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Clustering

As explained in Learn Docker in a Month of Lunches, Second Edition

A cluster is a group of machines managed together as a single computing system.

A cluster is a set of machines, each with a container runtime, grouped together by Kubernetes. You work with the cluster as a whole rather than managing each machine individually. section 15.1

Clusters can include Linux or Windows machines using Intel or Arm, with Docker or containerd as the runtime. A platform may provision the cluster for you; Azure AKS is one example. section 15.1

Figure 15.1 A multi-platform Kubernetes cluster can run containers of any kind.
figure

The diagram illustrates a multi-platform Kubernetes cluster running different kinds of containers. section 15.1

# make sure you're connected to the Docker Desktop cluster:
kubectl config use-context docker-desktop
# print information about the machines in the cluster -
# Kubernetes calls them "nodes":
kubectl get nodes

Use kubectl to select the Docker Desktop cluster and list its nodes, the Kubernetes name for its machines. section 15.1

How Learn Docker in a Month of Lunches, Second Edition covers it

How deep it goes
Defines cluster membership and whole-cluster operation, while leaving provisioning mostly to a platform.
Examples
Names Azure AKS provisioning, Docker Desktop, and Docker or containerd runtimes.
What you can do after
Operate a cluster by provisioning it through a platform and using kubectl to work with it as a whole.
How it connects
Connects Kubernetes with container runtimes, nodes, and kubectl.

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This explainer was generated by Manning's knowledge graph from the text of Learn Docker in a Month of Lunches, Second Edition. The section links point to the parts of the book it draws on.