Set Up Red Hat OpenShift Locally with CRC

OpenShift is a Kubernetes-based platform developed by Red Hat to help organizations build, run, and manage modern applications at scale. Kubernetes provides the core container orchestration engine; OpenShift adds enterprise security controls, developer tooling, CI/CD integrations, and an integrated management experience.

OpenShift Advantages

Higher developer productivity
- Focus on writing code and deploy with a single workflow.
Simpler administration
- Built-in security through RBAC, image scanning, and network policies.
- Integrated monitoring, logging, and scaling.
Flexible and portable
- Run in a public cloud, a private data center, or on a laptop.
- Support hybrid-cloud and multicloud architectures.
Complete ecosystem
- Ready-to-use catalogs for languages, frameworks, and middleware.
- Operator Framework support for automating complex applications.

OpenShift Trade-offs

Installation and operational complexity
- More involved than a vanilla Kubernetes installation.
Licensing cost
- Enterprise editions require a Red Hat subscription.
Resource requirements
- Production deployments require significant hardware and server capacity.

OpenShift therefore offers more than container orchestration: it provides an application platform that supports fast delivery, consistent security standards, and operational stability.

Resource Requirements

Minimum RAM: 9 GB (16 GB recommended)
CPU: 4 cores
Storage: 35 GB

Implementation

1. Register a Red Hat OpenShift Account

Create a Red Hat account.
If you have not used the account before, start the Red Hat OpenShift free trial from Red Hat Developer.
Scroll to "Self Manage", select "Deploy on your local development machine", and select "Start your trial".
Select "Local".
Scroll to "OpenShift Local":
- Choose the operating system. This example uses Linux.
- Right-click "Download OpenShift Local" and copy the download link.
- Select "Copy Pull Secret".

2. Set Up OpenShift on a Laptop or VM

Download OpenShift Local using the copied link. This example uses:

bash

wget https://developers.redhat.com/content-gateway/rest/mirror/pub/openshift-v4/clients/crc/latest/crc-linux-amd64.tar.xz

Extract the archive.

bash

tar -xvf crc-linux-amd64.tar.xz
cd crc-linux-amd64

Copy crc to /local/bin so it can be called from any directory.
bash
```
sudo cp crc /local/bin
```
Run the setup command. CRC downloads the required images and applies the local configuration.
bash
```
crc setup
```
Start OpenShift.
bash
```
crc start
```

When prompted, paste the Pull Secret copied from the Red Hat dashboard. After startup completes, CRC displays the console URL and default credentials.

bash

INFO A CRC VM for OpenShift 4.19.3 is already running 
Started the OpenShift cluster.

The server is accessible via web console at:
  https://console-openshift-console.apps-crc.testing

Log in as administrator:
  Username: kubeadmin
  Password: aTz4U-aaaa-iiii-uuuu

Log in as user:
  Username: developer
  Password: developer

Use the 'oc' command line interface:
  $ eval $(crc oc-env)
  $ oc login -u developer https://api.crc.testing:6443

Configure the OpenShift CLI environment.
bash
```
eval $(crc oc-env)
```

bash

# Log in as the administrator
oc login -u kubeadmin -p aTz4U-****-****-*** https://api.crc.testing:6443
# Log in as the default non-administrator user
oc login -u developer -p developer https://api.crc.testing:6443

3. Open the OpenShift Console in a Browser

Check the cluster status.
bash
```
crc status
```

Confirm that the output reports "Running" and "Starting".

bash

CRC VM:          Running
OpenShift:       Starting (v4.19.3)
RAM Usage:       7.618GB of 10.95GB
Disk Usage:      27.59GB of 32.68GB (Inside the CRC VM)
Cache Usage:     29.84GB
Cache Directory: /home/student/.crc/cache

Copy the console URL displayed by crc start.

bash

The server is accessible via web console at:
  https://console-openshift-console.apps-crc.testing

Open the URL in Firefox and sign in with the credentials displayed by crc start.
You can now configure the cluster and create deployments and pods in the same way as with Kubernetes.