Architecture
Clustering
Service Discovery Options
Choose from manual configuration, Consul, etcd, or Kubernetes-native discovery for your cluster topology.
Service discovery methods with trade-offs
Discovery Methods
Manual
Static node list in configuration file.
- • Simple to set up
- • No external dependencies
- • Requires restart for changes
- • Good for: dev, small clusters
Consul
HashiCorp Consul service registry.
- • Health checking built-in
- • DNS + HTTP discovery
- • Key-value for config
- • Good for: production multi-DC
etcd
CoreOS etcd distributed key-value store.
- • Strong consistency (Raft)
- • Watch for changes
- • Used by Kubernetes
- • Good for: existing etcd infra
KubernetesRecommended
Native K8s service and endpoint discovery.
- • Headless services
- • Automatic pod discovery
- • Label selectors
- • Good for: K8s deployments
Configuration Examples
Manual
{
"discovery": {
"type": "manual",
"nodes": [
{ "id": "node-1", "host": "10.0.0.1", "port": 9000 },
{ "id": "node-2", "host": "10.0.0.2", "port": 9000 },
{ "id": "node-3", "host": "10.0.0.3", "port": 9000 }
]
}
}Consul
{
"discovery": {
"type": "consul",
"consul": {
"address": "consul.service.consul:8500",
"serviceName": "mlgraph",
"datacenter": "dc1",
"token": "consul-acl-token",
"healthCheck": {
"interval": "10s",
"timeout": "5s",
"deregisterAfter": "1m"
}
}
}
}Kubernetes
{
"discovery": {
"type": "kubernetes",
"kubernetes": {
"namespace": "mlgraph",
"labelSelector": "app=mlgraph,component=node",
"portName": "grpc",
"watchTimeout": "30s"
}
}
}
# Kubernetes Service (headless)
apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
name: mlgraph-nodes
spec:
clusterIP: None # Headless
selector:
app: mlgraph
ports:
- name: grpc
port: 9000Comparison
| Feature | Manual | Consul | etcd | K8s |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dynamic updates | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Health checks | No | Yes | Manual | Yes |
| External deps | None | Consul | etcd | K8s API |
| Best for | Dev | Multi-DC | Existing | K8s native |