Wallos on GKE Autopilot — Lab Guide

Overview

Estimated time: 45–90 minutes

Wallos is an open-source, self-hosted subscription and recurring-expense tracker built on plain PHP 8.3 + php-fpm — it tracks recurring subscriptions, converts prices across currencies, sends renewal notifications, and supports a household multi-user mode, with no external database. This lab takes you through the full operational lifecycle of the Wallos on GKE Autopilot module on Google Cloud: deploy it, access and verify it, run it day-to-day, observe it, diagnose common problems, and tear it down.

The lab focuses on operating the GKE module and the Google Cloud platform, not on Wallos product features. For the complete list of provisioned services and every configuration input (organised by group), see the Configuration Guide — this lab deliberately does not duplicate that detail so it stays accurate over time.

Objectives

By the end of this lab you will be able to:

Deploy the module from the RAD platform and locate the resources it provisions.
Connect to the GKE cluster and access the running workload, including the default admin login.
Understand why this module is fixed to a single always-on replica and must never be scaled to zero or beyond one replica.
Perform day-2 operations — inspect the workload, understand the HDD PVC vs. GCS FUSE storage split, and manage ingress.
Observe the workload with Cloud Logging and Cloud Monitoring.
Diagnose and resolve the most common deployment and runtime issues.
Tear the deployment down cleanly.

Prerequisites

Services_GCP deployed in the target project (provides the VPC, GKE Autopilot cluster, Artifact Registry, and shared service accounts this module depends on).
A Google Cloud project with billing enabled.
gcloud CLI and kubectl installed; gcloud auth login and gcloud auth application-default login completed.
Project Owner (or equivalent) IAM on the project.
RAD platform access with permission to deploy modules into the project.

Set these shell variables once; every task below reuses them:

export PROJECT="<your-gcp-project-id>"
export REGION="us-central1"           # the region you deploy into

Task 1 — Deploy the module [Automated]

Click Deploy in the RAD platform top navigation, open Wallos (GKE) from the Platform Modules list to start configuration, set project_id, and review the inputs. Configure only what you need — the Configuration Guide documents every input by group, with defaults. Note that min_instance_count, max_instance_count, and stateful_pvc_enabled are all fixed at their sensible defaults (1, 1, true) for a real reason — see Task 3 before changing them. Review the estimated cost (if credits are enabled) and click Deploy, which opens the deployment status page with real-time logs.
The platform deploys the workload into the GKE Autopilot cluster as a StatefulSet with an HDD block PVC (default) mounted at /var/www/html/db for the SQLite database, plus a GCS FUSE bucket mounted at /var/www/html/images/uploads/logos for custom provider logos, then pulls the prebuilt bellamy/wallos image. There is no Cloud SQL instance, no Secret Manager application secret, and no database-initialisation job — Wallos is self-contained. First deploys typically complete in 10–15 minutes.

Connect to the cluster and discover the namespace with name-agnostic filters:

CLUSTER=$(gcloud container clusters list --project="$PROJECT" --format="value(name)" --limit=1)
gcloud container clusters get-credentials "$CLUSTER" --region="$REGION" --project="$PROJECT"

NS=$(kubectl get ns -o name | grep wallos | head -1 | cut -d/ -f2)
echo "Cluster: $CLUSTER   Namespace: $NS"
kubectl get all -n "$NS"

Task 2 — Access & verify [Manual]

Confirm the workload is running (a single-replica StatefulSet by default) and find its address:
```
kubectl get pods,svc,statefulset,pvc -n "$NS"
EXTERNAL_IP=$(kubectl get svc -n "$NS" \
  -o jsonpath='{.items[?(@.spec.type=="LoadBalancer")].status.loadBalancer.ingress[0].ip}')
echo "External IP: $EXTERNAL_IP"
```
The Service defaults to LoadBalancer (Wallos is a browser-driven web UI), so an external IP should appear once the workload is Ready.

Confirm the service is healthy. Wallos documents no dedicated health endpoint, so the probe (and this check) hits the login page at /:

kubectl exec -n "$NS" statefulset/"$(kubectl get statefulset -n "$NS" -o jsonpath='{.items[0].metadata.name}')" \
  -- wget -qO- -S http://localhost:80/ 2>&1 | head -1

Open the workload in a browser — via the external IP/custom domain, or a port-forward:
```
kubectl port-forward -n "$NS" svc/<service-name> 8080:80
# then browse to http://localhost:8080
```
Log in with the seeded default credential admin / admin. Immediately change the password under Settings → Account — this credential is well-known and grants full control of the subscription data.

Task 3 — Operate & keep it running (Day-2) [Manual]

Inspect the workload — statefulset, pods, and PVCs:

kubectl get statefulset,pods,pvc -n "$NS"
kubectl describe statefulset -n "$NS"

Never scale beyond one replica, and never scale to zero. This is stricter than the usual "avoid cold starts" rule of thumb — Wallos runs a real, always-on cron daemon (8 baked-in scheduled tasks: exchange-rate refresh, renewal notifications, an email-verification poll every 2 minutes, and others) that only fires while a pod is running, and its SQLite database has no multi-writer support. Leave min_instance_count = max_instance_count = 1 in the RAD platform; a manual kubectl scale would be reverted on the next apply anyway, and scaling to zero silently stops every scheduled task with no error.
Update the application version by changing the version input in the RAD platform and applying it via Update; bellamy/wallos is pulled fresh, and a rolling update replaces the pod.
Adjust ingress — toggle enable_custom_domain / application_domains, then apply via Update. Avoid disabling stateful_pvc_enabled unless you have a specific reason — it moves the database from a real block PVC back to a GCS FUSE mount, which is a weaker fit for SQLite's write-locking needs.

Inspect the persistent state:

# Database (default: block PVC)
kubectl get pvc -n "$NS"

# Uploads (always GCS FUSE)
gcloud storage buckets list --project="$PROJECT" --filter="name~wallos"
gcloud storage ls gs://<uploads-bucket>/

Never delete the database PVC or the uploads bucket — doing so destroys that state permanently.

Task 4 — Observe: Logging & Monitoring [Manual]

Logs — from kubectl or the Logs Explorer. Since Wallos's cron daemon runs in-process, its scheduled-task activity is visible only here (there is no separate CronJob for it):
```
kubectl logs -n "$NS" statefulset/"$(kubectl get statefulset -n "$NS" -o jsonpath='{.items[0].metadata.name}')" --tail=50
```
Logs Explorer filter: resource.type="k8s_container" AND resource.labels.namespace_name="<namespace>".
Monitoring — open the GKE / Kubernetes dashboards and review pod CPU and memory utilisation and restart counts (should stay at a single, stable pod). If uptime_check_config is enabled, review Monitoring → Uptime checks and Alerting → Policies.

Task 5 — Troubleshoot & debug [Manual]

Durable techniques for the failure modes you are most likely to hit. These are platform-level diagnostics and do not change with Wallos releases.

Pod not Ready / CrashLoopBackOff: inspect events and logs. The startup and liveness probes target /; a mount failure or bad image will keep the pod from becoming Ready.

kubectl describe pod -n "$NS" <pod>          # Events section shows scheduling/probe/mount errors
kubectl logs -n "$NS" <pod> --previous       # logs from the crashed container

Permission denied writing to the database PVC: bellamy/wallos's runtime UID/GID was not confirmed during research, so stateful_fs_group defaults unset. Inspect the running container to find the actual UID/GID and set stateful_fs_group accordingly.
```
kubectl exec -n "$NS" <pod> -- id
```
Double-mount at the database path: if you changed stateful_pvc_enabled, confirm enable_gcs_db_volume was correctly auto-disabled by Wallos_Common (both mounted at once is a misconfiguration, not a supported state).
```
kubectl describe pod -n "$NS" <pod>          # check Volumes / Mounts section
```
State not persisting across restarts: confirm stateful_pvc_mount_path is exactly /var/www/html/db; a mismatch stores the DB on ephemeral disk and loses state on restart.
Renewal notifications or exchange-rate updates stopped arriving: this almost always means the workload was scaled to zero or beyond one replica — check min_instance_count/max_instance_count first, before assuming an application-level bug.
Pending pod / no external IP: check kubectl describe pod events for resource or quota issues, and confirm the Service/Ingress has an assigned IP if enable_custom_domain = true.
Image pull errors: confirm the image exists in Artifact Registry (if mirrored) and the node service account can pull it; mirrored images use imagePullPolicy = Always, so a stale local cache is not the cause — check the registry and IAM instead.
Login shows admin/admin still active after redeploy: expected if no prior SQLite DB existed at /var/www/html/db/wallos.db. If a fresh admin/admin prompt appears unexpectedly on a previously-configured deployment, check whether the PVC or GCS bucket was replaced/emptied.

See the Configuration Guide's Configuration Pitfalls section for setting-specific gotchas (including the critical rule to keep min_instance_count = max_instance_count = 1, never delete the database PVC or uploads bucket, and let Common manage the GCS-FUSE/PVC exclusivity for the database path).

Task 6 — Tear down [Automated]

On the Deployments page, open the deployment and click the Trash icon (Delete). Delete runs terraform destroy and is irreversible (the deployment record is retained for history). If a deployment is stuck and the RAD platform can no longer manage it (for example after manual changes that conflict with the Terraform state), use Purge instead — it removes the deployment from RAD's records without destroying the cloud resources (it makes RAD forget the project). This removes everything the module created — the Kubernetes workload and namespace, the database PVC and uploads GCS bucket (including the embedded SQLite database and custom logos — this is destructive and unrecoverable), and Artifact Registry images. Resources owned by Services_GCP (the VPC, GKE cluster, shared Artifact Registry) are managed separately and are not removed here.

Summary

Task	Type	Outcome
1 — Deploy	Automated	Module deploys the GKE StatefulSet workload, an HDD PVC for the database, and a GCS bucket for uploads; no Cloud SQL, no init job
2 — Access & verify	Manual	Connect to the cluster; health check passes; log in with seeded `admin`/`admin` and change the password immediately
3 — Operate	Manual	Inspect workload, keep replicas at exactly 1, update version, adjust ingress, inspect persistent state
4 — Observe	Manual	Query Cloud Logging; review Cloud Monitoring metrics and uptime check
5 — Troubleshoot	Manual	Diagnose pod, mount, PVC permission, scheduling, and image-pull issues
6 — Tear down	Automated	Delete (Trash) removes the workload, database PVC, and uploads bucket (destructive)

By Dr Shiyghan Emmanuel Navti · Google Cloud certified: ACE · PCA · PCD · PDE · PSE · CDL

Overview​

Objectives​

Prerequisites​

Task 1 — Deploy the module [Automated]​

Task 2 — Access & verify [Manual]​

Task 3 — Operate & keep it running (Day-2) [Manual]​

Task 4 — Observe: Logging & Monitoring [Manual]​

Task 5 — Troubleshoot & debug [Manual]​

Task 6 — Tear down [Automated]​

Summary​