. Decide which branch base to your work on:

• For improvements to existing content, use upstream/main.

• For new content about existing features, use upstream/main.

• For localized content, use the localization's conventions. For more information, see localizing Kubernetes documentation.

• For new features in an upcoming Kubernetes release, use the feature branch. For more information, see documenting for a release.

• For long-running efforts that multiple SIG Docs contributors collaborate on, like content reorganization, use a specific feature branch created for that effort.

  If you need help choosing a branch, ask in the #sig-docs Slack channel.

2. Create a new branch based on the branch identified in step 1. This example assumes the base branch is upstream/main:

   git checkout -b <my_new_branch> upstream/main
   

3. Make your changes using a text editor.

At any time, use the git status command to see what files you've changed.

Commit your changes

When you are ready to submit a pull request, commit your changes.

1. In your local repository, check which files you need to commit:

   git status
   

   Output is similar to:

   On branch <my_new_branch>
   Your branch is up to date with 'origin/<my_new_branch>'.
   
   Changes not staged for commit:
   (use "git add <file>..." to update what will be committed)
   (use "git checkout -- <file>..." to discard changes in working directory)
   
   modified:   content/en/docs/contribute/new-content/contributing-content.md
   
   no changes added to commit (use "git add" and/or "git commit -a")
   

2. Add the files listed under Changes not staged for commit to the commit:

   git add <your_file_name>
   

   Repeat this for each file.

3. After adding all the files, create a commit:

   git commit -m "Your commit message"
   

   Note: Do not use any GitHub Keywords in your commit message. You can add those to the pull request description later.

4. Push your local branch and its new commit to your remote fork:

   git push origin <my_new_branch>
   

Preview your changes locally

It's a good idea to preview your changes locally before pushing them or opening a pull request. A preview lets you catch build errors or markdown formatting problems.

You can either build the website's container image or run Hugo locally. Building the container image is slower but displays Hugo shortcodes, which can be useful for debugging.

• Hugo in a container
• Hugo on the command line

Open a pull request from your fork to kubernetes/website

The figure below shows the steps to open a PR from your fork to the K8s/website. The details follow.

1. In a web browser, go to the kubernetes/website repository.

2. Select New Pull Request.

3. Select compare across forks.

4. From the head repository drop-down menu, select your fork.

5. From the compare drop-down menu, select your branch.

6. Select Create Pull Request.

7. Add a description for your pull request:

   • Title (50 characters or less): Summarize the intent of the change.
   • Description: Describe the change in more detail.
     • If there is a related GitHub issue, include Fixes #12345 or Closes #12345 in the description. GitHub's automation closes the mentioned issue after merging the PR if used. If there are other related PRs, link those as well.
     • If you want advice on something specific, include any questions you'd like reviewers to think about in your description.

8. Select the Create pull request button.

Congratulations! Your pull request is available in Pull requests.

After opening a PR, GitHub runs automated tests and tries to deploy a preview using Netlify.

• If the Netlify build fails, select Details for more information.
• If the Netlify build succeeds, select Details opens a staged version of the Kubernetes website with your changes applied. This is how reviewers check your changes.

GitHub also automatically assigns labels to a PR, to help reviewers. You can add them too, if needed. For more information, see Adding and removing issue labels.

Addressing feedback locally

1. After making your changes, amend your previous commit:

   git commit -a --amend
   

   • -a: commits all changes
   • --amend: amends the previous commit, rather than creating a new one

2. Update your commit message if needed.

3. Use git push origin <my_new_branch> to push your changes and re-run the Netlify tests.

   Note: If you use git commit -m instead of amending, you must squash your commits before merging.

Changes from reviewers

Sometimes reviewers commit to your pull request. Before making any other changes, fetch those commits.

1. Fetch commits from your remote fork and rebase your working branch:

   git fetch origin
   git rebase origin/<your-branch-name>
   

2. After rebasing, force-push new changes to your fork:

   git push --force-with-lease origin <your-branch-name>
   

Merge conflicts and rebasing

If another contributor commits changes to the same file in another PR, it can create a merge conflict. You must resolve all merge conflicts in your PR.

1. Update your fork and rebase your local branch:

   git fetch origin
   git rebase origin/<your-branch-name>
   

   Then force-push the changes to your fork:

   git push --force-with-lease origin <your-branch-name>
   

2. Fetch changes from kubernetes/website's upstream/main and rebase your branch:

   git fetch upstream
   git rebase upstream/main
   

3. Inspect the results of the rebase:

   git status
   

This results in a number of files marked as conflicted.

4. Open each conflicted file and look for the conflict markers: >>>, <<<, and ===. Resolve the conflict and delete the conflict marker.

   Note: For more information, see How conflicts are presented.

5. Add the files to the changeset:

   git add <filename>
   

6. Continue the rebase:

   git rebase --continue
   

7. Repeat steps 2 to 5 as needed.

   After applying all commits, the git status command shows that the rebase is complete.

8. Force-push the branch to your fork:

   git push --force-with-lease origin <your-branch-name>
   

   The pull request no longer shows any conflicts.

Squashing commits

If your PR has multiple commits, you must squash them into a single commit before merging your PR. You can check the number of commits on your PR's Commits tab or by running the git log command locally.

1. Start an interactive rebase:

   git rebase -i HEAD~<number_of_commits_in_branch>
   

   Squashing commits is a form of rebasing. The -i switch tells git you want to rebase interactively. HEAD~<number_of_commits_in_branch indicates how many commits to look at for the rebase.

   Output is similar to:

   pick d875112ca Original commit
   pick 4fa167b80 Address feedback 1
   pick 7d54e15ee Address feedback 2
   
   # Rebase 3d18sf680..7d54e15ee onto 3d183f680 (3 commands)
   
   ...
   
   # These lines can be re-ordered; they are executed from top to bottom.
   

   The first section of the output lists the commits in the rebase. The second section lists the options for each commit. Changing the word pick changes the status of the commit once the rebase is complete.

   For the purposes of rebasing, focus on squash and pick.

   Note: For more information, see Interactive Mode.

2. Start editing the file.

   Change the original text:

   pick d875112ca Original commit
   pick 4fa167b80 Address feedback 1
   pick 7d54e15ee Address feedback 2
   

   To:

   pick d875112ca Original commit
   squash 4fa167b80 Address feedback 1
   squash 7d54e15ee Address feedback 2
   

   This squashes commits 4fa167b80 Address feedback 1 and 7d54e15ee Address feedback 2 into d875112ca Original commit, leaving only d875112ca Original commit as a part of the timeline.

3. Save and exit your file.

4. Push your squashed commit:

   git push --force-with-lease origin <branch_name>
   

Contribute to other repos

The Kubernetes project contains 50+ repositories. Many of these repositories contain documentation: user-facing help text, error messages, API references or code comments.

If you see text you'd like to improve, use GitHub to search all repositories in the Kubernetes organization. This can help you figure out where to submit your issue or PR.

Each repository has its own processes and procedures. Before you file an issue or submit a PR, read that repository's README.md, CONTRIBUTING.md, and code-of-conduct.md, if they exist.

Most repositories use issue and PR templates. Have a look through some open issues and PRs to get a feel for that team's processes. Make sure to fill out the templates with as much detail as possible when you file issues or PRs.

What's next

• Read Reviewing to learn more about the review process.

2.2 - Documenting a feature for a release

Each major Kubernetes release introduces new features that require documentation. New releases also bring updates to existing features and documentation (such as upgrading a feature from alpha to beta).

Generally, the SIG responsible for a feature submits draft documentation of the feature as a pull request to the appropriate development branch of the kubernetes/website repository, and someone on the SIG Docs team provides editorial feedback or edits the draft directly. This section covers the branching conventions and process used during a release by both groups.

For documentation contributors

In general, documentation contributors don't write content from scratch for a release. Instead, they work with the SIG creating a new feature to refine the draft documentation and make it release ready.

After you've chosen a feature to document or assist, ask about it in the #sig-docs Slack channel, in a weekly SIG Docs meeting, or directly on the PR filed by the feature SIG. If you're given the go-ahead, you can edit into the PR using one of the techniques described in Commit into another person's PR.

Find out about upcoming features

To find out about upcoming features, attend the weekly SIG Release meeting (see the community page for upcoming meetings) and monitor the release-specific documentation in the kubernetes/sig-release repository. Each release has a sub-directory in the /sig-release/tree/master/releases/ directory. The sub-directory contains a release schedule, a draft of the release notes, and a document listing each person on the release team.

The release schedule contains links to all other documents, meetings, meeting minutes, and milestones relating to the release. It also contains information about the goals and timeline of the release, and any special processes in place for this release. Near the bottom of the document, several release-related terms are defined.

This document also contains a link to the Feature tracking sheet, which is the official way to find out about all new features scheduled to go into the release.

The release team document lists who is responsible for each release role. If it's not clear who to talk to about a specific feature or question you have, either attend the release meeting to ask your question, or contact the release lead so that they can redirect you.

The release notes draft is a good place to find out about specific features, changes, deprecations, and more about the release. The content is not finalized until late in the release cycle, so use caution.

Feature tracking sheet

The feature tracking sheet for a given Kubernetes release lists each feature that is planned for a release. Each line item includes the name of the feature, a link to the feature's main GitHub issue, its stability level (Alpha, Beta, or Stable), the SIG and individual responsible for implementing it, whether it needs docs, a draft release note for the feature, and whether it has been merged. Keep the following in mind:

• Beta and Stable features are generally a higher documentation priority than Alpha features.
• It's hard to test (and therefore to document) a feature that hasn't been merged, or is at least considered feature-complete in its PR.
• Determining whether a feature needs documentation is a manual process. Even if a feature is not marked as needing docs, you may need to document the feature.

For developers or other SIG members

This section is information for members of other Kubernetes SIGs documenting new features for a release.

If you are a member of a SIG developing a new feature for Kubernetes, you need to work with SIG Docs to be sure your feature is documented in time for the release. Check the feature tracking spreadsheet or check in the #sig-release Kubernetes Slack channel to verify scheduling details and deadlines.

Open a placeholder PR

1. Open a draft pull request against the dev-1.24 branch in the kubernetes/website repository, with a small commit that you will amend later. To create a draft pull request, use the Create Pull Request drop-down and select Create Draft Pull Request, then click Draft Pull Request.
2. Edit the pull request description to include links to kubernetes/kubernetes PR(s) and kubernetes/enhancements issue(s).
3. Leave a comment on the related kubernetes/enhancements issue with a link to the PR to notify the docs person managing this release that the feature docs are coming and should be tracked for the release.

If your feature does not need any documentation changes, make sure the sig-release team knows this, by mentioning it in the #sig-release Slack channel. If the feature does need documentation but the PR is not created, the feature may be removed from the milestone.

PR ready for review

When ready, populate your placeholder PR with feature documentation and change the state of the PR from draft to ready for review. To mark a pull request as ready for review, navigate to the merge box and click Ready for review.

Do your best to describe your feature and how to use it. If you need help structuring your documentation, ask in the #sig-docs slack channel.

When you complete your content, the documentation person assigned to your feature reviews it. To ensure technical accuracy, the content may also require a technical review from corresponding SIG(s). Use their suggestions to get the content to a release ready state.

If your feature is an Alpha or Beta feature and is behind a feature gate, make sure you add it to Alpha/Beta Feature gates table as part of your pull request. With new feature gates, a description of the feature gate is also required. If your feature is GA'ed or deprecated, make sure to move it from that table to Feature gates for graduated or deprecated features table with Alpha and Beta history intact.

If your feature needs documentation and the first draft content is not received, the feature may be removed from the milestone.

All PRs reviewed and ready to merge

If your PR has not yet been merged into the dev-1.24 branch by the release deadline, work with the docs person managing the release to get it in by the deadline. If your feature needs documentation and the docs are not ready, the feature may be removed from the milestone.

2.3 - Submitting blog posts and case studies

Anyone can write a blog post and submit it for review. Case studies require extensive review before they're approved.

The Kubernetes Blog

The Kubernetes blog is used by the project to communicate new features, community reports, and any news that might be relevant to the Kubernetes community. This includes end users and developers. Most of the blog's content is about things happening in the core project, but we encourage you to submit about things happening elsewhere in the ecosystem too!

Anyone can write a blog post and submit it for review.

Guidelines and expectations

• Blog posts should not be vendor pitches.
  • Articles must contain content that applies broadly to the Kubernetes community. For example, a submission should focus on upstream Kubernetes as opposed to vendor-specific configurations. Check the Documentation style guide for what is typically allowed on Kubernetes properties.
  • Links should primarily be to the official Kubernetes documentation. When using external references, links should be diverse - For example a submission shouldn't contain only links back to a single company's blog.
  • Sometimes this is a delicate balance. The blog team is there to give guidance on whether a post is appropriate for the Kubernetes blog, so don't hesitate to reach out.
• Blog posts are not published on specific dates.
  • Articles are reviewed by community volunteers. We'll try our best to accommodate specific timing, but we make no guarantees.
  • Many core parts of the Kubernetes projects submit blog posts during release windows, delaying publication times. Consider submitting during a quieter period of the release cycle.
  • If you are looking for greater coordination on post release dates, coordinating with CNCF marketing is a more appropriate choice than submitting a blog post.
  • Sometimes reviews can get backed up. If you feel your review isn't getting the attention it needs, you can reach out to the blog team via this slack channel to ask in real time.
• Blog posts should be relevant to Kubernetes users.
  • Topics related to participation in or results of Kubernetes SIGs activities are always on topic (see the work in the Upstream Marketing Team for support on these posts).
  • The components of Kubernetes are purposely modular, so tools that use existing integration points like CNI and CSI are on topic.
  • Posts about other CNCF projects may or may not be on topic. We recommend asking the blog team before submitting a draft.
    • Many CNCF projects have their own blog. These are often a better choice for posts. There are times of major feature or milestone for a CNCF project that users would be interested in reading on the Kubernetes blog.
  • Blog posts about contributing to the Kubernetes project should be in the Kubernetes Contributors site
• Blog posts should be original content
  • The official blog is not for repurposing existing content from a third party as new content.
  • The license for the blog allows commercial use of the content for commercial purposes, but not the other way around.
• Blog posts should aim to be future proof
  • Given the development velocity of the project, we want evergreen content that won't require updates to stay accurate for the reader.
  • It can be a better choice to add a tutorial or update official documentation than to write a high level overview as a blog post.
    • Consider concentrating the long technical content as a call to action of the blog post, and focus on the problem space or why readers should care.

Technical Considerations for submitting a blog post

Submissions need to be in Markdown format to be used by the Hugo generator for the blog. There are many resources available on how to use this technology stack.

We recognize that this requirement makes the process more difficult for less-familiar folks to submit, and we're constantly looking at solutions to lower this bar. If you have ideas on how to lower the barrier, please volunteer to help out.

The SIG Docs blog subproject manages the review process for blog posts. For more information, see Submit a post.

To submit a blog post follow these directions:

• Open a pull request with a new blog post. New blog posts go under the content/en/blog/_posts directory.

• Ensure that your blog post follows the correct naming conventions and the following frontmatter (metadata) information:

  • The Markdown file name must follow the format YYYY-MM-DD-Your-Title-Here.md. For example, 2020-02-07-Deploying-External-OpenStack-Cloud-Provider-With-Kubeadm.md.
  • Do not include dots in the filename. A name like 2020-01-01-whats-new-in-1.19.md causes failures during a build.
  • The front matter must include the following:

  ---
  layout: blog
  title: "Your Title Here"
  date: YYYY-MM-DD
  slug: text-for-URL-link-here-no-spaces
  ---
  

  • The first or initial commit message should be a short summary of the work being done and should stand alone as a description of the blog post. Please note that subsequent edits to your blog will be squashed into this main commit, so it should be as useful as possible.
    • Examples of a good commit message:
      • Add blog post on the foo kubernetes feature
      • blog: foobar announcement
    • Examples of bad commit message:
      • Add blog post
      • .
      • initial commit
      • draft post
  • The blog team will then review your PR and give you comments on things you might need to fix. After that the bot will merge your PR and your blog post will be published.

Submit a case study

Case studies highlight how organizations are using Kubernetes to solve real-world problems. The Kubernetes marketing team and members of the CNCF collaborate with you on all case studies.

Have a look at the source for the existing case studies.

Refer to the case study guidelines and submit your request as outlined in the guidelines.

3 - Reviewing changes

This section describes how to review content.

3.1 - Reviewing pull requests

Anyone can review a documentation pull request. Visit the pull requests section in the Kubernetes website repository to see open pull requests.

Reviewing documentation pull requests is a great way to introduce yourself to the Kubernetes community. It helps you learn the code base and build trust with other contributors.

Before reviewing, it's a good idea to:

• Read the content guide and style guide so you can leave informed comments.
• Understand the different roles and responsibilities in the Kubernetes documentation community.

Before you begin

Before you start a review:

• Read the CNCF Code of Conduct and ensure that you abide by it at all times.
• Be polite, considerate, and helpful.
• Comment on positive aspects of PRs as well as changes.
• Be empathetic and mindful of how your review may be received.
• Assume good intent and ask clarifying questions.
• Experienced contributors, consider pairing with new contributors whose work requires extensive changes.

Review process

In general, review pull requests for content and style in English. The figure below outlines the steps for the review process. The details for each step follow.

Figure - Review process steps

1. Go to https://github.com/kubernetes/website/pulls. You see a list of every open pull request against the Kubernetes website and docs.

2. Filter the open PRs using one or all of the following labels:

   • cncf-cla: yes (Recommended): PRs submitted by contributors who have not signed the CLA cannot be merged. See Sign the CLA for more information.
   • language/en (Recommended): Filters for english language PRs only.
   • size/<size>: filters for PRs of a certain size. If you're new, start with smaller PRs.

   Additionally, ensure the PR isn't marked as a work in progress. PRs using the work in progress label are not ready for review yet.

3. Once you've selected a PR to review, understand the change by:

   • Reading the PR description to understand the changes made, and read any linked issues
   • Reading any comments by other reviewers
   • Clicking the Files changed tab to see the files and lines changed
   • Previewing the changes in the Netlify preview build by scrolling to the PR's build check section at the bottom of the Conversation tab. Here's a screenshot (this shows GitHub's desktop site; if you're reviewing on a tablet or smartphone device, the GitHub web UI is slightly different):

     

     To open the preview, click on the Details link of the deploy/netlify line in the list of checks.

4. Go to the Files changed tab to start your review.

   1. Click on the + symbol beside the line you want to comment on.
   2. Fill in any comments you have about the line and click either Add single comment (if you have only one comment to make) or Start a review (if you have multiple comments to make).
   3. When finished, click Review changes at the top of the page. Here, you can add add a summary of your review (and leave some positive comments for the contributor!), approve the PR, comment or request changes as needed. New contributors should always choose Comment.

Reviewing checklist

When reviewing, use the following as a starting point.

Language and grammar

• Are there any obvious errors in language or grammar? Is there a better way to phrase something?
• Are there any complicated or archaic words which could be replaced with a simpler word?
• Are there any words, terms or phrases in use which could be replaced with a non-discriminatory alternative?
• Does the word choice and its capitalization follow the style guide?
• Are there long sentences which could be shorter or less complex?
• Are there any long paragraphs which might work better as a list or table?

Content

• Does similar content exist elsewhere on the Kubernetes site?
• Does the content excessively link to off-site, individual vendor or non-open source documentation?

Website

• Did this PR change or remove a page title, slug/alias or anchor link? If so, are there broken links as a result of this PR? Is there another option, like changing the page title without changing the slug?
• Does the PR introduce a new page? If so:
  • Is the page using the right page content type and associated Hugo shortcodes?
  • Does the page appear correctly in the section's side navigation (or at all)?
  • Should the page appear on the Docs Home listing?
• Do the changes show up in the Netlify preview? Be particularly vigilant about lists, code blocks, tables, notes and images.

Other

For small issues with a PR, like typos or whitespace, prefix your comments with nit:. This lets the author know the issue is non-critical.

3.2 - Reviewing for approvers and reviewers

SIG Docs Reviewers and Approvers do a few extra things when reviewing a change.

Every week a specific docs approver volunteers to triage and review pull requests. This person is the "PR Wrangler" for the week. See the PR Wrangler scheduler for more information. To become a PR Wrangler, attend the weekly SIG Docs meeting and volunteer. Even if you are not on the schedule for the current week, you can still review pull requests (PRs) that are not already under active review.

In addition to the rotation, a bot assigns reviewers and approvers for the PR based on the owners for the affected files.

Reviewing a PR

Kubernetes documentation follows the Kubernetes code review process.

Everything described in Reviewing a pull request applies, but Reviewers and Approvers should also do the following:

• Using the /assign Prow command to assign a specific reviewer to a PR as needed. This is extra important when it comes to requesting technical review from code contributors.

  Note: Look at the reviewers field in the front-matter at the top of a Markdown file to see who can provide technical review.

• Making sure the PR follows the Content and Style guides; link the author to the relevant part of the guide(s) if it doesn't.

• Using the GitHub Request Changes option when applicable to suggest changes to the PR author.

• Changing your review status in GitHub using the /approve or /lgtm Prow commands, if your suggestions are implemented.

Commit into another person's PR

Leaving PR comments is helpful, but there might be times when you need to commit into another person's PR instead.

Do not "take over" for another person unless they explicitly ask you to, or you want to resurrect a long-abandoned PR. While it may be faster in the short term, it deprives the person of the chance to contribute.

The process you use depends on whether you need to edit a file that is already in the scope of the PR, or a file that the PR has not yet touched.

You can't commit into someone else's PR if either of the following things is true:

• If the PR author pushed their branch directly to the https://github.com/kubernetes/website/ repository. Only a reviewer with push access can commit to another user's PR.

  Note: Encourage the author to push their branch to their fork before opening the PR next time.

• The PR author explicitly disallows edits from approvers.

Prow commands for reviewing

Prow is the Kubernetes-based CI/CD system that runs jobs against pull requests (PRs). Prow enables chatbot-style commands to handle GitHub actions across the Kubernetes organization, like adding and removing labels, closing issues, and assigning an approver. Enter Prow commands as GitHub comments using the /<command-name> format.

The most common prow commands reviewers and approvers use are:

See the Prow command reference to see the full list of commands you can use in a PR.

Triage and categorize issues

In general, SIG Docs follows the Kubernetes issue triage process and uses the same labels.

This GitHub Issue filter finds issues that might need triage.

Triaging an issue

1. Validate the issue

• Make sure the issue is about website documentation. Some issues can be closed quickly by answering a question or pointing the reporter to a resource. See the Support requests or code bug reports section for details.
• Assess whether the issue has merit.
• Add the triage/needs-information label if the issue doesn't have enough detail to be actionable or the template is not filled out adequately.
• Close the issue if it has both the lifecycle/stale and triage/needs-information labels.

2. Add a priority label (the Issue Triage Guidelines define priority labels in detail)

At your discretion, take ownership of an issue and submit a PR for it (especially if it's quick or relates to work you're already doing).

If you have questions about triaging an issue, ask in #sig-docs on Slack or the kubernetes-sig-docs mailing list.

Adding and removing issue labels

To add a label, leave a comment in one of the following formats:

• /<label-to-add> (for example, /good-first-issue)
• /<label-category> <label-to-add> (for example, /triage needs-information or /language ja)

To remove a label, leave a comment in one of the following formats:

• /remove-<label-to-remove> (for example, /remove-help)
• /remove-<label-category> <label-to-remove> (for example, /remove-triage needs-information)`

In both cases, the label must already exist. If you try to add a label that does not exist, the command is silently ignored.

For a list of all labels, see the website repository's Labels section. Not all labels are used by SIG Docs.

Issue lifecycle labels

Issues are generally opened and closed quickly. However, sometimes an issue is inactive after its opened. Other times, an issue may need to remain open for longer than 90 days.

Handling special issue types

SIG Docs encounters the following types of issues often enough to document how to handle them.

Duplicate issues

If a single problem has one or more issues open for it, combine them into a single issue. You should decide which issue to keep open (or open a new issue), then move over all relevant information and link related issues. Finally, label all other issues that describe the same problem with triage/duplicate and close them. Only having a single issue to work on reduces confusion and avoids duplicate work on the same problem.

Dead link issues

If the dead link issue is in the API or kubectl documentation, assign them /priority critical-urgent until the problem is fully understood. Assign all other dead link issues /priority important-longterm, as they must be manually fixed.

Blog issues

We expect Kubernetes Blog entries to become outdated over time. Therefore, we only maintain blog entries less than a year old. If an issue is related to a blog entry that is more than one year old, close the issue without fixing.

Support requests or code bug reports

Some docs issues are actually issues with the underlying code, or requests for assistance when something, for example a tutorial, doesn't work. For issues unrelated to docs, close the issue with the kind/support label and a comment directing the requester to support venues (Slack, Stack Overflow) and, if relevant, the repository to file an issue for bugs with features (kubernetes/kubernetes is a great place to start).

Sample response to a request for support:

This issue sounds more like a request for support and less
like an issue specifically for docs. I encourage you to bring
your question to the `#kubernetes-users` channel in
[Kubernetes slack](https://slack.k8s.io/). You can also search
resources like
[Stack Overflow](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/kubernetes)
for answers to similar questions.

You can also open issues for Kubernetes functionality in
https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes.

If this is a documentation issue, please re-open this issue.

Sample code bug report response:

This sounds more like an issue with the code than an issue with
the documentation. Please open an issue at
https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/issues.

If this is a documentation issue, please re-open this issue.

4 - Localizing Kubernetes documentation

This page shows you how to localize the docs for a different language.

Contribute to an existing localization

You can help add or improve content to an existing localization. In Kubernetes Slack you'll find a channel for each localization. There is also a general SIG Docs Localizations Slack channel where you can say hello.

Find your two-letter language code

First, consult the ISO 639-1 standard to find your localization's two-letter language code. For example, the two-letter code for Korean is ko.

Fork and clone the repo

First, create your own fork of the kubernetes/website repository.

Then, clone your fork and cd into it:

git clone https://github.com/<username>/website
cd website

The website content directory includes sub-directories for each language. The localization you want to help out with is inside content/<two-letter-code>.

Suggest changes

Create or update your chosen localized page based on the English original. See translating content for more details.

If you notice a technical inaccuracy or other problem with the upstream (English) documentation, you should fix the upstream documentation first and then repeat the equivalent fix by updating the localization you're working on.

Please limit pull requests to a single localization, since pull requests that change content in multiple localizations could be difficult to review.

Follow Suggesting Content Improvements to propose changes to that localization. The process is very similar to proposing changes to the upstream (English) content.

Start a new localization

If you want the Kubernetes documentation localized into a new language, here's what you need to do.

Because contributors can't approve their own pull requests, you need at least two contributors to begin a localization.

All localization teams must be self-sustaining. The Kubernetes website is happy to host your work, but it's up to you to translate it and keep existing localized content current.

You'll need to know the two-letter language code for your language. Consult the ISO 639-1 standard to find your localization's two-letter language code. For example, the two-letter code for Korean is ko.

When you start a new localization, you must localize all the minimum required content before the Kubernetes project can publish your changes to the live website.

SIG Docs can help you work on a separate branch so that you can incrementally work towards that goal.

Find community

Let Kubernetes SIG Docs know you're interested in creating a localization! Join the SIG Docs Slack channel and the SIG Docs Localizations Slack channel. Other localization teams are happy to help you get started and answer any questions you have.

Please also consider participating in the SIG Docs Localization Subgroup meeting. The mission of the SIG Docs localization subgroup is to work across the SIG Docs localization teams to collaborate on defining and documenting the processes for creating localized contribution guides. In addition, the SIG Docs localization subgroup will look for opportunities for the creation and sharing of common tools across localization teams and also serve to identify new requirements to the SIG Docs Leadership team. If you have questions about this meeting, please inquire on the SIG Docs Localizations Slack channel.

You can also create a Slack channel for your localization in the kubernetes/community repository. For an example of adding a Slack channel, see the PR for adding a channel for Persian.

Join the Kubernetes GitHub organization

Once you've opened a localization PR, you can become members of the Kubernetes GitHub organization. Each person on the team needs to create their own Organization Membership Request in the kubernetes/org repository.

Add your localization team in GitHub

Next, add your Kubernetes localization team to sig-docs/teams.yaml. For an example of adding a localization team, see the PR to add the Spanish localization team.

Members of @kubernetes/sig-docs-**-owners can approve PRs that change content within (and only within) your localization directory: /content/**/.

For each localization, The @kubernetes/sig-docs-**-reviews team automates review assignment for new PRs.

Members of @kubernetes/website-maintainers can create new localization branches to coordinate translation efforts.

Members of @kubernetes/website-milestone-maintainers can use the /milestone Prow command to assign a milestone to issues or PRs.

Configure the workflow

Next, add a GitHub label for your localization in the kubernetes/test-infra repository. A label lets you filter issues and pull requests for your specific language.

For an example of adding a label, see the PR for adding the Italian language label.

Modify the site configuration

The Kubernetes website uses Hugo as its web framework. The website's Hugo configuration resides in the config.toml file. To support a new localization, you'll need to modify config.toml.

Add a configuration block for the new language to config.toml, under the existing [languages] block. The German block, for example, looks like:

[languages.de]
title = "Kubernetes"
description = "Produktionsreife Container-Verwaltung"
languageName = "Deutsch"
contentDir = "content/de"
weight = 3

When assigning a weight parameter for your block, find the language block with the highest weight and add 1 to that value.

For more information about Hugo's multilingual support, see "Multilingual Mode".

Add a new localization directory

Add a language-specific subdirectory to the content folder in the repository. For example, the two-letter code for German is de:

mkdir content/de

You also need to create a directory inside data/i18n for localized strings; look at existing localizations for an example. To use these new strings, you must also create a symbolic link from i18n/<localization>.toml to the actual string configuration in data/i18n/<localization>/<localization>.toml (remember to commit the symbolic link).

For example, for German the strings live in data/i18n/de/de.toml, and i18n/de.toml is a symbolic link to data/i18n/de/de.toml.

Localize the community code of conduct

Open a PR against the cncf/foundation repository to add the code of conduct in your language.

Setting up the OWNERS files

To set the roles of each user contributing to the localization, create an OWNERS file inside the language-specific subdirectory with:

• reviewers: A list of kubernetes teams with reviewer roles, in this case, the sig-docs-**-reviews team created in Add your localization team in GitHub.
• approvers: A list of kubernetes teams with approvers roles, in this case, the sig-docs-**-owners team created in Add your localization team in GitHub.
• labels: A list of GitHub labels to automatically apply to a PR, in this case, the language label created in Configure the workflow.

More information about the OWNERS file can be found at go.k8s.io/owners.

The Spanish OWNERS file, with language code es, looks like:

# See the OWNERS docs at https://go.k8s.io/owners

# This is the localization project for Spanish.
# Teams and members are visible at https://github.com/orgs/kubernetes/teams.

reviewers:
- sig-docs-es-reviews

approvers:
- sig-docs-es-owners

labels:
- language/es

After adding the language-specific OWNERS file, update the root OWNERS_ALIASES file with the new Kubernetes teams for the localization, sig-docs-**-owners and sig-docs-**-reviews.

For each team, add the list of GitHub users requested in Add your localization team in GitHub, in alphabetical order.

--- a/OWNERS_ALIASES
+++ b/OWNERS_ALIASES
@@ -48,6 +48,14 @@ aliases:
     - stewart-yu
     - xiangpengzhao
     - zhangxiaoyu-zidif
+  sig-docs-es-owners: # Admins for Spanish content
+    - alexbrand
+    - raelga
+  sig-docs-es-reviews: # PR reviews for Spanish content
+    - alexbrand
+    - electrocucaracha
+    - glo-pena
+    - raelga
   sig-docs-fr-owners: # Admins for French content
     - perriea
     - remyleone

Open a pull request

Next, open a pull request (PR) to add a localization to the kubernetes/website repository.

The PR must include all of the minimum required content before it can be approved.

For an example of adding a new localization, see the PR to enable docs in French.

Add a localized README file

To guide other localization contributors, add a new README-**.md to the top level of k/website, where ** is the two-letter language code. For example, a German README file would be README-de.md.

Provide guidance to localization contributors in the localized README-**.md file. Include the same information contained in README.md as well as:

• A point of contact for the localization project
• Any information specific to the localization

After you create the localized README, add a link to the file from the main English README.md, and include contact information in English. You can provide a GitHub ID, email address, Slack channel, or other method of contact. You must also provide a link to your localized Community Code of Conduct.

Launching your new localization

Once a localization meets requirements for workflow and minimum output, SIG Docs will:

• Enable language selection on the website
• Publicize the localization's availability through Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) channels, including the Kubernetes blog.

Translating content

Localizing all of the Kubernetes documentation is an enormous task. It's okay to start small and expand over time.

Minimum required content

At a minimum, all localizations must include:

Translated documents must reside in their own content/**/ subdirectory, but otherwise follow the same URL path as the English source. For example, to prepare the Kubernetes Basics tutorial for translation into German, create a subfolder under the content/de/ folder and copy the English source:

mkdir -p content/de/docs/tutorials
cp content/en/docs/tutorials/kubernetes-basics.md content/de/docs/tutorials/kubernetes-basics.md

Translation tools can speed up the translation process. For example, some editors offers plugins to quickly translate text.

To ensure accuracy in grammar and meaning, members of your localization team should carefully review all machine-generated translations before publishing.

Source files

Localizations must be based on the English files from a specific release targeted by the localization team. Each localization team can decide which release to target which is referred to as the target version below.

To find source files for your target version:

1. Navigate to the Kubernetes website repository at https://github.com/kubernetes/website.
2. Select a branch for your target version from the following table:

   Target version	Branch
   Latest version	main
   Previous version	release-1.22
   Next version	dev-1.24

The main branch holds content for the current release v1.23. The release team will create a release-1.23 branch before the next release: v1.24.

Site strings in i18n

Localizations must include the contents of data/i18n/en/en.toml in a new language-specific file. Using German as an example: data/i18n/de/de.toml.

Add a new localization directory and file to data/i18n/. For example, with German (de):

mkdir -p data/i18n/de
cp data/i18n/en/en.toml data/i18n/de/de.toml

Revise the comments at the top of the file to suit your localization, then translate the value of each string. For example, this is the German-language placeholder text for the search form:

[ui_search_placeholder]
other = "Suchen"

Localizing site strings lets you customize site-wide text and features: for example, the legal copyright text in the footer on each page.

Language specific style guide and glossary

Some language teams have their own language-specific style guide and glossary. For example, see the Korean Localization Guide.

Language specific Zoom meetings

If the localization project needs a separate meeting time, contact a SIG Docs Co-Chair or Tech Lead to create a new reoccurring Zoom meeting and calendar invite. This is only needed when the the team is large enough to sustain and require a separate meeting.

Per CNCF policy, the localization teams must upload their meetings to the SIG Docs YouTube playlist. A SIG Docs Co-Chair or Tech Lead can help with the process until SIG Docs automates it.

Branching strategy

Because localization projects are highly collaborative efforts, we encourage teams to work in shared localization branches - especially when starting out and the localization is not yet live.

To collaborate on a localization branch:

1. A team member of @kubernetes/website-maintainers opens a localization branch from a source branch on https://github.com/kubernetes/website.

   Your team approvers joined the @kubernetes/website-maintainers team when you added your localization team to the kubernetes/org repository.

   We recommend the following branch naming scheme:

   dev-<source version>-<language code>.<team milestone>

   For example, an approver on a German localization team opens the localization branch dev-1.12-de.1 directly against the k/website repository, based on the source branch for Kubernetes v1.12.

2. Individual contributors open feature branches based on the localization branch.

   For example, a German contributor opens a pull request with changes to kubernetes:dev-1.12-de.1 from username:local-branch-name.

3. Approvers review and merge feature branches into the localization branch.

4. Periodically, an approver merges the localization branch to its source branch by opening and approving a new pull request. Be sure to squash the commits before approving the pull request.

Repeat steps 1-4 as needed until the localization is complete. For example, subsequent German localization branches would be: dev-1.12-de.2, dev-1.12-de.3, etc.

Teams must merge localized content into the same branch from which the content was sourced.

For example:

• a localization branch sourced from main must be merged into main.
• a localization branch sourced from release-1.22 must be merged into release-1.22.

At the beginning of every team milestone, it's helpful to open an issue comparing upstream changes between the previous localization branch and the current localization branch. There are two scripts for comparing upstream changes. upstream_changes.py is useful for checking the changes made to a specific file. And diff_l10n_branches.py is useful for creating a list of outdated files for a specific localization branch.

While only approvers can open a new localization branch and merge pull requests, anyone can open a pull request for a new localization branch. No special permissions are required.

For more information about working from forks or directly from the repository, see "fork and clone the repo".

Upstream contributions

SIG Docs welcomes upstream contributions and corrections to the English source.

5 - Participating in SIG Docs

SIG Docs is one of the special interest groups within the Kubernetes project, focused on writing, updating, and maintaining the documentation for Kubernetes as a whole. See SIG Docs from the community github repo for more information about the SIG.

SIG Docs welcomes content and reviews from all contributors. Anyone can open a pull request (PR), and anyone is welcome to file issues about content or comment on pull requests in progress.

You can also become a member, reviewer, or approver. These roles require greater access and entail certain responsibilities for approving and committing changes. See community-membership for more information on how membership works within the Kubernetes community.

The rest of this document outlines some unique ways these roles function within SIG Docs, which is responsible for maintaining one of the most public-facing aspects of Kubernetes -- the Kubernetes website and documentation.

SIG Docs chairperson

Each SIG, including SIG Docs, selects one or more SIG members to act as chairpersons. These are points of contact between SIG Docs and other parts of the Kubernetes organization. They require extensive knowledge of the structure of the Kubernetes project as a whole and how SIG Docs works within it. See Leadership for the current list of chairpersons.

SIG Docs teams and automation

Automation in SIG Docs relies on two different mechanisms: GitHub teams and OWNERS files.

GitHub teams

There are two categories of SIG Docs teams on GitHub:

• @sig-docs-{language}-owners are approvers and leads
• @sig-docs-{language}-reviewers are reviewers

Each can be referenced with their @name in GitHub comments to communicate with everyone in that group.

Sometimes Prow and GitHub teams overlap without matching exactly. For assignment of issues, pull requests, and to support PR approvals, the automation uses information from OWNERS files.

OWNERS files and front-matter

The Kubernetes project uses an automation tool called prow for automation related to GitHub issues and pull requests. The Kubernetes website repository uses two prow plugins:

• blunderbuss
• approve

These two plugins use the OWNERS and OWNERS_ALIASES files in the top level of the kubernetes/website GitHub repository to control how prow works within the repository.

An OWNERS file contains a list of people who are SIG Docs reviewers and approvers. OWNERS files can also exist in subdirectories, and can override who can act as a reviewer or approver of files in that subdirectory and its descendants. For more information about OWNERS files in general, see OWNERS.

In addition, an individual Markdown file can list reviewers and approvers in its front-matter, either by listing individual GitHub usernames or GitHub groups.

The combination of OWNERS files and front-matter in Markdown files determines the advice PR owners get from automated systems about who to ask for technical and editorial review of their PR.

How merging works

When a pull request is merged to the branch used to publish content, that content is published to http://kubernetes.io. To ensure that the quality of our published content is high, we limit merging pull requests to SIG Docs approvers. Here's how it works.

• When a pull request has both the lgtm and approve labels, has no hold labels, and all tests are passing, the pull request merges automatically.
• Kubernetes organization members and SIG Docs approvers can add comments to prevent automatic merging of a given pull request (by adding a /hold comment or withholding a /lgtm comment).
• Any Kubernetes member can add the lgtm label by adding a /lgtm comment.
• Only SIG Docs approvers can merge a pull request by adding an /approve comment. Some approvers also perform additional specific roles, such as PR Wrangler or SIG Docs chairperson.

What's next

For more information about contributing to the Kubernetes documentation, see:

• Contributing new content
• Reviewing content
• Documentation style guide

5.1 - Roles and responsibilities

Anyone can contribute to Kubernetes. As your contributions to SIG Docs grow, you can apply for different levels of membership in the community. These roles allow you to take on more responsibility within the community. Each role requires more time and commitment. The roles are:

• Anyone: regular contributors to the Kubernetes documentation
• Members: can assign and triage issues and provide non-binding review on pull requests
• Reviewers: can lead reviews on documentation pull requests and can vouch for a change's quality
• Approvers: can lead reviews on documentation and merge changes

Anyone

Anyone with a GitHub account can contribute to Kubernetes. SIG Docs welcomes all new contributors!

Anyone can:

• Open an issue in any Kubernetes repository, including kubernetes/website
• Give non-binding feedback on a pull request
• Contribute to a localization
• Suggest improvements on Slack or the SIG docs mailing list.

After signing the CLA, anyone can also:

• Open a pull request to improve existing content, add new content, or write a blog post or case study
• Create diagrams, graphics assets, and embeddable screencasts and videos

For more information, see contributing new content.

Members

A member is someone who has submitted multiple pull requests to kubernetes/website. Members are a part of the Kubernetes GitHub organization.

Members can:

• Do everything listed under Anyone

• Use the /lgtm comment to add the LGTM (looks good to me) label to a pull request

  Note: Using /lgtm triggers automation. If you want to provide non-binding approval, commenting "LGTM" works too!

• Use the /hold comment to block merging for a pull request

• Use the /assign comment to assign a reviewer to a pull request

• Provide non-binding review on pull requests

• Use automation to triage and categorize issues

• Document new features

Becoming a member

After submitting at least 5 substantial pull requests and meeting the other requirements:

1. Find two reviewers or approvers to sponsor your membership.

   Ask for sponsorship in the #sig-docs channel on Slack or on the SIG Docs mailing list.

   Note: Don't send a direct email or Slack direct message to an individual SIG Docs member. You must request sponsorship before submitting your application.

2. Open a GitHub issue in the kubernetes/org repository. Use the Organization Membership Request issue template.

3. Let your sponsors know about the GitHub issue. You can either:

   • Mention their GitHub username in an issue (@<GitHub-username>)

   • Send them the issue link using Slack or email.

     Sponsors will approve your request with a +1 vote. Once your sponsors approve the request, a Kubernetes GitHub admin adds you as a member. Congratulations!

     If your membership request is not accepted you will receive feedback. After addressing the feedback, apply again.

4. Accept the invitation to the Kubernetes GitHub organization in your email account.

   Note: GitHub sends the invitation to the default email address in your account.

Reviewers

Reviewers are responsible for reviewing open pull requests. Unlike member feedback, you must address reviewer feedback. Reviewers are members of the @kubernetes/sig-docs-{language}-reviews GitHub team.

Reviewers can:

• Do everything listed under Anyone and Members

• Review pull requests and provide binding feedback

  Note: To provide non-binding feedback, prefix your comments with a phrase like "Optionally: ".

• Edit user-facing strings in code

• Improve code comments

You can be a SIG Docs reviewer, or a reviewer for docs in a specific subject area.

Assigning reviewers to pull requests

Automation assigns reviewers to all pull requests. You can request a review from a specific person by commenting: /assign [@_github_handle].

If the assigned reviewer has not commented on the PR, another reviewer can step in. You can also assign technical reviewers as needed.

Using /lgtm

LGTM stands for "Looks good to me" and indicates that a pull request is technically accurate and ready to merge. All PRs need a /lgtm comment from a reviewer and a /approve comment from an approver to merge.

A /lgtm comment from reviewer is binding and triggers automation that adds the lgtm label.

Becoming a reviewer

When you meet the requirements, you can become a SIG Docs reviewer. Reviewers in other SIGs must apply separately for reviewer status in SIG Docs.

To apply:

1. Open a pull request that adds your GitHub user name to a section of the OWNERS_ALIASES file in the kubernetes/website repository.

   Note: If you aren't sure where to add yourself, add yourself to sig-docs-en-reviews.

2. Assign the PR to one or more SIG-Docs approvers (user names listed under sig-docs-{language}-owners).

If approved, a SIG Docs lead adds you to the appropriate GitHub team. Once added, K8s-ci-robot assigns and suggests you as a reviewer on new pull requests.

Approvers

Approvers review and approve pull requests for merging. Approvers are members of the @kubernetes/sig-docs-{language}-owners GitHub teams.

Approvers can do the following:

• Everything listed under Anyone, Members and Reviewers
• Publish contributor content by approving and merging pull requests using the /approve comment
• Propose improvements to the style guide
• Propose improvements to docs tests
• Propose improvements to the Kubernetes website or other tooling

If the PR already has a /lgtm, or if the approver also comments with /lgtm, the PR merges automatically. A SIG Docs approver should only leave a /lgtm on a change that doesn't need additional technical review.

Approving pull requests

Approvers and SIG Docs leads are the only ones who can merge pull requests into the website repository. This comes with certain responsibilities.

• Approvers can use the /approve command, which merges PRs into the repo.

  Warning: A careless merge can break the site, so be sure that when you merge something, you mean it.

• Make sure that proposed changes meet the contribution guidelines.

  If you ever have a question, or you're not sure about something, feel free to call for additional review.

• Verify that Netlify tests pass before you /approve a PR.

  

• Visit the Netlify page preview for a PR to make sure things look good before approving.

• Participate in the PR Wrangler rotation schedule for weekly rotations. SIG Docs expects all approvers to participate in this rotation. See PR wranglers. for more details.

Becoming an approver

When you meet the requirements, you can become a SIG Docs approver. Approvers in other SIGs must apply separately for approver status in SIG Docs.

To apply:

1. Open a pull request adding yourself to a section of the OWNERS_ALIASES file in the kubernetes/website repository.

   Note: If you aren't sure where to add yourself, add yourself to sig-docs-en-owners.

2. Assign the PR to one or more current SIG Docs approvers.

If approved, a SIG Docs lead adds you to the appropriate GitHub team. Once added, @k8s-ci-robot assigns and suggests you as a reviewer on new pull requests.

What's next

• Read about PR wrangling, a role all approvers take on rotation.

5.2 - PR wranglers

SIG Docs approvers take week-long shifts managing pull requests for the repository.

This section covers the duties of a PR wrangler. For more information on giving good reviews, see Reviewing changes.

Duties

Each day in a week-long shift as PR Wrangler:

• Triage and tag incoming issues daily. See Triage and categorize issues for guidelines on how SIG Docs uses metadata.
• Review open pull requests for quality and adherence to the Style and Content guides.
  • Start with the smallest PRs (size/XS) first, and end with the largest (size/XXL). Review as many PRs as you can.
• Make sure PR contributors sign the CLA.
  • Use this script to remind contributors that haven't signed the CLA to do so.
• Provide feedback on changes and ask for technical reviews from members of other SIGs.
  • Provide inline suggestions on the PR for the proposed content changes.
  • If you need to verify content, comment on the PR and request more details.
  • Assign relevant sig/ label(s).
  • If needed, assign reviewers from the reviewers: block in the file's front matter.
  • You can also tag a SIG for a review by commenting @kubernetes/<sig>-pr-reviews on the PR.
• Use the /approve comment to approve a PR for merging. Merge the PR when ready.
  • PRs should have a /lgtm comment from another member before merging.
  • Consider accepting technically accurate content that doesn't meet the style guidelines. As you approve the change, open a new issue to address the style concern. You can usually write these style fix issues as good first issues.
  • Using style fixups as good first issues is a good way to ensure a supply of easier tasks to help onboard new contributors.

Helpful GitHub queries for wranglers

The following queries are helpful when wrangling. After working through these queries, the remaining list of PRs to review is usually small. These queries exclude localization PRs. All queries are against the main branch except the last one.

• No CLA, not eligible to merge: Remind the contributor to sign the CLA. If both the bot and a human have reminded them, close the PR and remind them that they can open it after signing the CLA. Do not review PRs whose authors have not signed the CLA!
• Needs LGTM: Lists PRs that need an LGTM from a member. If the PR needs technical review, loop in one of the reviewers suggested by the bot. If the content needs work, add suggestions and feedback in-line.
• Has LGTM, needs docs approval: Lists PRs that need an /approve comment to merge.
• Quick Wins: Lists PRs against the main branch with no clear blockers. (change "XS" in the size label as you work through the PRs [XS, S, M, L, XL, XXL]).
• Not against the primary branch: If the PR is against a dev- branch, it's for an upcoming release. Assign the docs release manager using: /assign @<manager's_github-username>. If the PR is against an old branch, help the author figure out whether it's targeted against the best branch.

Helpful Prow commands for wranglers

# add English label
/language en

# add squash label to PR if more than one commit
/label tide/merge-method-squash

# retitle a PR via Prow (such as a work-in-progress [WIP] or better detail of PR)
/retitle [WIP] <TITLE>

When to close Pull Requests

Reviews and approvals are one tool to keep our PR queue short and current. Another tool is closure.

Close PRs where:

• The author hasn't signed the CLA for two weeks.

  Authors can reopen the PR after signing the CLA. This is a low-risk way to make sure nothing gets merged without a signed CLA.

• The author has not responded to comments or feedback in 2 or more weeks.

Don't be afraid to close pull requests. Contributors can easily reopen and resume works in progress. Often a closure notice is what spurs an author to resume and finish their contribution.

To close a pull request, leave a /close comment on the PR.

6 - Documentation style overview

The topics in this section provide guidance on writing style, content formatting and organization, and using Hugo customizations specific to Kubernetes documentation.

6.1 - Documentation Content Guide

This page contains guidelines for Kubernetes documentation.

If you have questions about what's allowed, join the #sig-docs channel in Kubernetes Slack and ask!

You can register for Kubernetes Slack at https://slack.k8s.io/.

For information on creating new content for the Kubernetes docs, follow the style guide.

Overview

Source for the Kubernetes website, including the docs, resides in the kubernetes/website repository.

Located in the kubernetes/website/content/<language_code>/docs folder, the majority of Kubernetes documentation is specific to the Kubernetes project.

What's allowed

Kubernetes docs allow content for third-party projects only when:

• Content documents software in the Kubernetes project
• Content documents software that's out of project but necessary for Kubernetes to function
• Content is canonical on kubernetes.io, or links to canonical content elsewhere

Third party content

Kubernetes documentation includes applied examples of projects in the Kubernetes project—projects that live in the kubernetes and kubernetes-sigs GitHub organizations.

Links to active content in the Kubernetes project are always allowed.

Kubernetes requires some third party content to function. Examples include container runtimes (containerd, CRI-O, Docker), networking policy (CNI plugins), Ingress controllers, and logging.

Docs can link to third-party open source software (OSS) outside the Kubernetes project only if it's necessary for Kubernetes to function.

Dual sourced content

Wherever possible, Kubernetes docs link to canonical sources instead of hosting dual-sourced content.

Dual-sourced content requires double the effort (or more!) to maintain and grows stale more quickly.

More information

If you have questions about allowed content, join the Kubernetes Slack #sig-docs channel and ask!

What's next

• Read the Style guide.

6.2 - Documentation Style Guide

This page gives writing style guidelines for the Kubernetes documentation. These are guidelines, not rules. Use your best judgment, and feel free to propose changes to this document in a pull request.

For additional information on creating new content for the Kubernetes documentation, read the Documentation Content Guide.

Changes to the style guide are made by SIG Docs as a group. To propose a change or addition, add it to the agenda for an upcoming SIG Docs meeting, and attend the meeting to participate in the discussion.

Language

Kubernetes documentation has been translated into multiple languages (see Localization READMEs).

The way of localizing the docs for a different language is described in Localizing Kubernetes Documentation.

The English-language documentation uses U.S. English spelling and grammar.

Documentation formatting standards

Use upper camel case for API objects

When you refer specifically to interacting with an API object, use UpperCamelCase, also known as Pascal case. You may see different capitalization, such as "configMap", in the API Reference. When writing general documentation, it's better to use upper camel case, calling it "ConfigMap" instead.

When you are generally discussing an API object, use sentence-style capitalization.

You may use the word "resource", "API", or "object" to clarify a Kubernetes resource type in a sentence.

Don't split an API object name into separate words. For example, use PodTemplateList, not Pod Template List.

The following examples focus on capitalization. For more information about formatting API object names, review the related guidance on Code Style.

Use angle brackets for placeholders

Use angle brackets for placeholders. Tell the reader what a placeholder represents, for example:

Display information about a pod:

kubectl describe pod <pod-name> -n <namespace>

If the namespace of the pod is default, you can omit the '-n' parameter.

Use bold for user interface elements

Use italics to define or introduce new terms

Use code style for filenames, directories, and paths

Use the international standard for punctuation inside quotes

Inline code formatting

Use code style for inline code, commands, and API objects

For inline code in an HTML document, use the <code> tag. In a Markdown document, use the backtick (`).

Use code style for object field names and namespaces

Use code style for Kubernetes command tool and component names

Starting a sentence with a component tool or component name

Use a general descriptor over a component name

Use normal style for string and integer field values

For field values of type string or integer, use normal style without quotation marks.

Code snippet formatting

Don't include the command prompt

Separate commands from output

Verify that the pod is running on your chosen node:

kubectl get pods --output=wide

The output is similar to this:

NAME     READY     STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE    IP           NODE
nginx    1/1       Running   0          13s    10.200.0.4   worker0

Versioning Kubernetes examples

Code examples and configuration examples that include version information should be consistent with the accompanying text.

If the information is version specific, the Kubernetes version needs to be defined in the prerequisites section of the Task template or the Tutorial template. Once the page is saved, the prerequisites section is shown as Before you begin.

To specify the Kubernetes version for a task or tutorial page, include min-kubernetes-server-version in the front matter of the page.

If the example YAML is in a standalone file, find and review the topics that include it as a reference. Verify that any topics using the standalone YAML have the appropriate version information defined. If a stand-alone YAML file is not referenced from any topics, consider deleting it instead of updating it.

For example, if you are writing a tutorial that is relevant to Kubernetes version 1.8, the front-matter of your markdown file should look something like:

---
title: <your tutorial title here>
min-kubernetes-server-version: v1.8
---

In code and configuration examples, do not include comments about alternative versions. Be careful to not include incorrect statements in your examples as comments, such as:

apiVersion: v1 # earlier versions use...
kind: Pod
...

Kubernetes.io word list

A list of Kubernetes-specific terms and words to be used consistently across the site.

Shortcodes

Hugo Shortcodes help create different rhetorical appeal levels. Our documentation supports three different shortcodes in this category: Note {{< note >}}, Caution {{< caution >}}, and Warning {{< warning >}}.

1. Surround the text with an opening and closing shortcode.

2. Use the following syntax to apply a style:

   {{< note >}}
   No need to include a prefix; the shortcode automatically provides one. (Note:, Caution:, etc.)
   {{< /note >}}
   

   The output is:

   Note: The prefix you choose is the same text for the tag.

Note

Use {{< note >}} to highlight a tip or a piece of information that may be helpful to know.

For example:

{{< note >}}
You can _still_ use Markdown inside these callouts.
{{< /note >}}

The output is:

You can use a {{< note >}} in a list:

1. Use the note shortcode in a list

1. A second item with an embedded note

   {{< note >}}
   Warning, Caution, and Note shortcodes, embedded in lists, need to be indented four spaces. See [Common Shortcode Issues](#common-shortcode-issues).
   {{< /note >}}

1. A third item in a list

1. A fourth item in a list

The output is:

1. Use the note shortcode in a list

2. A second item with an embedded note

   Note: Warning, Caution, and Note shortcodes, embedded in lists, need to be indented four spaces. See Common Shortcode Issues.

3. A third item in a list

4. A fourth item in a list

Caution

Use {{< caution >}} to call attention to an important piece of information to avoid pitfalls.

For example:

{{< caution >}}
The callout style only applies to the line directly above the tag.
{{< /caution >}}

The output is:

Warning

Use {{< warning >}} to indicate danger or a piece of information that is crucial to follow.

For example:

{{< warning >}}
Beware.
{{< /warning >}}

The output is:

Katacoda Embedded Live Environment

This button lets users run Minikube in their browser using the Katacoda Terminal. It lowers the barrier of entry by allowing users to use Minikube with one click instead of going through the complete Minikube and Kubectl installation process locally.

The Embedded Live Environment is configured to run minikube start and lets users complete tutorials in the same window as the documentation.

For example:

{{< kat-button >}}

The output is:

Common Shortcode Issues

Ordered Lists

Shortcodes will interrupt numbered lists unless you indent four spaces before the notice and the tag.

For example:

1. Preheat oven to 350˚F

1. Prepare the batter, and pour into springform pan.
   `{{< note >}}Grease the pan for best results.{{< /note >}}`

1. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until set.

The output is:

1. Preheat oven to 350˚F

2. Prepare the batter, and pour into springform pan.

   Note: Grease the pan for best results.

3. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until set.

Include Statements

Shortcodes inside include statements will break the build. You must insert them in the parent document, before and after you call the include. For example:

{{< note >}}
{{< include "task-tutorial-prereqs.md" >}}
{{< /note >}}

Markdown elements

Line breaks

Use a single newline to separate block-level content like headings, lists, images, code blocks, and others. The exception is second-level headings, where it should be two newlines. Second-level headings follow the first-level (or the title) without any preceding paragraphs or texts. A two line spacing helps visualize the overall structure of content in a code editor better.

Headings

People accessing this documentation may use a screen reader or other assistive technology (AT). Screen readers are linear output devices, they output items on a page one at a time. If there is a lot of content on a page, you can use headings to give the page an internal structure. A good page structure helps all readers to easily navigate the page or filter topics of interest.

Paragraphs

Links

Lists

Group items in a list that are related to each other and need to appear in a specific order or to indicate a correlation between multiple items. When a screen reader comes across a list—whether it is an ordered or unordered list—it will be announced to the user that there is a group of list items. The user can then use the arrow keys to move up and down between the various items in the list. Website navigation links can also be marked up as list items; after all they are nothing but a group of related links.

• End each item in a list with a period if one or more items in the list are complete sentences. For the sake of consistency, normally either all items or none should be complete sentences.

  Note: Ordered lists that are part of an incomplete introductory sentence can be in lowercase and punctuated as if each item was a part of the introductory sentence.

• Use the number one (1.) for ordered lists.

• Use (+), (*), or (-) for unordered lists.

• Leave a blank line after each list.

• Indent nested lists with four spaces (for example, ⋅⋅⋅⋅).

• List items may consist of multiple paragraphs. Each subsequent paragraph in a list item must be indented by either four spaces or one tab.

Tables

The semantic purpose of a data table is to present tabular data. Sighted users can quickly scan the table but a screen reader goes through line by line. A table caption is used to create a descriptive title for a data table. Assistive technologies (AT) use the HTML table caption element to identify the table contents to the user within the page structure.

• Add table captions using Hugo shortcodes for tables.

Content best practices

This section contains suggested best practices for clear, concise, and consistent content.

Use present tense

Exception: Use future or past tense if it is required to convey the correct meaning.

Use active voice

Exception: Use passive voice if active voice leads to an awkward construction.

Use simple and direct language

Use simple and direct language. Avoid using unnecessary phrases, such as saying "please."

Address the reader as "you"

Avoid Latin phrases

Prefer English terms over Latin abbreviations.

Exception: Use "etc." for et cetera.

Patterns to avoid

Avoid using "we"

Using "we" in a sentence can be confusing, because the reader might not know whether they're part of the "we" you're describing.

Avoid jargon and idioms

Some readers speak English as a second language. Avoid jargon and idioms to help them understand better.

Avoid statements about the future

Avoid making promises or giving hints about the future. If you need to talk about an alpha feature, put the text under a heading that identifies it as alpha information.

An exception to this rule is documentation about announced deprecations targeting removal in future versions. One example of documentation like this is the Deprecated API migration guide.

Avoid statements that will soon be out of date

Avoid words like "currently" and "new." A feature that is new today might not be considered new in a few months.

Avoid words that assume a specific level of understanding

Avoid words such as "just", "simply", "easy", "easily", or "simple". These words do not add value.

What's next

• Learn about writing a new topic.
• Learn about using page templates.
• Learn about creating a pull request.

6.3 - Diagram Guide

This guide shows you how to create, edit and share diagrams using the Mermaid Javascript library. Mermaid.js allows you to generate diagrams using a simple markdown-like syntax inside Markdown files. You can also use Mermaid to generate .svg or .png image files that you can add to your documentation.

The target audience for this guide is anybody wishing to learn about Mermaid and/or how to create and add diagrams to Kubernetes documentation.

Figure 1 outlines the topics covered in this section.

Figure 1. Topics covered in this section.

All you need to begin working with Mermaid is the following:

• Basic understanding of markdown.
• Using the Mermaid live editor.
• Using Hugo shortcodes.
• Using the Hugo {{< figure >}} shortcode.
• Performing Hugo local previews.
• Familiar with the Contributing new content process.

Why you should use diagrams in documentation

Diagrams improve documentation clarity and comprehension. There are advantages for both the user and the contributor.

The user benefits include:

• Friendly landing spot. A detailed text-only greeting page could intimidate users, in particular, first-time Kubernetes users.
• Faster grasp of concepts. A diagram can help users understand the key points of a complex topic. Your diagram can serve as a visual learning guide to dive into the topic details.
• Better retention. For some, it is easier to recall pictures rather than text.

The contributor benefits include:

• Assist in developing the structure and content of your contribution. For example, you can start with a simple diagram covering the high-level points and then dive into details.
• Expand and grow the user community. Easily consumed documentation augmented with diagrams attracts new users who might previously have been reluctant to engage due to perceived complexities.

You should consider your target audience. In addition to experienced K8s users, you will have many who are new to Kubernetes. Even a simple diagram can assist new users in absorbing Kubernetes concepts. They become emboldened and more confident to further explore Kubernetes and the documentation.

Mermaid

Mermaid is an open source JavaScript library that allows you to create, edit and easily share diagrams using a simple, markdown-like syntax configured inline in Markdown files.

The following lists features of Mermaid:

• Simple code syntax.
• Includes a web-based tool allowing you to code and preview your diagrams.
• Supports multiple formats including flowchart, state and sequence.
• Easy collaboration with colleagues by sharing a per-diagram URL.
• Broad selection of shapes, lines, themes and styling.

The following lists advantages of using Mermaid:

• No need for separate, non-Mermaid diagram tools.
• Adheres to existing PR workflow. You can think of Mermaid code as just Markdown text included in your PR.
• Simple tool builds simple diagrams. You don't want to get bogged down (re)crafting an overly complex and detailed picture. Keep it simple!

Mermaid provides a simple, open and transparent method for the SIG communities to add, edit and collaborate on diagrams for new or existing documentation.

Live editor

The Mermaid live editor is a web-based tool that enables you to create, edit and review diagrams.

The following lists live editor functions:

• Displays Mermaid code and rendered diagram.
• Generates a URL for each saved diagram. The URL is displayed in the URL field of your browser. You can share the URL with colleagues who can access and modify the diagram.
• Option to download .svg or .png files.

Methods for creating diagrams

Figure 2 outlines the three methods to generate and add diagrams.

Figure 2. Methods to create diagrams.

Inline

Figure 3 outlines the steps to follow for adding a diagram using the Inline method.

Figure 3. Inline Method steps.

The following lists the steps you should follow for adding a diagram using the Inline method:

1. Create your diagram using the live editor.
2. Store the diagram URL somewhere for later access.
3. Copy the mermaid code to the location in your .md file where you want the diagram to appear.
4. Add a caption below the diagram using Markdown text.

A Hugo build runs the Mermaid code and turns it into a diagram.

Here is a sample code snippet contained in an .md file:

---
title: My PR
---
Figure 17 shows a simple A to B process.
some markdown text
...
{{< mermaid >}} 
    graph TB
    A --> B
{{< /mermaid >}}

Figure 17. A to B
more text

For more details on diagram captions, see How to use captions.

The following lists advantages of the Inline method:

• Live editor tool.
• Easy to copy Mermaid code to and from the live editor and your .md file.
• No need for separate .svg image file handling.
• Content text, diagram code and diagram caption contained in the same .md file.

You should use the local and Netlify previews to verify the diagram is properly rendered.

Mermaid+SVG

Figure 4 outlines the steps to follow for adding a diagram using the Mermaid+SVG method.

Figure 4. Mermaid+SVG method steps.

The following lists the steps you should follow for adding a diagram using the Mermaid+SVG method:

1. Create your diagram using the live editor.
2. Store the diagram URL somewhere for later access.
3. Generate an .svg image file for the diagram and download it to the appropriate images/ folder.
4. Use the {{< figure >}} shortcode to reference the diagram in the .md file.
5. Add a caption using the {{< figure >}} shortcode's caption parameter.

For example, use the live editor to create a diagram called boxnet. Store the diagram URL somewhere for later access. Generate and download a boxnet.svg file to the appropriate ../images/ folder.

Use the {{< figure >}} shortcode in your PR's .md file to reference the .svg image file and add a caption.

{{< figure src="/static/images/boxnet.svg" alt="Boxnet figure" class="diagram-large" caption="Figure 14. Boxnet caption" >}}

For more details on diagram captions, see How to use captions.

You should add the live editor URL as a comment block in the .svg image file using a text editor. For example, you would include the following at the beginning of the .svg image file:

<!-- To view or edit the mermaid code, use the following URL: -->
<!-- https://mermaid-js.github.io/mermaid-live-editor/edit/#eyJjb ... <remainder of the URL> -->

The following lists advantages of the Mermaid+SVG method:

• Live editor tool.
• Live editor tool supports the most current Mermaid feature set.
• Employ existing K8s/website methods for handling .svg image files.
• Environment doesn't require Mermaid support.

Be sure to check that your diagram renders properly using the local and Netlify previews.

External tool

Figure 5 outlines the steps to follow for adding a diagram using the External Tool method.

First, use your external tool to create the diagram and save it as an .svg or .png image file. After that, use the same steps as the Mermaid+SVG method for adding .svg image files.

Figure 5. External Tool method steps

The following lists the steps you should follow for adding a diagram using the External Tool method:

1. Use your external tool to create a diagram.
2. Save the diagram coordinates for contributor access. For example, your tool may offer a link to the diagram image, or you could place the source code file, such as an .xml file, in a public repository for later contributor access.
3. Generate and save the diagram as an .svg or .png image file. Download this file to the appropriate ../images/ folder.
4. Use the {{< figure >}} shortcode to reference the diagram in the .md file.
5. Add a caption using the {{< figure >}} shortcode's caption parameter.

Here is the {{< figure >}} shortcode for the images/apple.svg diagram:

{{< figure src="/static/images/apple.svg" alt="red-apple-figure" class="diagram-large" caption="Figure 9. A Big Red Apple" >}} 

If your external drawing tool permits:

• You can incorporate multiple .svg or .png logos, icons and images into your diagram. However, make sure you observe copyright and follow the Kubernetes documentation guidelines on the use of third party content.
• You should save the diagram source coordinates for later contributor access. For example, your tool may offer a link to the diagram image, or you could place the source code file, such as an .xml file, somewhere for contributor access.

For more information on K8s and CNCF logos and images, check out CNCF Artwork.

The following lists advantages of the External Tool method:

• Contributor familiarity with external tool.
• Diagrams require more detail than what Mermaid can offer.

Don't forget to check that your diagram renders correctly using the local and Netlify previews.

Examples

This section shows several examples of Mermaid diagrams.

Example 1 - Pod topology spread constraints

Figure 6 shows the diagram appearing in the Pod Topology Spread Constraints page.

Figure 6. Pod Topology Spread Constraints.

Code block:

graph TB
   subgraph "zoneB"
       n3(Node3)
       n4(Node4)
   end
   subgraph "zoneA"
       n1(Node1)
       n2(Node2)
   end
 
   classDef plain fill:#ddd,stroke:#fff,stroke-width:4px,color:#000;
   classDef k8s fill:#326ce5,stroke:#fff,stroke-width:4px,color:#fff;
   classDef cluster fill:#fff,stroke:#bbb,stroke-width:2px,color:#326ce5;
   class n1,n2,n3,n4 k8s;
   class zoneA,zoneB cluster;

Example 2 - Ingress

Figure 7 shows the diagram appearing in the What is Ingress page.

Code block:

graph LR;
 client([client])-. Ingress-managed <br> load balancer .->ingress[Ingress];
 ingress-->|routing rule|service[Service];
 subgraph cluster
 ingress;
 service-->pod1[Pod];
 service-->pod2[Pod];
 end
 classDef plain fill:#ddd,stroke:#fff,stroke-width:4px,color:#000;
 classDef k8s fill:#326ce5,stroke:#fff,stroke-width:4px,color:#fff;
 classDef cluster fill:#fff,stroke:#bbb,stroke-width:2px,color:#326ce5;
 class ingress,service,pod1,pod2 k8s;
 class client plain;
 class cluster cluster;

Example 3 - K8s system flow

Figure 8 depicts a Mermaid sequence diagram showing the system flow between K8s components to start a container.

Code block:

%%{init:{"theme":"neutral"}}%%
sequenceDiagram
    actor me
    participant apiSrv as control plane<br><br>api-server
    participant etcd as control plane<br><br>etcd datastore
    participant cntrlMgr as control plane<br><br>controller<br>manager
    participant sched as control plane<br><br>scheduler
    participant kubelet as node<br><br>kubelet
    participant container as node<br><br>container<br>runtime
    me->>apiSrv: 1. kubectl create -f pod.yaml
    apiSrv-->>etcd: 2. save new state
    cntrlMgr->>apiSrv: 3. check for changes
    sched->>apiSrv: 4. watch for unassigned pods(s)
    apiSrv->>sched: 5. notify about pod w nodename=" "
    sched->>apiSrv: 6. assign pod to node
    apiSrv-->>etcd: 7. save new state
    kubelet->>apiSrv: 8. look for newly assigned pod(s)
    apiSrv->>kubelet: 9. bind pod to node
    kubelet->>container: 10. start container
    kubelet->>apiSrv: 11. update pod status
    apiSrv-->>etcd: 12. save new state

How to style diagrams

You can style one or more diagram elements using well-known CSS nomenclature. You accomplish this using two types of statements in the Mermaid code.

• classDef defines a class of style attributes.
• class defines one or more elements to apply the class to.

In the code for figure 7, you can see examples of both.

classDef k8s fill:#326ce5,stroke:#fff,stroke-width:4px,color:#fff; // defines style for the k8s class
class ingress,service,pod1,pod2 k8s; // k8s class is applied to elements ingress, service, pod1 and pod2.

You can include one or multiple classDef and class statements in your diagram. You can also use the official K8s #326ce5 hex color code for K8s components in your diagram.

For more information on styling and classes, see Mermaid Styling and classes docs.

How to use captions

A caption is a brief description of a diagram. A title or a short description of the diagram are examples of captions. Captions aren't meant to replace explanatory text you have in your documentation. Rather, they serve as a "context link" between that text and your diagram.

The combination of some text and a diagram tied together with a caption help provide a concise representation of the information you wish to convey to the user.

Without captions, you are asking the user to scan the text above or below the diagram to figure out a meaning. This can be frustrating for the user.

Figure 9 lays out the three components for proper captioning: diagram, diagram caption and the diagram referral.

Diagram

The Mermaid+SVG and External Tool methods generate .svg image files.

Here is the {{< figure >}} shortcode for the diagram defined in an .svg image file saved to /images/docs/components-of-kubernetes.svg:

{{< figure src="/images/docs/components-of-kubernetes.svg" alt="Kubernetes pod running inside a cluster" class="diagram-large" caption="Figure 4. Kubernetes Architecture Components >}}

You should pass the src, alt, class and caption values into the {{< figure >}} shortcode. You can adjust the size of the diagram using diagram-large, diagram-medium and diagram-small classes.

See Methods for creating diagrams for more information on the different methods for creating diagrams.

Diagram Caption

Next, add a diagram caption.

If you define your diagram in an .svg image file, then you should use the {{< figure >}} shortcode's caption parameter.

{{< figure src="/images/docs/components-of-kubernetes.svg" alt="Kubernetes pod running inside a cluster" class="diagram-large" caption="Figure 4. Kubernetes Architecture Components" >}}

If you define your diagram using inline Mermaid code, then you should use Markdown text.

Figure 4. Kubernetes Architecture Components

The following lists several items to consider when adding diagram captions:

• Use the {{< figure >}} shortcode to add a diagram caption for Mermaid+SVG and External Tool diagrams.
• Use simple Markdown text to add a diagram caption for the Inline method.
• Prepend your diagram caption with Figure NUMBER.. You must use Figure and the number must be unique for each diagram in your documentation page. Add a period after the number.
• Add your diagram caption text after the Figure NUMBER. on the same line. You must puncuate the caption with a period. Keep the caption text short.
• Position your diagram caption BELOW your diagram.

Diagram Referral

Finally, you can add a diagram referral. This is used inside your text and should precede the diagram itself. It allows a user to connect your text with the associated diagram. The Figure NUMBER in your referral and caption must match.

You should avoid using spatial references such as ..the image below.. or ..the following figure ..

Here is an example of a diagram referral:

Figure 10 depicts the components of the Kubernetes architecture. The control plane ...

Diagram referrals are optional and there are cases where they might not be suitable. If you are not sure, add a diagram referral to your text to see if it looks and sounds okay. When in doubt, use a diagram referral.

Complete picture

Figure 10 shows the Kubernetes Architecture diagram that includes the diagram, diagram caption and diagram referral. The {{< figure >}} shortcode renders the diagram, adds the caption and includes the optional link parameter so you can hyperlink the diagram. The diagram referral is contained in this paragraph.

Here is the {{< figure >}} shortcode for this diagram:

{{< figure src="/images/docs/components-of-kubernetes.svg" alt="Kubernetes pod running inside a cluster" class="diagram-large" caption="Figure 10. Kubernetes Architecture." link="https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/overview/components/" >}}

Tips

• Always use the live editor to create/edit your diagram.

• Always use Hugo local and Netlify previews to check out how the diagram appears in the documentation.

• Include diagram source pointers such as a URL, source code location, or indicate the code is self-documenting.

• Always use diagram captions.

• Very helpful to include the diagram .svg or .png image and/or Mermaid source code in issues and PRs.

• With the Mermaid+SVG and External Tool methods, use .svg image files because they stay sharp when you zoom in on the diagram.

• Best practice for .svg files is to load it into an SVG editing tool and use the “Convert text to paths” function. This ensures that the diagram renders the same on all systems, regardless of font availability and font rendering support.

• No Mermaid support for additional icons or artwork.

• Hugo Mermaid shortcodes don't work in the live editor.

• Any time you modify a diagram in the live editor, you must save it to generate a new URL for the diagram.

• Click on the diagrams in this section to view the code and diagram rendering in the live editor.

• Look over the source code of this page, diagram-guide.md, for more examples.

• Check out the Mermaid docs for explanations and examples.

Most important, Keep Diagrams Simple. This will save time for you and fellow contributors, and allow for easier reading by new and experienced users.

6.4 - Writing a new topic

This page shows how to create a new topic for the Kubernetes docs.

Before you begin

Create a fork of the Kubernetes documentation repository as described in Open a PR.

Choosing a page type

As you prepare to write a new topic, think about the page type that would fit your content the best:

Creating a new page

Use a content type for each new page that you write. The docs site provides templates or Hugo archetypes to create new content pages. To create a new type of page, run hugo new with the path to the file you want to create. For example:

hugo new docs/concepts/my-first-concept.md

Choosing a title and filename

Choose a title that has the keywords you want search engines to find. Create a filename that uses the words in your title separated by hyphens. For example, the topic with title Using an HTTP Proxy to Access the Kubernetes API has filename http-proxy-access-api.md. You don't need to put "kubernetes" in the filename, because "kubernetes" is already in the URL for the topic, for example:

   /docs/tasks/extend-kubernetes/http-proxy-access-api/

Adding the topic title to the front matter

In your topic, put a title field in the front matter. The front matter is the YAML block that is between the triple-dashed lines at the top of the page. Here's an example:

---
title: Using an HTTP Proxy to Access the Kubernetes API
---

Choosing a directory

Depending on your page type, put your new file in a subdirectory of one of these:

• /content/en/docs/tasks/
• /content/en/docs/tutorials/
• /content/en/docs/concepts/

You can put your file in an existing subdirectory, or you can create a new subdirectory.

Placing your topic in the table of contents

The table of contents is built dynamically using the directory structure of the documentation source. The top-level directories under /content/en/docs/ create top-level navigation, and subdirectories each have entries in the table of contents.

Each subdirectory has a file _index.md, which represents the "home" page for a given subdirectory's content. The _index.md does not need a template. It can contain overview content about the topics in the subdirectory.

Other files in a directory are sorted alphabetically by default. This is almost never the best order. To control the relative sorting of topics in a subdirectory, set the weight: front-matter key to an integer. Typically, we use multiples of 10, to account for adding topics later. For instance, a topic with weight 10 will come before one with weight 20.

Embedding code in your topic

If you want to include some code in your topic, you can embed the code in your file directly using the markdown code block syntax. This is recommended for the following cases (not an exhaustive list):

• The code shows the output from a command such as kubectl get deploy mydeployment -o json | jq '.status'.
• The code is not generic enough for users to try out. As an example, you can embed the YAML file for creating a Pod which depends on a specific FlexVolume implementation.
• The code is an incomplete example because its purpose is to highlight a portion of a larger file. For example, when describing ways to customize the PodSecurityPolicy for some reasons, you can provide a short snippet directly in your topic file.
• The code is not meant for users to try out due to other reasons. For example, when describing how a new attribute should be added to a resource using the kubectl edit command, you can provide a short example that includes only the attribute to add.

Including code from another file

Another way to include code in your topic is to create a new, complete sample file (or group of sample files) and then reference the sample from your topic. Use this method to include sample YAML files when the sample is generic and reusable, and you want the reader to try it out themselves.

When adding a new standalone sample file, such as a YAML file, place the code in one of the <LANG>/examples/ subdirectories where <LANG> is the language for the topic. In your topic file, use the codenew shortcode:

{{< codenew file="<RELPATH>/my-example-yaml>" >}}

where <RELPATH> is the path to the file to include, relative to the examples directory. The following Hugo shortcode references a YAML file located at /content/en/examples/pods/storage/gce-volume.yaml.

{{< codenew file="pods/storage/gce-volume.yaml" >}}

Showing how to create an API object from a configuration file

If you need to demonstrate how to create an API object based on a configuration file, place the configuration file in one of the subdirectories under <LANG>/examples.

In your topic, show this command:

kubectl create -f https://k8s.io/examples/pods/storage/gce-volume.yaml

For an example of a topic that uses this technique, see Running a Single-Instance Stateful Application.

Adding images to a topic

Put image files in the /images directory. The preferred image format is SVG.

What's next

• Learn about using page content types.
• Learn about creating a pull request.

6.5 - Page content types

The Kubernetes documentation follows several types of page content:

• Concept
• Task
• Tutorial
• Reference

Content sections

Each page content type contains a number of sections defined by Markdown comments and HTML headings. You can add content headings to your page with the heading shortcode. The comments and headings help maintain the structure of the page content types.

Examples of Markdown comments defining page content sections:

<!-- overview -->

<!-- body -->

To create common headings in your content pages, use the heading shortcode with a heading string.

Examples of heading strings:

• whatsnext
• prerequisites
• objectives
• cleanup
• synopsis
• seealso
• options

For example, to create a whatsnext heading, add the heading shortcode with the "whatsnext" string:

## {{% heading "whatsnext" %}}

You can declare a prerequisites heading as follows:

## {{% heading "prerequisites" %}}

The heading shortcode expects one string parameter. The heading string parameter matches the prefix of a variable in the i18n/<lang>.toml files. For example:

i18n/en.toml:

[whatsnext_heading]
other = "What's next"

i18n/ko.toml:

[whatsnext_heading]
other = "다음 내용"

Content types

Each content type informally defines its expected page structure. Create page content with the suggested page sections.

Concept

A concept page explains some aspect of Kubernetes. For example, a concept page might describe the Kubernetes Deployment object and explain the role it plays as an application once it is deployed, scaled, and updated. Typically, concept pages don't include sequences of steps, but instead provide links to tasks or tutorials.

To write a new concept page, create a Markdown file in a subdirectory of the /content/en/docs/concepts directory, with the following characteristics:

Concept pages are divided into three sections:

The overview and body sections appear as comments in the concept page. You can add the whatsnext section to your page with the heading shortcode.

Fill each section with content. Follow these guidelines:

• Organize content with H2 and H3 headings.
• For overview, set the topic's context with a single paragraph.
• For body, explain the concept.
• For whatsnext, provide a bulleted list of topics (5 maximum) to learn more about the concept.

Annotations is a published example of a concept page.

Task

A task page shows how to do a single thing, typically by giving a short sequence of steps. Task pages have minimal explanation, but often provide links to conceptual topics that provide related background and knowledge.

To write a new task page, create a Markdown file in a subdirectory of the /content/en/docs/tasks directory, with the following characteristics:

The overview, steps, and discussion sections appear as comments in the task page. You can add the prerequisites and whatsnext sections to your page with the heading shortcode.

Within each section, write your content. Use the following guidelines:

• Use a minimum of H2 headings (with two leading # characters). The sections themselves are titled automatically by the template.
• For overview, use a paragraph to set context for the entire topic.
• For prerequisites, use bullet lists when possible. Start adding additional prerequisites below the include. The default prerequisites include a running Kubernetes cluster.
• For steps, use numbered lists.
• For discussion, use normal content to expand upon the information covered in steps.
• For whatsnext, give a bullet list of up to 5 topics the reader might be interested in reading next.

An example of a published task topic is Using an HTTP proxy to access the Kubernetes API.

Tutorial

A tutorial page shows how to accomplish a goal that is larger than a single task. Typically a tutorial page has several sections, each of which has a sequence of steps. For example, a tutorial might provide a walkthrough of a code sample that illustrates a certain feature of Kubernetes. Tutorials can include surface-level explanations, but should link to related concept topics for deep explanations.

To write a new tutorial page, create a Markdown file in a subdirectory of the /content/en/docs/tutorials directory, with the following characteristics:

The overview, objectives, and lessoncontent sections appear as comments in the tutorial page. You can add the prerequisites, cleanup, and whatsnext sections to your page with the heading shortcode.

Within each section, write your content. Use the following guidelines:

• Use a minimum of H2 headings (with two leading # characters). The sections themselves are titled automatically by the template.
• For overview, use a paragraph to set context for the entire topic.
• For prerequisites, use bullet lists when possible. Add additional prerequisites below the ones included by default.
• For objectives, use bullet lists.
• For lessoncontent, use a mix of numbered lists and narrative content as appropriate.
• For cleanup, use numbered lists to describe the steps to clean up the state of the cluster after finishing the task.
• For whatsnext, give a bullet list of up to 5 topics the reader might be interested in reading next.

An example of a published tutorial topic is Running a Stateless Application Using a Deployment.

Reference

A component tool reference page shows the description and flag options output for a Kubernetes component tool. Each page generates from scripts using the component tool commands.

A tool reference page has several possible sections:

Examples of published tool reference pages are:

• kubeadm init
• kube-apiserver
• kubectl

What's next

• Learn about the Style guide
• Learn about the Content guide
• Learn about content organization

6.6 - Content organization

This site uses Hugo. In Hugo, content organization is a core concept.

Page Lists

Page Order

The documentation side menu, the documentation page browser etc. are listed using Hugo's default sort order, which sorts by weight (from 1), date (newest first), and finally by the link title.

Given that, if you want to move a page or a section up, set a weight in the page's front matter:

title: My Page
weight: 10

Documentation Main Menu

The Documentation main menu is built from the sections below docs/ with the main_menu flag set in front matter of the _index.md section content file:

main_menu: true

Note that the link title is fetched from the page's linkTitle, so if you want it to be something different than the title, change it in the content file:

main_menu: true
title: Page Title
linkTitle: Title used in links

Documentation Side Menu

The documentation side-bar menu is built from the current section tree starting below docs/.

It will show all sections and their pages.

If you don't want to list a section or page, set the toc_hide flag to true in front matter:

toc_hide: true

When you navigate to a section that has content, the specific section or page (e.g. _index.md) is shown. Else, the first page inside that section is shown.

Documentation Browser

The page browser on the documentation home page is built using all the sections and pages that are directly below the docs section.

If you don't want to list a section or page, set the toc_hide flag to true in front matter:

toc_hide: true

The Main Menu

The site links in the top-right menu -- and also in the footer -- are built by page-lookups. This is to make sure that the page actually exists. So, if the case-studies section does not exist in a site (language), it will not be linked to.

Page Bundles

In addition to standalone content pages (Markdown files), Hugo supports Page Bundles.

One example is Custom Hugo Shortcodes. It is considered a leaf bundle. Everything below the directory, including the index.md, will be part of the bundle. This also includes page-relative links, images that can be processed etc.:

en/docs/home/contribute/includes
├── example1.md
├── example2.md
├── index.md
└── podtemplate.json

Another widely used example is the includes bundle. It sets headless: true in front matter, which means that it does not get its own URL. It is only used in other pages.

en/includes
├── default-storage-class-prereqs.md
├── index.md
├── partner-script.js
├── partner-style.css
├── task-tutorial-prereqs.md
├── user-guide-content-moved.md
└── user-guide-migration-notice.md

Some important notes to the files in the bundles:

• For translated bundles, any missing non-content files will be inherited from languages above. This avoids duplication.
• All the files in a bundle are what Hugo calls Resources and you can provide metadata per language, such as parameters and title, even if it does not supports front matter (YAML files etc.). See Page Resources Metadata.
• The value you get from .RelPermalink of a Resource is page-relative. See Permalinks.

Styles

The SASS source of the stylesheets for this site is stored in assets/sass and is automatically built by Hugo.

What's next

• Learn about custom Hugo shortcodes
• Learn about the Style guide
• Learn about the Content guide

6.7 - Custom Hugo Shortcodes

This page explains the custom Hugo shortcodes that can be used in Kubernetes Markdown documentation.

Read more about shortcodes in the Hugo documentation.

Feature state

In a Markdown page (.md file) on this site, you can add a shortcode to display version and state of the documented feature.

Feature state demo

Below is a demo of the feature state snippet, which displays the feature as stable in the latest Kubernetes version.

{{< feature-state state="stable" >}}

Renders to:

The valid values for state are:

• alpha
• beta
• deprecated
• stable

Feature state code

The displayed Kubernetes version defaults to that of the page or the site. You can change the feature state version by passing the for_k8s_version shortcode parameter. For example:

{{< feature-state for_k8s_version="v1.10" state="beta" >}}

Renders to:

Glossary

There are two glossary shortcodes: glossary_tooltip and glossary_definition.

You can reference glossary terms with an inclusion that automatically updates and replaces content with the relevant links from our glossary. When the glossary term is moused-over, the glossary entry displays a tooltip. The glossary term also displays as a link.

As well as inclusions with tooltips, you can reuse the definitions from the glossary in page content.

The raw data for glossary terms is stored at https://github.com/kubernetes/website/tree/main/content/en/docs/reference/glossary, with a content file for each glossary term.

Glossary demo

For example, the following include within the Markdown renders to cluster with a tooltip:

{{< glossary_tooltip text="cluster" term_id="cluster" >}}

Here's a short glossary definition:

{{< glossary_definition prepend="A cluster is" term_id="cluster" length="short" >}}

which renders as:

A cluster is a set of worker machines, called nodes, that run containerized applications. Every cluster has at least one worker node.

You can also include a full definition:

{{< glossary_definition term_id="cluster" length="all" >}}

which renders as:

A set of worker machines, called nodes, that run containerized applications. Every cluster has at least one worker node.

The worker node(s) host the Pods that are the components of the application workload. The control plane manages the worker nodes and the Pods in the cluster. In production environments, the control plane usually runs across multiple computers and a cluster usually runs multiple nodes, providing fault-tolerance and high availability.

Links to API Reference

You can link to a page of the Kubernetes API reference using the api-reference shortcode, for example to the Pod reference:

{{< api-reference page="workload-resources/pod-v1" >}}

The content of the page parameter is the suffix of the URL of the API reference page.

You can link to a specific place into a page by specifying an anchor parameter, for example to the PodSpec reference or the environment-variables section of the page:

{{< api-reference page="workload-resources/pod-v1" anchor="PodSpec" >}}
{{< api-reference page="workload-resources/pod-v1" anchor="environment-variables" >}}

You can change the text of the link by specifying a text parameter, for example by linking to the Environment Variables section of the page:

{{< api-reference page="workload-resources/pod-v1" anchor="environment-variables" text="Environment Variable" >}}

Table captions

You can make tables more accessible to screen readers by adding a table caption. To add a caption to a table, enclose the table with a table shortcode and specify the caption with the caption parameter.

Here's an example:

{{< table caption="Configuration parameters" >}}
Parameter | Description | Default
:---------|:------------|:-------
`timeout` | The timeout for requests | `30s`
`logLevel` | The log level for log output | `INFO`
{{< /table >}}

The rendered table looks like this:

If you inspect the HTML for the table, you should see this element immediately after the opening <table> element:

<caption style="display: none;">Configuration parameters</caption>

Tabs

In a markdown page (.md file) on this site, you can add a tab set to display multiple flavors of a given solution.

The tabs shortcode takes these parameters:

• name: The name as shown on the tab.
• codelang: If you provide inner content to the tab shortcode, you can tell Hugo what code language to use for highlighting.
• include: The file to include in the tab. If the tab lives in a Hugo leaf bundle, the file -- which can be any MIME type supported by Hugo -- is looked up in the bundle itself. If not, the content page that needs to be included is looked up relative to the current page. Note that with the include, you do not have any shortcode inner content and must use the self-closing syntax. For example, {{< tab name="Content File #1" include="example1" />}}. The language needs to be specified under codelang or the language is taken based on the file name. Non-content files are code-highlighted by default.
• If your inner content is markdown, you must use the %-delimiter to surround the tab. For example, {{% tab name="Tab 1" %}}This is **markdown**{{% /tab %}}
• You can combine the variations mentioned above inside a tab set.

Below is a demo of the tabs shortcode.

Tabs demo: Code highlighting

{{< tabs name="tab_with_code" >}}
{{{< tab name="Tab 1" codelang="bash" >}}
echo "This is tab 1."
{{< /tab >}}
{{< tab name="Tab 2" codelang="go" >}}
println "This is tab 2."
{{< /tab >}}}
{{< /tabs >}}

Renders to:

• Tab 1
• Tab 2

echo "This is tab 1."

println "This is tab 2."

Tabs demo: Inline Markdown and HTML

{{< tabs name="tab_with_md" >}}
{{% tab name="Markdown" %}}
This is **some markdown.**
{{< note >}}
It can even contain shortcodes.
{{< /note >}}
{{% /tab %}}
{{< tab name="HTML" >}}
<div>
	<h3>Plain HTML</h3>
	<p>This is some <i>plain</i> HTML.</p>
</div>
{{< /tab >}}
{{< /tabs >}}

Renders to:

• Markdown
• HTML

Tabs demo: File include

{{< tabs name="tab_with_file_include" >}}
{{< tab name="Content File #1" include="example1" />}}
{{< tab name="Content File #2" include="example2" />}}
{{< tab name="JSON File" include="podtemplate" />}}
{{< /tabs >}}

Renders to:

• Content File #1
• Content File #2
• JSON File

  {
    "apiVersion": "v1",
    "kind": "PodTemplate",
    "metadata": {
      "name": "nginx"
    },
    "template": {
      "metadata": {
        "labels": {
          "name": "nginx"
        },
        "generateName": "nginx-"
      },
      "spec": {
         "containers": [{
           "name": "nginx",
           "image": "dockerfile/nginx",
           "ports": [{"containerPort": 80}]
         }]
      }
    }
  }

Third party content marker

Running Kubernetes requires third-party software. For example: you usually need to add a DNS server to your cluster so that name resolution works.

When we link to third-party software, or otherwise mention it, we follow the content guide and we also mark those third party items.

Using these shortcodes adds a disclaimer to any documentation page that uses them.

Lists

For a list of several third-party items, add:

{{% thirdparty-content %}}

just below the heading for the section that includes all items.

Items

If you have a list where most of the items refer to in-project software (for example: Kubernetes itself, and the separate Descheduler component), then there is a different form to use.

Add the shortcode:

{{% thirdparty-content single="true" %}}

before the item, or just below the heading for the specific item.

Version strings

To generate a version string for inclusion in the documentation, you can choose from several version shortcodes. Each version shortcode displays a version string derived from the value of a version parameter found in the site configuration file, config.toml. The two most commonly used version parameters are latest and version.

{{< param "version" >}}

The {{< param "version" >}} shortcode generates the value of the current version of the Kubernetes documentation from the version site parameter. The param shortcode accepts the name of one site parameter, in this case: version.

Renders to:

{{< latest-version >}}

The {{< latest-version >}} shortcode returns the value of the latest site parameter. The latest site parameter is updated when a new version of the documentation is released. This parameter does not always match the value of version in a documentation set.

Renders to:

{{< latest-semver >}}

The {{< latest-semver >}} shortcode generates the value of latest without the "v" prefix.

Renders to:

{{< version-check >}}

The {{< version-check >}} shortcode checks if the min-kubernetes-server-version page parameter is present and then uses this value to compare to version.

Renders to:

{{< latest-release-notes >}}

The {{< latest-release-notes >}} shortcode generates a version string from latest and removes the "v" prefix. The shortcode prints a new URL for the release note CHANGELOG page with the modified version string.

Renders to:

What's next

• Learn about Hugo.
• Learn about writing a new topic.
• Learn about page content types.
• Learn about opening a pull request.
• Learn about advanced contributing.

7 - Reference Docs Overview

The topics in this section document how to generate the Kubernetes reference guides.

To build the reference documentation, see the following guide:

• Generating Reference Documentation Quickstart

7.1 - Contributing to the Upstream Kubernetes Code

This page shows how to contribute to the upstream kubernetes/kubernetes project. You can fix bugs found in the Kubernetes API documentation or the content of the Kubernetes components such as kubeadm, kube-apiserver, and kube-controller-manager.

If you instead want to regenerate the reference documentation for the Kubernetes API or the kube-* components from the upstream code, see the following instructions:

• Generating Reference Documentation for the Kubernetes API
• Generating Reference Documentation for the Kubernetes Components and Tools

Before you begin

• You need to have these tools installed:

  • Git
  • Golang version 1.13+
  • Docker
  • etcd

• Your GOPATH environment variable must be set, and the location of etcd must be in your PATH environment variable.

• You need to know how to create a pull request to a GitHub repository. Typically, this involves creating a fork of the repository. For more information, see Creating a Pull Request and GitHub Standard Fork & Pull Request Workflow.

The big picture

The reference documentation for the Kubernetes API and the kube-* components such as kube-apiserver, kube-controller-manager are automatically generated from the source code in the upstream Kubernetes.

When you see bugs in the generated documentation, you may want to consider creating a patch to fix it in the upstream project.

Cloning the Kubernetes repository

If you don't already have the kubernetes/kubernetes repository, get it now:

mkdir $GOPATH/src
cd $GOPATH/src
go get github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes

Determine the base directory of your clone of the kubernetes/kubernetes repository. For example, if you followed the preceding step to get the repository, your base directory is $GOPATH/src/github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes. The remaining steps refer to your base directory as <k8s-base>.

Determine the base directory of your clone of the kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs repository. For example, if you followed the preceding step to get the repository, your base directory is $GOPATH/src/github.com/kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs. The remaining steps refer to your base directory as <rdocs-base>.

Editing the Kubernetes source code

The Kubernetes API reference documentation is automatically generated from an OpenAPI spec, which is generated from the Kubernetes source code. If you want to change the API reference documentation, the first step is to change one or more comments in the Kubernetes source code.

The documentation for the kube-* components is also generated from the upstream source code. You must change the code related to the component you want to fix in order to fix the generated documentation.

Making changes to the upstream source code

Here's an example of editing a comment in the Kubernetes source code.

In your local kubernetes/kubernetes repository, check out the default branch, and make sure it is up to date:

cd <k8s-base>
git checkout master
git pull https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes master

Suppose this source file in that default branch has the typo "atmost":

kubernetes/kubernetes/staging/src/k8s.io/api/apps/v1/types.go

In your local environment, open types.go, and change "atmost" to "at most".

Verify that you have changed the file:

git status

The output shows that you are on the master branch, and that the types.go source file has been modified:

On branch master
...
    modified:   staging/src/k8s.io/api/apps/v1/types.go

Committing your edited file

Run git add and git commit to commit the changes you have made so far. In the next step, you will do a second commit. It is important to keep your changes separated into two commits.

Generating the OpenAPI spec and related files

Go to <k8s-base> and run these scripts:

hack/update-generated-swagger-docs.sh
hack/update-openapi-spec.sh
hack/update-generated-protobuf.sh

Run git status to see what was generated.

On branch master
...
    modified:   api/openapi-spec/swagger.json
    modified:   staging/src/k8s.io/api/apps/v1/generated.proto
    modified:   staging/src/k8s.io/api/apps/v1/types.go
    modified:   staging/src/k8s.io/api/apps/v1/types_swagger_doc_generated.go

View the contents of api/openapi-spec/swagger.json to make sure the typo is fixed. For example, you could run git diff -a api/openapi-spec/swagger.json. This is important, because swagger.json is the input to the second stage of the doc generation process.

Run git add and git commit to commit your changes. Now you have two commits: one that contains the edited types.go file, and one that contains the generated OpenAPI spec and related files. Keep these two commits separate. That is, do not squash your commits.

Submit your changes as a pull request to the master branch of the kubernetes/kubernetes repository. Monitor your pull request, and respond to reviewer comments as needed. Continue to monitor your pull request until it is merged.

PR 57758 is an example of a pull request that fixes a typo in the Kubernetes source code.

Cherry picking your commit into a release branch

In the preceding section, you edited a file in the master branch and then ran scripts to generate an OpenAPI spec and related files. Then you submitted your changes in a pull request to the master branch of the kubernetes/kubernetes repository. Now suppose you want to backport your change into a release branch. For example, suppose the master branch is being used to develop Kubernetes version 1.23, and you want to backport your change into the release-1.22 branch.

Recall that your pull request has two commits: one for editing types.go and one for the files generated by scripts. The next step is to propose a cherry pick of your first commit into the release-1.22 branch. The idea is to cherry pick the commit that edited types.go, but not the commit that has the results of running the scripts. For instructions, see Propose a Cherry Pick.

When you have a pull request in place for cherry picking your one commit into the release-1.22 branch, the next step is to run these scripts in the release-1.22 branch of your local environment.

hack/update-generated-swagger-docs.sh
hack/update-openapi-spec.sh
hack/update-generated-protobuf.sh
hack/update-api-reference-docs.sh

Now add a commit to your cherry-pick pull request that has the recently generated OpenAPI spec and related files. Monitor your pull request until it gets merged into the release-1.22 branch.

At this point, both the master branch and the release-1.22 branch have your updated types.go file and a set of generated files that reflect the change you made to types.go. Note that the generated OpenAPI spec and other generated files in the release-1.22 branch are not necessarily the same as the generated files in the master branch. The generated files in the release-1.22 branch contain API elements only from Kubernetes 1.22. The generated files in the master branch might contain API elements that are not in 1.22, but are under development for 1.23.

Generating the published reference docs

The preceding section showed how to edit a source file and then generate several files, including api/openapi-spec/swagger.json in the kubernetes/kubernetes repository. The swagger.json file is the OpenAPI definition file to use for generating the API reference documentation.

You are now ready to follow the Generating Reference Documentation for the Kubernetes API guide to generate the published Kubernetes API reference documentation.

What's next

• Generating Reference Documentation for the Kubernetes API
• Generating Reference Docs for Kubernetes Components and Tools
• Generating Reference Documentation for kubectl Commands

7.2 - Quickstart

This page shows how to use the update-imported-docs.py script to generate the Kubernetes reference documentation. The script automates the build setup and generates the reference documentation for a release.

Before you begin

Requirements:

• You need a machine that is running Linux or macOS.

• You need to have these tools installed:

  • Python v3.7.x
  • Git
  • Golang version 1.13+
  • Pip used to install PyYAML
  • PyYAML v5.1.2
  • make
  • gcc compiler/linker
  • Docker (Required only for kubectl command reference)

• Your PATH environment variable must include the required build tools, such as the Go binary and python.

• You need to know how to create a pull request to a GitHub repository. This involves creating your own fork of the repository. For more information, see Work from a local clone.

Getting the docs repository

Make sure your website fork is up-to-date with the kubernetes/website remote on GitHub (main branch), and clone your website fork.

mkdir github.com
cd github.com
git clone git@github.com:<your_github_username>/website.git

Determine the base directory of your clone. For example, if you followed the preceding step to get the repository, your base directory is github.com/website. The remaining steps refer to your base directory as <web-base>.

Overview of update-imported-docs

The update-imported-docs.py script is located in the <web-base>/update-imported-docs/ directory.

The script builds the following references:

• Component and tool reference pages
• The kubectl command reference
• The Kubernetes API reference

The update-imported-docs.py script generates the Kubernetes reference documentation from the Kubernetes source code. The script creates a temporary directory under /tmp on your machine and clones the required repositories: kubernetes/kubernetes and kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs into this directory. The script sets your GOPATH to this temporary directory. Three additional environment variables are set:

• K8S_RELEASE
• K8S_ROOT
• K8S_WEBROOT

The script requires two arguments to run successfully:

• A YAML configuration file (reference.yml)
• A release version, for example:1.17

The configuration file contains a generate-command field. The generate-command field defines a series of build instructions from kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs/Makefile. The K8S_RELEASE variable determines the version of the release.

The update-imported-docs.py script performs the following steps:

1. Clones the related repositories specified in a configuration file. For the purpose of generating reference docs, the repository that is cloned by default is kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs.
2. Runs commands under the cloned repositories to prepare the docs generator and then generates the HTML and Markdown files.
3. Copies the generated HTML and Markdown files to a local clone of the <web-base> repository under locations specified in the configuration file.
4. Updates kubectl command links from kubectl.md to the refer to the sections in the kubectl command reference.

When the generated files are in your local clone of the <web-base> repository, you can submit them in a pull request to <web-base>.

Configuration file format

Each configuration file may contain multiple repos that will be imported together. When necessary, you can customize the configuration file by manually editing it. You may create new config files for importing other groups of documents. The following is an example of the YAML configuration file:

repos:
- name: community
  remote: https://github.com/kubernetes/community.git
  branch: master
  files:
  - src: contributors/devel/README.md
    dst: docs/imported/community/devel.md
  - src: contributors/guide/README.md
    dst: docs/imported/community/guide.md

Single page Markdown documents, imported by the tool, must adhere to the Documentation Style Guide.

Customizing reference.yml

Open <web-base>/update-imported-docs/reference.yml for editing. Do not change the content for the generate-command field unless you understand how the command is used to build the references. You should not need to update reference.yml. At times, changes in the upstream source code, may require changes to the configuration file (for example: golang version dependencies and third-party library changes). If you encounter build issues, contact the SIG-Docs team on the #sig-docs Kubernetes Slack channel.

In reference.yml, files contains a list of src and dst fields. The src field contains the location of a generated Markdown file in the cloned kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs build directory, and the dst field specifies where to copy this file in the cloned kubernetes/website repository. For example:

repos:
- name: reference-docs
  remote: https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs.git
  files:
  - src: gen-compdocs/build/kube-apiserver.md
    dst: content/en/docs/reference/command-line-tools-reference/kube-apiserver.md
  ...

Note that when there are many files to be copied from the same source directory to the same destination directory, you can use wildcards in the value given to src. You must provide the directory name as the value for dst. For example:

  files:
  - src: gen-compdocs/build/kubeadm*.md
    dst: content/en/docs/reference/setup-tools/kubeadm/generated/

Running the update-imported-docs tool

You can run the update-imported-docs.py tool as follows:

cd <web-base>/update-imported-docs
./update-imported-docs.py <configuration-file.yml> <release-version>

For example:

./update-imported-docs.py reference.yml 1.17

Fixing Links

The release.yml configuration file contains instructions to fix relative links. To fix relative links within your imported files, set thegen-absolute-links property to true. You can find an example of this in release.yml.

Adding and committing changes in kubernetes/website

List the files that were generated and copied to <web-base>:

cd <web-base>
git status

The output shows the new and modified files. The generated output varies depending upon changes made to the upstream source code.

Generated component tool files

content/en/docs/reference/command-line-tools-reference/cloud-controller-manager.md
content/en/docs/reference/command-line-tools-reference/kube-apiserver.md
content/en/docs/reference/command-line-tools-reference/kube-controller-manager.md
content/en/docs/reference/command-line-tools-reference/kube-proxy.md
content/en/docs/reference/command-line-tools-reference/kube-scheduler.md
content/en/docs/reference/setup-tools/kubeadm/generated/kubeadm.md
content/en/docs/reference/kubectl/kubectl.md

Generated kubectl command reference files

static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/kubectl-commands.html
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/navData.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/scroll.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/stylesheet.css
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/tabvisibility.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/node_modules/bootstrap/dist/css/bootstrap.min.css
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/node_modules/highlight.js/styles/default.css
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/node_modules/jquery.scrollto/jquery.scrollTo.min.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/node_modules/jquery/dist/jquery.min.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/css/font-awesome.min.css

Generated Kubernetes API reference directories and files

static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/index.html
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/js/navData.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/js/scroll.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/js/query.scrollTo.min.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/css/font-awesome.min.css
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/css/bootstrap.min.css
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/css/stylesheet.css
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/fonts/FontAwesome.otf
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/fonts/fontawesome-webfont.eot
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/fonts/fontawesome-webfont.svg
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/fonts/fontawesome-webfont.ttf
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/fonts/fontawesome-webfont.woff
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/fonts/fontawesome-webfont.woff2

Run git add and git commit to commit the files.

Creating a pull request

Create a pull request to the kubernetes/website repository. Monitor your pull request, and respond to review comments as needed. Continue to monitor your pull request until it is merged.

A few minutes after your pull request is merged, your updated reference topics will be visible in the published documentation.

What's next

To generate the individual reference documentation by manually setting up the required build repositories and running the build targets, see the following guides:

• Generating Reference Documentation for Kubernetes Components and Tools
• Generating Reference Documentation for kubectl Commands
• Generating Reference Documentation for the Kubernetes API

7.3 - Generating Reference Documentation for the Kubernetes API

This page shows how to update the Kubernetes API reference documentation.

The Kubernetes API reference documentation is built from the Kubernetes OpenAPI spec using the kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs generation code.

If you find bugs in the generated documentation, you need to fix them upstream.

If you need only to regenerate the reference documentation from the OpenAPI spec, continue reading this page.

Before you begin

Requirements:

• You need a machine that is running Linux or macOS.

• You need to have these tools installed:

  • Python v3.7.x
  • Git
  • Golang version 1.13+
  • Pip used to install PyYAML
  • PyYAML v5.1.2
  • make
  • gcc compiler/linker
  • Docker (Required only for kubectl command reference)

• Your PATH environment variable must include the required build tools, such as the Go binary and python.

• You need to know how to create a pull request to a GitHub repository. This involves creating your own fork of the repository. For more information, see Work from a local clone.

Setting up the local repositories

Create a local workspace and set your GOPATH.

mkdir -p $HOME/<workspace>

export GOPATH=$HOME/<workspace>

Get a local clone of the following repositories:

go get -u github.com/kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs

go get -u github.com/go-openapi/loads
go get -u github.com/go-openapi/spec

If you don't already have the kubernetes/website repository, get it now:

git clone https://github.com/<your-username>/website $GOPATH/src/github.com/<your-username>/website

Get a clone of the kubernetes/kubernetes repository as k8s.io/kubernetes:

git clone https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes $GOPATH/src/k8s.io/kubernetes

• The base directory of your clone of the kubernetes/kubernetes repository is $GOPATH/src/k8s.io/kubernetes. The remaining steps refer to your base directory as <k8s-base>.

• The base directory of your clone of the kubernetes/website repository is $GOPATH/src/github.com/<your username>/website. The remaining steps refer to your base directory as <web-base>.

• The base directory of your clone of the kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs repository is $GOPATH/src/github.com/kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs. The remaining steps refer to your base directory as <rdocs-base>.

Generating the API reference docs

This section shows how to generate the published Kubernetes API reference documentation.

Setting build variables

• Set K8S_ROOT to <k8s-base>.
• Set K8S_WEBROOT to <web-base>.
• Set K8S_RELEASE to the version of the docs you want to build. For example, if you want to build docs for Kubernetes 1.17.0, set K8S_RELEASE to 1.17.0.

For example:

export K8S_WEBROOT=${GOPATH}/src/github.com/<your-username>/website
export K8S_ROOT=${GOPATH}/src/k8s.io/kubernetes
export K8S_RELEASE=1.17.0

Creating versioned directory and fetching Open API spec

The updateapispec build target creates the versioned build directory. After the directory is created, the Open API spec is fetched from the <k8s-base> repository. These steps ensure that the version of the configuration files and Kubernetes Open API spec match the release version. The versioned directory name follows the pattern of v<major>_<minor>.

In the <rdocs-base> directory, run the following build target:

cd <rdocs-base>
make updateapispec

Building the API reference docs

The copyapi target builds the API reference and copies the generated files to directories in <web-base>. Run the following command in <rdocs-base>:

cd <rdocs-base>
make copyapi

Verify that these two files have been generated:

[ -e "<rdocs-base>/gen-apidocs/build/index.html" ] && echo "index.html built" || echo "no index.html"
[ -e "<rdocs-base>/gen-apidocs/build/navData.js" ] && echo "navData.js built" || echo "no navData.js"

Go to the base of your local <web-base>, and view which files have been modified:

cd <web-base>
git status

The output is similar to:

static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/css/bootstrap.min.css
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/css/font-awesome.min.css
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/css/stylesheet.css
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/fonts/FontAwesome.otf
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/fonts/fontawesome-webfont.eot
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/fonts/fontawesome-webfont.svg
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/fonts/fontawesome-webfont.ttf
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/fonts/fontawesome-webfont.woff
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/fonts/fontawesome-webfont.woff2
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/index.html
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/js/jquery.scrollTo.min.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/js/navData.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.23/js/scroll.js

Updating the API reference index pages

When generating reference documentation for a new release, update the file, <web-base>/content/en/docs/reference/kubernetes-api/api-index.md with the new version number.

• Open <web-base>/content/en/docs/reference/kubernetes-api/api-index.md for editing, and update the API reference version number. For example:

  ---
  title: v1.17
  ---
  
  [Kubernetes API v1.17](/docs/reference/generated/kubernetes-api/v1.17/)
  

• Open <web-base>/content/en/docs/reference/_index.md for editing, and add a new link for the latest API reference. Remove the oldest API reference version. There should be five links to the most recent API references.

Locally test the API reference

Publish a local version of the API reference. Verify the local preview.

cd <web-base>
git submodule update --init --recursive --depth 1 # if not already done
make container-serve

Commit the changes

In <web-base> run git add and git commit to commit the change.

Submit your changes as a pull request to the kubernetes/website repository. Monitor your pull request, and respond to reviewer comments as needed. Continue to monitor your pull request until it has been merged.

What's next

• Generating Reference Documentation Quickstart
• Generating Reference Docs for Kubernetes Components and Tools
• Generating Reference Documentation for kubectl Commands

7.4 - Generating Reference Documentation for kubectl Commands

This page shows how to generate the kubectl command reference.

Before you begin

Requirements:

• You need a machine that is running Linux or macOS.

• You need to have these tools installed:

  • Python v3.7.x
  • Git
  • Golang version 1.13+
  • Pip used to install PyYAML
  • PyYAML v5.1.2
  • make
  • gcc compiler/linker
  • Docker (Required only for kubectl command reference)

• Your PATH environment variable must include the required build tools, such as the Go binary and python.

• You need to know how to create a pull request to a GitHub repository. This involves creating your own fork of the repository. For more information, see Work from a local clone.

Setting up the local repositories

Create a local workspace and set your GOPATH.

mkdir -p $HOME/<workspace>

export GOPATH=$HOME/<workspace>

Get a local clone of the following repositories:

go get -u github.com/spf13/pflag
go get -u github.com/spf13/cobra
go get -u gopkg.in/yaml.v2
go get -u github.com/kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs

If you don't already have the kubernetes/website repository, get it now:

git clone https://github.com/<your-username>/website $GOPATH/src/github.com/<your-username>/website

Get a clone of the kubernetes/kubernetes repository as k8s.io/kubernetes:

git clone https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes $GOPATH/src/k8s.io/kubernetes

Remove the spf13 package from $GOPATH/src/k8s.io/kubernetes/vendor/github.com.

rm -rf $GOPATH/src/k8s.io/kubernetes/vendor/github.com/spf13

The kubernetes/kubernetes repository provides the kubectl and kustomize source code.

• Determine the base directory of your clone of the kubernetes/kubernetes repository. For example, if you followed the preceding step to get the repository, your base directory is $GOPATH/src/k8s.io/kubernetes. The remaining steps refer to your base directory as <k8s-base>.

• Determine the base directory of your clone of the kubernetes/website repository. For example, if you followed the preceding step to get the repository, your base directory is $GOPATH/src/github.com/<your-username>/website. The remaining steps refer to your base directory as <web-base>.

• Determine the base directory of your clone of the kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs repository. For example, if you followed the preceding step to get the repository, your base directory is $GOPATH/src/github.com/kubernetes-sigs/reference-docs. The remaining steps refer to your base directory as <rdocs-base>.

In your local k8s.io/kubernetes repository, check out the branch of interest, and make sure it is up to date. For example, if you want to generate docs for Kubernetes 1.22.0, you could use these commands:

cd <k8s-base>
git checkout v1.22.0
git pull https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes 1.22.0

If you do not need to edit the kubectl source code, follow the instructions for Setting build variables.

Editing the kubectl source code

The kubectl command reference documentation is automatically generated from the kubectl source code. If you want to change the reference documentation, the first step is to change one or more comments in the kubectl source code. Make the change in your local kubernetes/kubernetes repository, and then submit a pull request to the master branch of github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes.

PR 56673 is an example of a pull request that fixes a typo in the kubectl source code.

Monitor your pull request, and respond to reviewer comments. Continue to monitor your pull request until it is merged into the target branch of the kubernetes/kubernetes repository.

Cherry picking your change into a release branch

Your change is now in the master branch, which is used for development of the next Kubernetes release. If you want your change to appear in the docs for a Kubernetes version that has already been released, you need to propose that your change be cherry picked into the release branch.

For example, suppose the master branch is being used to develop Kubernetes 1.23 and you want to backport your change to the release-1.22 branch. For instructions on how to do this, see Propose a Cherry Pick.

Monitor your cherry-pick pull request until it is merged into the release branch.

Setting build variables

Go to <rdocs-base>. On you command line, set the following environment variables.

• Set K8S_ROOT to <k8s-base>.
• Set K8S_WEBROOT to <web-base>.
• Set K8S_RELEASE to the version of the docs you want to build. For example, if you want to build docs for Kubernetes 1.22, set K8S_RELEASE to 1.22.

For example:

export K8S_WEBROOT=$GOPATH/src/github.com/<your-username>/website
export K8S_ROOT=$GOPATH/src/k8s.io/kubernetes
export K8S_RELEASE=1.22

Creating a versioned directory

The createversiondirs build target creates a versioned directory and copies the kubectl reference configuration files to the versioned directory. The versioned directory name follows the pattern of v<major>_<minor>.

In the <rdocs-base> directory, run the following build target:

cd <rdocs-base>
make createversiondirs

Checking out a release tag in k8s.io/kubernetes

In your local <k8s-base> repository, checkout the branch that has the version of Kubernetes that you want to document. For example, if you want to generate docs for Kubernetes 1.22.0, check out the v1.22 tag. Make sure you local branch is up to date.

cd <k8s-base>
git checkout v1.22.0
git pull https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes v1.22.0

Running the doc generation code

In your local <rdocs-base>, run the copycli build target. The command runs as root:

cd <rdocs-base>
make copycli

The copycli command cleans the temporary build directory, generates the kubectl command files, and copies the collated kubectl command reference HTML page and assets to <web-base>.

Locate the generated files

Verify that these two files have been generated:

[ -e "<rdocs-base>/gen-kubectldocs/generators/build/index.html" ] && echo "index.html built" || echo "no index.html"
[ -e "<rdocs-base>/gen-kubectldocs/generators/build/navData.js" ] && echo "navData.js built" || echo "no navData.js"

Locate the copied files

Verify that all generated files have been copied to your <web-base>:

cd <web-base>
git status

The output should include the modified files:

static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/kubectl-commands.html
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/navData.js

The output may also include:

static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/scroll.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/stylesheet.css
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/tabvisibility.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/node_modules/bootstrap/dist/css/bootstrap.min.css
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/node_modules/highlight.js/styles/default.css
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/node_modules/jquery.scrollto/jquery.scrollTo.min.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/node_modules/jquery/dist/jquery.min.js
static/docs/reference/generated/kubectl/node_modules/font-awesome/css/font-awesome.min.css

Locally test the documentation

Build the Kubernetes documentation in your local <web-base>.

cd <web-base>
git submodule update --init --recursive --depth 1 # if not already done
make container-serve

View the local preview.

Adding and committing changes in kubernetes/website

Run git add and git commit to commit the files.

Creating a pull request

Create a pull request to the kubernetes/website repository. Monitor your pull request, and respond to review comments as needed. Continue to monitor your pull request until it is merged.

A few minutes after your pull request is merged, your updated reference topics will be visible in the published documentation.

What's next

• Generating Reference Documentation Quickstart
• Generating Reference Documentation for Kubernetes Components and Tools
• Generating Reference Documentation for the Kubernetes API

7.5 - Generating Reference Pages for Kubernetes Components and Tools

This page shows how to build the Kubernetes component and tool reference pages.

Before you begin

Start with the Prerequisites section in the Reference Documentation Quickstart guide.

Follow the Reference Documentation Quickstart to generate the Kubernetes component and tool reference pages.

What's next

• Generating Reference Documentation Quickstart
• Generating Reference Documentation for kubectl Commands
• Generating Reference Documentation for the Kubernetes API
• Contributing to the Upstream Kubernetes Project for Documentation

7.6 -

Requirements:

• You need a machine that is running Linux or macOS.

• You need to have these tools installed:

  • Python v3.7.x
  • Git
  • Golang version 1.13+
  • Pip used to install PyYAML
  • PyYAML v5.1.2
  • make
  • gcc compiler/linker
  • Docker (Required only for kubectl command reference)

• Your PATH environment variable must include the required build tools, such as the Go binary and python.

• You need to know how to create a pull request to a GitHub repository. This involves creating your own fork of the repository. For more information, see Work from a local clone.

8 - Advanced contributing

This page assumes that you understand how to contribute to new content and review others' work, and are ready to learn about more ways to contribute. You need to use the Git command line client and other tools for some of these tasks.

Propose improvements

SIG Docs members can propose improvements.

After you've been contributing to the Kubernetes documentation for a while, you may have ideas for improving the Style Guide , the Content Guide, the toolchain used to build the documentation, the website style, the processes for reviewing and merging pull requests, or other aspects of the documentation. For maximum transparency, these types of proposals need to be discussed in a SIG Docs meeting or on the kubernetes-sig-docs mailing list. In addition, it can help to have some context about the way things currently work and why past decisions have been made before proposing sweeping changes. The quickest way to get answers to questions about how the documentation currently works is to ask in the #sig-docs Slack channel on kubernetes.slack.com

After the discussion has taken place and the SIG is in agreement about the desired outcome, you can work on the proposed changes in the way that is the most appropriate. For instance, an update to the style guide or the website's functionality might involve opening a pull request, while a change related to documentation testing might involve working with sig-testing.

Coordinate docs for a Kubernetes release

SIG Docs approvers can coordinate docs for a Kubernetes release.

Each Kubernetes release is coordinated by a team of people participating in the sig-release Special Interest Group (SIG). Others on the release team for a given release include an overall release lead, as well as representatives from sig-testing and others. To find out more about Kubernetes release processes, refer to https://github.com/kubernetes/sig-release.

The SIG Docs representative for a given release coordinates the following tasks:

• Monitor the feature-tracking spreadsheet for new or changed features with an impact on documentation. If the documentation for a given feature won't be ready for the release, the feature may not be allowed to go into the release.
• Attend sig-release meetings regularly and give updates on the status of the docs for the release.
• Review and copyedit feature documentation drafted by the SIG responsible for implementing the feature.
• Merge release-related pull requests and maintain the Git feature branch for the release.
• Mentor other SIG Docs contributors who want to learn how to do this role in the future. This is known as "shadowing".
• Publish the documentation changes related to the release when the release artifacts are published.

Coordinating a release is typically a 3-4 month commitment, and the duty is rotated among SIG Docs approvers.

Serve as a New Contributor Ambassador

SIG Docs approvers can serve as New Contributor Ambassadors.

New Contributor Ambassadors welcome new contributors to SIG-Docs, suggest PRs to new contributors, and mentor new contributors through their first few PR submissions.

Responsibilities for New Contributor Ambassadors include:

• Monitoring the #sig-docs Slack channel for questions from new contributors.
• Working with PR wranglers to identify good first issues for new contributors.
• Mentoring new contributors through their first few PRs to the docs repo.
• Helping new contributors create the more complex PRs they need to become Kubernetes members.
• Sponsoring contributors on their path to becoming Kubernetes members.

Current New Contributor Ambassadors are announced at each SIG-Docs meeting and in the Kubernetes #sig-docs channel.

Sponsor a new contributor

SIG Docs reviewers can sponsor new contributors.

After a new contributor has successfully submitted 5 substantive pull requests to one or more Kubernetes repositories, they are eligible to apply for membership in the Kubernetes organization. The contributor's membership needs to be backed by two sponsors who are already reviewers.

New docs contributors can request sponsors by asking in the #sig-docs channel on the Kubernetes Slack instance or on the SIG Docs mailing list. If you feel confident about the applicant's work, you volunteer to sponsor them. When they submit their membership application, reply to the application with a "+1" and include details about why you think the applicant is a good fit for membership in the Kubernetes organization.

Serve as a SIG Co-chair

SIG Docs members can serve a term as a co-chair of SIG Docs.

Prerequisites

A Kubernetes member must meet the following requirements to be a co-chair:

• Understand SIG Docs workflows and tooling: git, Hugo, localization, blog subproject
• Understand how other Kubernetes SIGs and repositories affect the SIG Docs workflow, including: teams in k/org, the process in k/community, plugins in k/test-infra, and the role of SIG Architecture. In addition, understand how the Kubernetes docs release process works.
• Approved by the SIG Docs community either directly or via lazy consensus.
• Commit at least 5 hours per week (and often more) to the role for a minimum of 6 months

Responsibilities

The role of co-chair is one of service: co-chairs build contributor capacity, handle process and policy, schedule and run meetings, schedule PR wranglers, advocate for docs in the Kubernetes community, make sure that docs succeed in Kubernetes release cycles, and keep SIG Docs focused on effective priorities.

Responsibilities include:

• Keep SIG Docs focused on maximizing developer happiness through excellent documentation
• Exemplify the community code of conduct and hold SIG members accountable to it
• Learn and set best practices for the SIG by updating contribution guidelines
• Schedule and run SIG meetings: weekly status updates, quarterly retro/planning sessions, and others as needed
• Schedule and run doc sprints at KubeCon events and other conferences
• Recruit for and advocate on behalf of SIG Docs with the CNCF and its platinum partners, including Google, Oracle, Azure, IBM, and Huawei
• Keep the SIG running smoothly

Running effective meetings

To schedule and run effective meetings, these guidelines show what to do, how to do it, and why.

Uphold the community code of conduct:

• Hold respectful, inclusive discussions with respectful, inclusive language.

Set a clear agenda:

• Set a clear agenda of topics
• Publish the agenda in advance

For weekly meetings, copypaste the previous week's notes into the "Past meetings" section of the notes

Collaborate on accurate notes:

• Record the meeting's discussion
• Consider delegating the role of note-taker

Assign action items clearly and accurately:

• Record the action item, who is assigned to it, and the expected completion date

Moderate as needed:

• If discussion strays from the agenda, refocus participants on the current topic
• Make room for different discussion styles while keeping the discussion focused and honoring folks' time

Honor folks' time:

Begin and end meetings on time.

Use Zoom effectively:

• Familiarize yourself with Zoom guidelines for Kubernetes
• Claim the host role when you log in by entering the host key

Recording meetings on Zoom

When you're ready to start the recording, click Record to Cloud.

When you're ready to stop recording, click Stop.

The video uploads automatically to YouTube.

9 - Viewing Site Analytics

This page contains information about the kubernetes.io analytics dashboard.

View the dashboard.

This dashboard is built using Google Data Studio and shows information collected on kubernetes.io using Google Analytics.

Using the dashboard

By default, the dashboard shows all collected analytics for the past 30 days. Use the date selector to see data from a different date range. Other filtering options allow you to view data based on user location, the device used to access the site, the translation of the docs used, and more.

If you notice an issue with this dashboard, or would like to request any improvements, please open an issue.