Installing aws-iam-authenticator - Amazon EKS
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Installing aws-iam-authenticator

Amazon EKS uses IAM to provide authentication to your Kubernetes cluster through the Amazon IAM authenticator for Kubernetes. You can configure the stock kubectl client to work with Amazon EKS by installing the Amazon IAM authenticator for Kubernetes and modifying your kubectl configuration file to use it for authentication.

Note

If you're running the Amazon CLI version 1.16.156 or later, then you don't need to install the authenticator. Instead, you can use the aws eks get-token command. For more information, see Create kubeconfig file manually.

If you're unable to use the Amazon CLI version 1.16.156 or later to create the kubeconfig file, then you can install the Amazon IAM authenticator for Kubernetes on macOS, Linux, or Windows.

macOS
To install aws-iam-authenticator with Homebrew

The easiest way to install the aws-iam-authenticator is with Homebrew.

  1. If you do not already have Homebrew installed on your Mac, install it with the following command.

    /bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install.sh)"

  2. Install the aws-iam-authenticator with the following command.

    brew install aws-iam-authenticator

  3. Test that the aws-iam-authenticator binary works.

    aws-iam-authenticator help
To install aws-iam-authenticator on macOS

You can also install the aws-iam-authenticator by following these steps.

  1. Download the aws-iam-authenticator binary from GitHub for your hardware platform. The first command downloads the amd64 release. The second command downloads the arm64 release.

    curl -Lo aws-iam-authenticator https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-iam-authenticator/releases/download/v0.5.9/aws-iam-authenticator_0.5.9_darwin_amd64

    curl -Lo aws-iam-authenticator https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-iam-authenticator/releases/download/v0.5.9/aws-iam-authenticator_0.5.9_darwin_arm64

  2. (Optional) Verify the downloaded binary with the SHA-256 checksum for the file.

    1. Download the SHA-256 checksum file.

      curl -Lo aws-iam-authenticator.txt https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-iam-authenticator/releases/download/v0.5.9/authenticator_0.5.9_checksums.txt

    2. View the checksum for the authenticator binary that you downloaded. The first command returns the amd64 checksum. The second command returns the arm64 checksum.

      awk '/aws-iam-authenticator_0.5.9_darwin_amd64/ {print $1}' aws-iam-authenticator.txt

      awk '/aws-iam-authenticator_0.5.9_darwin_arm64/ {print $1}' aws-iam-authenticator.txt

      The example output is as follows.

      7656bd290a7e9cb588df1d9ccec43fab7f2447b88ed4f41d3f5092fd114b0939

    3. Determine the SHA-256 checksum for your downloaded binary.

      openssl sha1 -sha256 aws-iam-authenticator

      The example output is as follows.

      SHA256(aws-iam-authenticator)= 7656bd290a7e9cb588df1d9ccec43fab7f2447b88ed4f41d3f5092fd114b0939

      The returned output should match the output returned in the previous step.

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  3. Apply execute permissions to the binary.

    chmod +x ./aws-iam-authenticator

  4. Copy the binary to a folder in your $PATH. We recommend creating a $HOME/bin/aws-iam-authenticator and ensuring that $HOME/bin comes first in your $PATH.

    mkdir -p $HOME/bin && cp ./aws-iam-authenticator $HOME/bin/aws-iam-authenticator && export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/bin

  5. Add $HOME/bin to your PATH environment variable.

    echo 'export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/bin' >> ~/.bash_profile

  6. Test that the aws-iam-authenticator binary works.

    aws-iam-authenticator help
Linux
To install aws-iam-authenticator on Linux

  1. Download the aws-iam-authenticator binary from GitHub for your hardware platform. The first command downloads the amd64 release. The second command downloads the arm64 release.

    curl -Lo aws-iam-authenticator https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-iam-authenticator/releases/download/v0.5.9/aws-iam-authenticator_0.5.9_linux_amd64

    curl -Lo aws-iam-authenticator https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-iam-authenticator/releases/download/v0.5.9/aws-iam-authenticator_0.5.9_linux_arm64

  2. (Optional) Verify the downloaded binary with the SHA-256 checksum for the file.

    1. Download the SHA-256 checksum file.

      curl -Lo aws-iam-authenticator.txt https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-iam-authenticator/releases/download/v0.5.9/authenticator_0.5.9_checksums.txt

    2. View the checksum for the authenticator binary that you downloaded. The first command returns the amd64 checksum. The second command returns the arm64 checksum.

      awk '/aws-iam-authenticator_0.5.9_linux_amd64/ {print $1}' aws-iam-authenticator.txt

      awk '/aws-iam-authenticator_0.5.9_linux_arm64/ {print $1}' aws-iam-authenticator.txt

      The example output is as follows.

      b192431c22d720c38adbf53b016c33ab17105944ee73b25f485aa52c9e9297a7

    3. Determine the SHA-256 checksum for your downloaded binary.

      openssl sha1 -sha256 aws-iam-authenticator

      The example output is as follows.

      SHA256(aws-iam-authenticator)= b192431c22d720c38adbf53b016c33ab17105944ee73b25f485aa52c9e9297a7

      The returned output should match the output returned in the previous step.

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  3. Apply execute permissions to the binary.

    chmod +x ./aws-iam-authenticator

  4. Copy the binary to a folder in your $PATH. We recommend creating a $HOME/bin/aws-iam-authenticator and ensuring that $HOME/bin comes first in your $PATH.

    mkdir -p $HOME/bin && cp ./aws-iam-authenticator $HOME/bin/aws-iam-authenticator && export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/bin

  5. Add $HOME/bin to your PATH environment variable.

    echo 'export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/bin' >> ~/.bashrc

  6. Test that the aws-iam-authenticator binary works.

    aws-iam-authenticator help
Windows
To install aws-iam-authenticator on Windows with Chocolatey

  1. If you do not already have Chocolatey installed on your Windows system, see Installing chocolatey.

  2. Open a PowerShell terminal window and install the aws-iam-authenticator package with the following command:

    choco install -y aws-iam-authenticator

  3. Test that the aws-iam-authenticator binary works.

    aws-iam-authenticator help
To install aws-iam-authenticator on Windows

  1. Open a PowerShell terminal window and download the aws-iam-authenticator binary from GitHub.

    curl -Lo aws-iam-authenticator.exe https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-iam-authenticator/releases/download/v0.5.9/aws-iam-authenticator_0.5.9_windows_amd64.exe

  2. (Optional) Verify the downloaded binary with the SHA-256 checksum for the file.

    1. Download the SHA-256 checksum file.

      curl -Lo aws-iam-authenticator.txt https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/aws-iam-authenticator/releases/download/v0.5.9/authenticator_0.5.9_checksums.txt

    2. View the checksum for the authenticator binary that you downloaded.

      $checksum = Get-Content aws-iam-authenticator.txt
$checksum[3]

      The example output is as follows.

      b7345e06c5f1d31b9459a38baffe0744343711cb5042cb31ff1e072d870c42f9  aws-iam-authenticator_0.5.9_windows_amd64.exe

    3. Determine the SHA-256 checksum for your downloaded binary.

      Get-Filehash aws-iam-authenticator.exe

      The example output is as follows.

      Algorithm       Hash                                                                   Path
---------       ----                                                                   ----
SHA256          B7345E06C5F1D31B9459A38BAFFE0744343711CB5042CB31FF1E072D870C42F9       /home/cloudshell-user/temp/aws-iam-authenticator

      Though the returned output is uppercase, it should match the lowercase output returned in the previous step.

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  3. Copy the binary to a folder in your PATH. If you have an existing directory in your PATH that you use for command line utilities, copy the binary to that directory. Otherwise, complete the following steps.

    1. Create a new directory for your command line binaries, such as C:\bin.

    2. Copy the aws-iam-authenticator.exe binary to your new directory.

    3. Edit your user or system PATH environment variable to add the new directory to your PATH.

    4. Close your PowerShell terminal and open a new one to pick up the new PATH variable.

  4. Test that the aws-iam-authenticator binary works.

    aws-iam-authenticator help

If you have an existing Amazon EKS cluster, create a kubeconfig file for that cluster. For more information, see Creating or updating a kubeconfig file for an Amazon EKS cluster. Otherwise, see Creating an Amazon EKS cluster to create a new Amazon EKS cluster.