OpenShift Container Platform

Understand configuration drift detection

The Machine Config Operator (MCO) uses the Machine Config Daemon (MCD) to check nodes for configuration drift on a regular basis. If detected, the MCO sets the node and the machine config pool (MCP) to Degraded and reports the error. A degraded node is online and operational, but, it cannot be updated.

There might be situations when the on-disk state of a node differs from what is configured in the machine config. This is known as configuration drift. For example, a cluster admin might manually modify a file, a systemd unit file, or a file permission that was configured through a machine config. This causes configuration drift. Configuration drift can cause problems between nodes in a Machine Config Pool or when the machine configs are updated.

The MCD performs configuration drift detection upon each of the following conditions:

When a node boots.
After any of the files (Ignition files and systemd drop-in units) specified in the machine config are modified outside of the machine config.

Before a new machine config is applied.

If you apply a new machine config to the nodes, the MCD temporarily shuts down configuration drift detection. This shutdown is needed because the new machine config necessarily differs from the machine config on the nodes. After the new machine config is applied, the MCD restarts detecting configuration drift using the new machine config.

When performing configuration drift detection, the MCD validates that the file contents and permissions fully match what the currently-applied machine config specifies. Typically, the MCD detects configuration drift in less than a second after the detection is triggered.

If the MCD detects configuration drift, the MCD performs the following tasks:

Emits an error to the console logs
Emits a Kubernetes event
Stops further detection on the node
Sets the node and MCP to degraded

You can check if you have a degraded node by listing the MCPs:

$ oc get mcp worker

If you have a degraded MCP, the DEGRADEDMACHINECOUNT field is non-zero, similar to the following output:

Example output

NAME     CONFIG                                             UPDATED   UPDATING   DEGRADED   MACHINECOUNT   READYMACHINECOUNT   UPDATEDMACHINECOUNT   DEGRADEDMACHINECOUNT   AGE
worker   rendered-worker-404caf3180818d8ac1f50c32f14b57c3   False     True       True       2              1                   1                     1                      5h51m

You can determine if the problem is caused by configuration drift by examining the machine config pool:

$ oc describe mcp worker

Example output

 ...
    Last Transition Time:  2021-12-20T18:54:00Z
    Message:               Node ci-ln-j4h8nkb-72292-pxqxz-worker-a-fjks4 is reporting: "content mismatch for file \"/etc/mco-test-file\""
    Reason:                1 nodes are reporting degraded status on sync
    Status:                True
    Type:                  NodeDegraded
 ...

In this example, the text in the Message field shows that a node’s /etc/mco-test-file file, which was added by the machine config, has changed outside of the machine config. In response, the Type field show that state of the node is NodeDegraded.

Or, if you know which node is degraded, examine that node:

$ oc describe node/ci-ln-j4h8nkb-72292-pxqxz-worker-a-fjks4

Example output

 ...

Annotations:        cloud.network.openshift.io/egress-ipconfig: [{"interface":"nic0","ifaddr":{"ipv4":"10.0.128.0/17"},"capacity":{"ip":10}}]
                    csi.volume.kubernetes.io/nodeid:
                      {"pd.csi.storage.gke.io":"projects/openshift-gce-devel-ci/zones/us-central1-a/instances/ci-ln-j4h8nkb-72292-pxqxz-worker-a-fjks4"}
                    machine.openshift.io/machine: openshift-machine-api/ci-ln-j4h8nkb-72292-pxqxz-worker-a-fjks4
                    machineconfiguration.openshift.io/controlPlaneTopology: HighlyAvailable
                    machineconfiguration.openshift.io/currentConfig: rendered-worker-67bd55d0b02b0f659aef33680693a9f9
                    machineconfiguration.openshift.io/desiredConfig: rendered-worker-67bd55d0b02b0f659aef33680693a9f9
                    machineconfiguration.openshift.io/reason: content mismatch for file "/etc/mco-test-file"
                    machineconfiguration.openshift.io/state: Degraded
 ...

The content mismatch for file error message indicates that configuration drift was detected between the node and the listed machine config. Here the error message indicates that the contents of the /etc/mco-test-file, which was added by the machine config, has changed outside of the machine config. As a result, the state of the node is Degraded.

You can correct configuration drift and return the node to the Ready state by performing one of the following remediations:

Ensure that the contents and file permissions of the files on the node match what is configured in the machine config. You can manually rewrite the file contents or change the file permissions.
Generate a force file on the degraded node. The force file causes the MCD to bypass the usual configuration drift detection and reapplies the current machine config. For more information, see "How to skip validation of failing / stuck MachineConfig in OCP 4?" in the Additional resources section.

Generating a force file on a node causes that node to reboot.