dsh-kubernetes

dsh-kubernetes gives DeepSeek Harness a safe Kubernetes capability: inspect workloads, retrieve bounded logs and events, diagnose common failures, and perform approval-gated changes.

A community plugin for DeepSeek Harness (DSH). It is not a kubectl wrapper — it turns Kubernetes into a structured, Agent-friendly runtime capability with a read-first security model.

DSH Agent
   ↓
Generic Kubernetes Tools (10)
   ↓
ctx.kubernetes capability service
   ↓
KubernetesService (policy · diagnosis · bounding)
   ↓
KubernetesClientProvider (@kubernetes/client-node)
   ↓
Kubernetes API

Highlights

• Read-first by default — readOnly: true out of the box. Real writes require explicit opt-in and survive the DSH approval gate.
• 10 structured tools — every tool returns JSON with a schema plus a compact text rendering; no fragile CLI output parsing.
• k8s_diagnose evidence engine — walks Deployment/StatefulSet → Pods → containers → events → bounded logs and classifies likely failure categories (CrashLoopBackOff, ImagePullBackOff, OOMKilled, probe failures, …). No inner LLM: the plugin collects evidence, the DSH Agent reasons.
• Bounded, sanitized logs — tailLines / sinceSeconds / container / previous / maxChars with hard caps. Logs are UNTRUSTED DATA: secret-shaped values are redacted, ANSI/control characters stripped.
• Secrets never leak — k8s_describe secret returns metadata, type and data keys only. Credential-shaped fields (token, password, client-key-data, service-account tokens, container env secrets, …) are redacted everywhere.
• Controlled k8s_apply — server-side dry-run by default; real applies are denied under read-only policy, or escalated to approval (ask) when writes are enabled, with cluster/namespace context and production-risk warnings in the reason.

Installation

dsh plugin add dsh-kubernetes          # from npm (once published)
# or from a packed tarball:
npm pack
dsh plugin add ./dsh-kubernetes-0.1.0.tgz

Library use outside DSH also works — the package exports a host-agnostic API:

import { KubernetesClientProvider, DiagnosisEngine, KubernetesService } from 'dsh-kubernetes';

Configuration

The plugin resolves kubeconfig with standard priority: explicit kubeconfigPath → KUBECONFIG env → ~/.kube/config → in-cluster service account. Context is never switched silently.

Option	Default	Description
readOnly	true	Read-only mode. Disables real writes even if allowWrite is true.
allowWrite	false	Master switch for write operations. Real applies additionally require approval.
context	–	Explicit kubeconfig context override.
namespace	context namespace / default	Default namespace override.
kubeconfigPath	–	Explicit kubeconfig file path.
maxLogChars	8000	Hard cap of characters per log excerpt (500–20000).
maxLogTailLines	200	Hard cap of tail lines per log request (1–500).
maxLogSinceSeconds	3600	Hard cap of the log time window in seconds (10–21600).

Profile example — the plugin's bundled cordis.patch.yml inserts itself with safe defaults automatically; override by id in your own profile layer if needed:

- id: dsh-kubernetes
  config:
    readOnly: true
    allowWrite: false

Tools

Tool	Access	What it does
k8s_context	read	Active context, cluster server, effective namespace, capabilities, all contexts (no credentials).
k8s_namespaces	read	Namespaces with phase.
k8s_workloads	read	Deployments/StatefulSets/DaemonSets with replicas + health, unhealthy-first.
k8s_pods	read	Pods with phase, health, restarts, container waiting reasons (cap 200).
k8s_describe	read	Sanitized resource describe. Secrets: metadata/type/data keys only.
k8s_logs	read	Bounded, sanitized, de-duplicated pod logs.
k8s_events	read	Events (optionally scoped to a resource), sanitized + bounded.
k8s_diagnose	read	Structured DiagnosisEvidence with likely failure categories.
k8s_rollout	read	Rollout status for a workload.
k8s_apply	gated	Server-side dry-run apply by default; real apply needs allowWrite and approval.

Security model

readOnly=true (default)      readOnly=false + allowWrite=true
────────────────────────     ─────────────────────────────────
get/list/describe  ✓         get/list/describe          ✓
logs/events        ✓         logs/events                ✓
apply dryRun=true  ✓         apply dryRun=true          ✓
apply dryRun=false ✗ deny    apply dryRun=false         → approval (ask)

• Write operations bind explicitly to context / cluster / namespace / resource and show them before approval.
• Contexts named like prod/production/prd raise the risk level in the approval reason (string match is a hint, never proof of safety).
• No delete, exec, port-forward, scale, restart or rollback tools in v1 — by design.
• kubeconfig contents, tokens, client keys and certificates never enter tool results or the session.

Diagnosis demo

User: Why does production/order-service keep restarting?

Agent → k8s_diagnose(Deployment/order-service)

Evidence:
- deployment: 3 desired / 1 ready — progressing
- pods: 3 total; 2× CrashLoopBackOff (unhealthy)
- containers: last termination OOMKilled (exit 137), restarts 14
- memory limit: 512Mi on all containers
- relevant events: BackOff ×14 (Warning)
- bounded logs (tail 40, redacted): "OOMkilled while serving traffic"
- likelyCategories: ["crash-loop", "oom-killed"]

The plugin marks categories as likely, never as certain facts — final reasoning stays with the DSH Agent.

Dry-run / approval demo

Agent → k8s_apply(manifest, dryRun=true)
Result: applied (server-side dry-run): ConfigMap/order-service-config (namespace default)

User: looks good, apply it for real

Agent → k8s_apply(manifest, dryRun=false)
Approval request (ask):
  k8s_apply with dryRun=false targets context "kind-dsh-e2e" (namespace "default").
  Approve to perform the real change.

Under the default read-only policy the same call is denied outright:

{ kind: "deny", reason: "real apply denied: plugin is read-only (readOnly=true, allowWrite=false). Set allowWrite=true and readOnly=false to enable approval-gated writes." }

Compatibility

Component	Tested with
DeepSeek Harness plugin API	@deepseek-ai/dsh-tools 0.1.0-rc.6
Cordis runtime	@deepseek-ai/cordis 4.0.1
Kubernetes client	@kubernetes/client-node 1.4.0
Kubernetes cluster	kind v1.32.2 (E2E), standard API groups core/v1, apps/v1
Node.js	≥ 18.18 (tested on 22.x)

Known limitations

• v1 targets standard Kubernetes only (OpenShift / EKS/GKE/AKS-specific auth flows untested; standard kubeconfig works).
• k8s_apply performs server-side apply for create/update; no delete, no exec, no port-forward, no scale/rollback tools.
• Rollout status is computed for Deployment/StatefulSet/DaemonSet; other kinds return unknown.
• Log redaction uses pattern heuristics — exhaustive secret detection is not guaranteed.
• CRDs are not listed by k8s_workloads (core workload kinds only); k8s_describe works for arbitrary kinds.

Uninstall

dsh plugin remove dsh-kubernetes

All service/tool registrations are attached to the plugin fiber — removal rolls them back completely, with no residual listeners or processes.

Development

npm install
npm run lint        # tsc --noEmit
npm test            # 105 unit + mock-API + contract + cordis tests
npm run build

# Real-cluster E2E (throwaway cluster only):
kind create cluster --name dsh-e2e
DSH_K8S_E2E=1 npm run test:e2e

License

MIT