ROSAENG-726: Spike request-serving isolation on EKS (kata + qemu)

[typeid]

Summary

• Design doc comparing isolation models for request-serving workloads on EKS (docs/design/request-serving-isolation-eks.md)
  • Option A: Karpenter dedicated nodes (A1: per-HCP subnets, A2: shared subnets)
  • Option B: Kata Containers microVM isolation (B1: Firecracker, B2: QEMU)
  • Security analysis with attack chain comparison across all options
  • Covers FIPS compliance, subnet isolation compatibility, VPA scaling overrides
• Working POC of Option B1 (Kata/Firecracker) on AL2023 — validated with full KAS pods running under kata-fc

Related branches

The POC implementation spans three repos. The design doc covers multiple variants; this implementation is B1 (Firecracker) only:

Repo	Branch	Changes
rosa-hyperfleet (this PR)	spike_request_serving_nodes	kata-deploy Helm chart, Karpenter NodePool with nested virt + devmapper, design doc
rosa-hyperfleet-api	request_serving_nodes	Kata topology annotation on HostedClusters, CPO image update
hypershift	request_serving_nodes	Kata RuntimeClass for request-serving pods, aws-iam-authenticator KAS sidecar

Open questions

1. Does AWS accept shared-subnet Nitro isolation (Option A2) for the ROSA HCP security bar?
2. Does Kata deploy + run on RHCOS's immutable OSTree root? (FIPS requirement for production)
3. Karpenter node pairing mechanism for Option A
4. Full FIPS validation of RHCOS → KVM → VMM → guest kernel stack

Test plan

• KAS pods boot and serve under kata-fc with all ConfigMap/Secret mounts
• RHCOS AMI with Kata (not yet attempted)
• QEMU variant (B2) validation
• VPA minAllowed scaling override

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

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[openshift-ci-robot]

@typeid: This pull request references ROSAENG-726 which is a valid jira issue.

Warning: The referenced jira issue has an invalid target version for the target branch this PR targets: expected the story to target the "5.0.0" version, but no target version was set.

Details

In response to this:

Summary

• Design doc comparing isolation models for request-serving workloads on EKS (docs/design/request-serving-isolation-eks.md)
• Option A: Karpenter dedicated nodes (A1: per-HCP subnets, A2: shared subnets)
• Option B: Kata Containers microVM isolation (B1: Firecracker, B2: QEMU)
• Security analysis with attack chain comparison across all options
• Covers FIPS compliance, subnet isolation compatibility, VPA scaling overrides
• Working POC of Option B1 (Kata/Firecracker) on AL2023 — validated with full KAS pods running under kata-fc

Related branches

The POC implementation spans three repos. The design doc covers multiple variants; this implementation is B1 (Firecracker) only:

Repo	Branch	Changes
rosa-hyperfleet (this PR)	spike_request_serving_nodes	kata-deploy Helm chart, Karpenter NodePool with nested virt + devmapper, design doc
rosa-hyperfleet-api	request_serving_nodes	Kata topology annotation on HostedClusters, CPO image update
hypershift	request_serving_nodes	Kata RuntimeClass for request-serving pods, aws-iam-authenticator KAS sidecar

Open questions

1. Does AWS accept shared-subnet Nitro isolation (Option A2) for the ROSA HCP security bar?
2. Does Kata deploy + run on RHCOS's immutable OSTree root? (FIPS requirement for production)
3. Karpenter node pairing mechanism for Option A
4. Full FIPS validation of RHCOS → KVM → VMM → guest kernel stack

Test plan

• KAS pods boot and serve under kata-fc with all ConfigMap/Secret mounts
• RHCOS AMI with Kata (not yet attempted)
• QEMU variant (B2) validation
• VPA minAllowed scaling override

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

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