Accessing the dashboard

We can either use port forwarding or use ingress to access the dashboard. Let's start with the simple way of doing things, that is, by port forwarding to your local system:

1. View the Linkerd dashboard by running the following command:

$ linkerd dashboard &

2. Visit the following link in your browser to view the dashboard:

http://127.0.0.1:50750

The preceding commands will set up a port forward from your local system to the linkerd-web pod.

If you want to access the dashboard from an external IP, then follow these steps:

1. Download the sample ingress definition:

$ wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/k8sdevopscookbook/src/master/chapter7/linkerd/ingress-nginx.yaml

2. Edit the ingress configuration in the ingress-nginx.yaml file in the src/chapter7/linkerd directory and change - host: dashboard.example.com on line 27 to the URL where you want your dashboard to be exposed. Apply the configuration using the following command:

$ kubectl apply -f ingress-nginx.yaml

The preceding example file uses linkerddashboard.containerized.me as the dashboard address. It also protects access with basic auth using admin/admin credentials. It is highly suggested that you use your own credentials by changing the base64-encoded key pair defined in the auth section of the configuration using the username:password format.