Setting up gitlab runner in kubernetes

I spent time to configure gitlab runners in kubernetes. Until now we had runners on EC2 which worked well. However, it was bugging me that those ec2 instances were under utilze. I wanted to configure gitlab runners in kubernetes to ensure that we are not wasting resources. Gitlab already have extensive documentation on the topic, mainly I will refer to pointers in gitlab documentation.

Add kubernetes cluster to gitlab.

This is straight forward and gitlab has a detailed documentation, When you are adding an existing cluster Cluster Use "More Information" link to get more information on the topic. This gitlab kubernetes documentation has additional information.

Add gitlab runners in kubernetes.

As shown in here, you will need gitlab url and runner registration token. Also, you need helm configured on the system. helm uses values.yaml to pass configuration options to gitlab runners. A values.yaml exapmle is available in above document, also you can download from here. After download, uncomment gitlabUrl and runnerRegistrationToken to add your values. Please read above document to find out information on other configuration options. After modifying values.yaml run following commands.

helm init
helm install --namespace gitlab-managed-apps --name gitlab-runner -f values.yaml gitlab/gitlab-runner

after this step, you can see kubernetes runner appear in Settings -> CI/CD -> Runners section.