<p>I was wondering if it is possible to run a specific command (Example: echo "foo") at a specific time in all existing pods (pods that are not in the default namespace are included). It would be like a cronJob, but the only difference is that I want to specify/deploy it in one place only. Is that even possible?</p>

<p>It is possible. Please find the steps I followed, hope it help you.</p>

<p>First, create a simple script to read pod's name, <code>exec</code> and execute the command. </p>

<pre><code>import os, sys
import logging
from datetime import datetime

logging.basicConfig(stream=sys.stdout, level=logging.DEBUG)

dt = datetime.now()
ts = dt.strftime("%d-%m-%Y-%H-%M-%S-%f")

pods = os.popen("kubectl get po --all-namespaces").readlines()

for pod in pods:
    ns = pod.split()[0]
    po = pod.split()[1]

    try:
        h = os.popen("kubectl -n %s exec -i %s sh -- hostname" %(ns, po)).read()
        os.popen("kubectl -n %s exec -i %s sh -- touch /tmp/foo-%s.txt" %(ns, po, ts))
        logging.debug("Executed on %s" %h)
    except Exception as e:
        logging.error(e) 
</code></pre>

<p>Next, Dockerize the above script, build and push.</p>

<pre><code>FROM python:3.8-alpine

ENV KUBECTL_VERSION=v1.18.0

WORKDIR /foo

ADD https://storage.googleapis.com/kubernetes-release/release/${KUBECTL_VERSION}/bin/linux/amd64/kubectl .

RUN chmod +x kubectl &amp;&amp;\
    mv kubectl /usr/local/bin

COPY foo.py .

CMD ["python", "foo.py"]
</code></pre>

<p>Later we'll use this image in CronJob. You can see I have installed kubectl in the Dockerfile to trigger the kubectl commands. But it is insufficient, we should add <code>clusterole</code> and <code>clusterrolebinding</code> to the service account which runs the CronJob.</p>

<p>I have created a ns <code>foo</code> and I bound foo's default service account to cluster role I created as shown below.</p>

<pre><code>---
apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: ClusterRole
metadata:
  name: foo
rules:
- apiGroups: [""]
  resources: ["pods", "pods/exec"]
  verbs: ["get", "list", "create"]
---
apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: ClusterRoleBinding
metadata:
  name: foo
subjects:
- kind: ServiceAccount
  name: default
  namespace: foo
roleRef:
  kind: ClusterRole
  name: foo
  apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io
</code></pre>

<p>Now service account default of foo has permissions to <code>get, list, exec</code> to all the pods in the cluster.</p>

<p>Finally create a cronjob to run the task.</p>

<pre><code>apiVersion: batch/v1beta1
kind: CronJob
metadata:
  name: foo
spec:
  schedule: "15 9 * * *"
  jobTemplate:
    spec:
      template:
        spec:
          containers:
          - name: foo
            image: harik8/sof:62177831
            imagePullPolicy: Always
          restartPolicy: OnFailure
</code></pre>

<p>Login to the pods and check, it should have created file with timestamp at <code>/tmp</code> directory of each pod.</p>

<pre><code>$ kubectl exec -it app-59666bb5bc-v6p2h sh           
# ls -lah /tmp          
-rw-r--r--  1 root root    0 Jun  4 09:15 foo-04-06-2020-09-15-06-792614.txt
</code></pre>

<p>logs</p>

<pre><code>error: cannot exec into a container in a completed pod; current phase is Failed
error: cannot exec into a container in a completed pod; current phase is Succeeded
DEBUG:root:Executed on foo-1591262100-798ng

DEBUG:root:Executed on grafana-5f6f8cbf75-jtksp

DEBUG:root:Executed on istio-egressgateway-557dcf8d8-npfnd

DEBUG:root:Executed on istio-ingressgateway-6489d9556d-2dp7j

command terminated with exit code 126
DEBUG:root:Executed on OCI runtime exec failed: exec failed: container_linux.go:349: starting container process caused "exec: \"hostname\": executable file not found in $PATH": unknown

DEBUG:root:Executed on istiod-774777b79-mvmqm
</code></pre>
