Lion Cipher Lab
Install kubectl and kind, and bring up a local Kubernetes cluster you can break
- Cloud Security
- Beginner
- ~45 min
- Free · no account required
Why it matters
Kubernetes is where most modern production software runs, and it is where a large share of cloud security work happens: RBAC, admission control, pod hardening, secrets, network policy, runtime detection. Twenty-two labs on this site practise exactly those things — and every one of them opens with "you'll need a local cluster and kubectl". This lab removes that assumption. It gives you a real Kubernetes cluster that lives entirely inside Docker on your own machine, costs nothing, and can be deleted and rebuilt in a minute — which means you can break it on purpose, the only honest way to learn…
What you'll learn
- installing kubectl
- installing kind
- creating and deleting a local Kubernetes cluster
- kubeconfig and contexts
- kubectl get / describe / logs
- checking your own permissions with kubectl auth can-i
- reading Kubernetes errors
Steps in this lab
- What Kubernetes, a cluster, a node, a pod and kubectl are — in one paragraph
- Why kind: a real cluster inside Docker, disposable by design
- Check you're ready: Docker must be running
- Install kubectl on Windows (winget, or curl + checksum)
- Install kubectl on macOS (Homebrew, or curl + checksum)
- Install kubectl on Linux (curl + checksum + install) — and why the checksum
- Install kind (no Go required) and check both tools
- Create the cluster — and understand what just happened
- kubeconfig and contexts: the "which cluster am I talking to?" habit
- Run one pod and one Deployment; get, describe, logs; delete
- The memory reality: Docker Desktop limits and .wslconfig
- Security honesty: this cluster is not hardened, and you are its admin
- Troubleshooting: the four errors you will actually see
- Clean up: delete the cluster (and know it is gone)
- Prove it: the round trip every later lab assumes, in six commands
- What you just did — and why it matters