Datadog Operator

Overview

The Datadog Operator aims to provide a new way of deploying the Datadog Agent on Kubernetes. Once deployed, the Datadog Operator provides:

• Agent configuration validation that limits configuration mistakes.
• Orchestration of creating/updating Datadog Agent resources.
• Reporting of Agent configuration status in its Kubernetes CRD resource.
• Optionally, use of an advanced DaemonSet deployment by leveraging the ExtendedDaemonSet.
• Many other features to come :).

The Datadog Operator is RedHat certified and available on operatorhub.io.

Datadog Operator vs. Helm chart

You can also use official Datadog Helm chart or a DaemonSet to install the Datadog Agent on Kubernetes. However, using the Datadog Operator offers the following advantages:

• The Operator has built-in defaults based on Datadog best practices.
• Operator configuration is more flexible for future enhancements.
• As a Kubernetes Operator, the Datadog Operator is treated as a first-class resource by the Kubernetes API.
• Unlike the Helm chart, the Operator is included in the Kubernetes reconciliation loop.

Datadog fully supports using a DaemonSet to deploy the Agent, but manual DaemonSet configuration leaves significant room for error. Therefore, using a DaemonSet is not highly recommended.

Getting started

See the Getting Started dedicated documentation to learn how to deploy the Datadog operator and your first Agent, and Configuration to see examples, a list of all configuration keys, and default values.

Migrating from v1alpha1 to v2alpha1

Datadog Operator v1.8.0+ does not support migrating from DatadogAgent CRD v1alpha1 to v2alpha1 or from Operator v0.8.x to v1.x.x.

Use the conversion webhook in v1.7.0 to migrate, and then upgrade to a recent version.

Default Enabled Features

• Cluster Agent
• Admission Controller
• Cluster Checks
• Kubernetes Event Collection
• Kubernetes State Core Check
• Live Container Collection
• Orchestrator Explorer
• UnixDomainSocket transport for DogStatsD (and APM if enabled)
• Process Discovery

Functionalities

The Datadog operator also allows you to:

• Configure and provide custom checks to the Agents.
• Deploy the Datadog Cluster Agent with your node Agents.
• Secrets Management with the Datadog Operator.

How to contribute

See the How to Contribute page.

Release

Release process documentation is available here.