Options for creating a cluster

There are many ways to create a Kubernetes cluster, ranging from simple local tools all the way to fully creating a cluster from scratch.

If you're just getting started with learning Kubernetes, you'll probably want to spin up a simple local cluster with a tool such as minikube.

If you're looking to build a production cluster for an application, you have several options:

• You can use a tool such as Kops, Kubespray, or Kubeadm to create the cluster programmatically.
• You can use a managed Kubernetes service.
• You can create a cluster completely from scratch on VMs or physical hardware.

Unless you have extremely specific demands in terms of cluster configuration (and even then), it is not usually recommended to create your cluster completely from scratch without using a bootstrapping tool.

For most use cases, the decision will be between using a managed Kubernetes service on a cloud provider and using a bootstrapping...