Field Notes

Field Notes are practical operating references: commands, checks, failure modes, and recovery patterns that are useful during real infrastructure work.

Platform

Kubernetes And Rancher

Cluster inspection, rollout triage, node health, namespace checks, Rancher-managed fleet behavior, and common failure signals.

Virtualization

vCenter Operations

VM lifecycle checks, datastore and cluster review, template hygiene, snapshots, permissions, and platform integration touchpoints.

Infrastructure

Terraform Change Review

Plan inspection, state safety, provider behavior, module boundaries, promotion checks, and recovery steps for failed applies.

Images

Packer Builds

Template build checks, image versioning, validation steps, common build failures, and release criteria before publishing images.

Security

Vault And Secrets

Secrets engine checks, token behavior, policy review, authentication methods, lease handling, and operational safety practices.

Cloud

Cloud Platforms

Operational notes for cloud-based platforms, account structure, identity, networking, cost awareness, and service-level troubleshooting.

Delivery

CI/CD Pipelines

Pipeline triage, credential checks, artifact flow, promotion behavior, Concourse patterns, and failure output worth preserving.

Operations

Observability And Incidents

Alert review, dashboard checks, log queries, incident timelines, service ownership, and post-incident follow-up prompts.

Netplan Conflicts After VMware Guest Customization

VMware guest customization can write /etc/netplan/99-netcfg-vmware.yaml. If the template already has another active netplan file, the host can end up with multiple network authorities. That can break routing, DNS, bootstrap scripts, Kubernetes node communication, and storage initialization. Symptoms Common signs: Error: Conflicting default route declarations for IPv4 first declared in nic0 but also in ens192 or: Destination Host Unreachable or DNS search drift like: resolv_conf_search = . netplan_search = [] Inspect Netplan Ownership ls -l /etc/netplan sudo grep -R "routes:\|gateway\|search:" /etc/netplan -n If both a template file and VMware file are present, decide which one owns networking. ...

Terraform State Moves During A Module Refactor

When an existing Terraform resource is moved into a module, Terraform sees a new resource address. If state is not moved first, the plan may try to create the module resource and destroy the old root resource. Symptom After converting a root resource to a module call, the plan shows addresses like this: # module.vm_group.vsphere_virtual_machine.vm["lb1"] will be created while the existing state still has: vsphere_virtual_machine.vm["lb1"] Check Current State Run from the environment root: ...