Hibernator Operator

Declarative Kubernetes operator for suspending and restoring cloud infrastructure during off-hours

Overview

Hibernator is a Kubernetes operator that provides centralized, declarative management for suspending and restoring cloud resources during user-defined off-hours. It extends beyond Kubernetes to manage heterogeneous cloud infrastructure (EKS, RDS, EC2, and more) with dependency-aware orchestration and auditable execution.

Key capabilities:

• 🕐 Timezone-aware scheduling with start/end times and day-of-week patterns
• ⏸️ Schedule exceptions with lead-time grace periods (extend, suspend, replace)
• 🔗 Dependency orchestration using DAG, Staged, Parallel, or Sequential strategies
• 🔌 Pluggable executor model for AWS (EKS, RDS, EC2, Karpenter)
• 🔒 Isolated runner jobs with scoped RBAC, IRSA, and projected ServiceAccount tokens
• 📊 Real-time progress streaming via gRPC (preferred) or HTTP webhooks (fallback)
• 💾 Durable restore metadata persisted in ConfigMaps for safe recovery

Why Hibernator?

Problem: Teams running non-production environments (DEV/STG) waste resources during off-hours. Ad-hoc scripts lack coordination, auditability, and safe restore semantics when dealing with dependencies across Kubernetes clusters, databases, and compute instances.

Solution: Hibernator provides intent-driven infrastructure suspension with:

• Declarative HibernatePlan CRDs defining what to suspend, not how
• Controller-managed dependency resolution preventing race conditions (e.g., snapshot before cluster shutdown)
• Central status ledger with execution history, logs, and restore artifact references
• GitOps-friendly configuration with validation webhooks

Architecture

graph TD
    subgraph CP [Control Plane]
        direction TB
        Reconciler["<b>Unified Reconciler (HibernatePlan Controller)</b><br/>• Schedule evaluation<br/>• Dependency resolution<br/>• Job lifecycle management"]
        
        subgraph Processors [Resource Processors]
            direction LR
            P1[EKS]
            P2[RDS]
            P3[EC2]
            P4[...]
        end
        
        Connectors[("<b>Connectors (Metadata)</b><br/>• CloudProvider<br/>• K8SCluster")]
        
        Streaming["<b>Streaming Server</b><br/>• Log aggregation<br/>• Progress tracking"]
        
        Reconciler --> Processors
        Processors -.-> Connectors
        Reconciler --- Streaming
    end

    Processors --> RJ1["<b>Runner Job (EKS)</b><br/>• Executor<br/>• gRPC client"]
    Processors --> RJ2["<b>Runner Job (RDS)</b><br/>• Executor<br/>• gRPC client"]
    Processors --> RJ3["<b>Runner Job (EC2)</b><br/>• Executor<br/>• gRPC client"]

    style CP fill:#f5f5f5,stroke:#333,stroke-width:2px
    style Connectors fill:#fff,stroke:#333,stroke-dasharray: 5 5
    style RJ1 fill:#fff,stroke:#333,stroke-width:1px
    style RJ2 fill:#fff,stroke:#333,stroke-width:1px
    style RJ3 fill:#fff,stroke:#333,stroke-width:1px

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The operator adopts a unified reconciler pattern:

• Control Plane: The HibernatePlan controller acts as the central brain, orchestrating the lifecycle through resource-specific processors.
• Connectors: Resources like CloudProvider and K8SCluster currently serve as metadata-only containers for credentials and connectivity details.
• Runner Jobs: Isolated Kubernetes Jobs per target, performing the actual shutdown/wakeup operations while streaming logs back to the control plane.
• Executors: Pluggable implementations within the runners (EKS, RDS, EC2) handling resource-specific logic.

Features

• Execution Strategies: Sequential, Parallel, DAG, and Staged orchestration.
• Supported Executors: EKS, RDS, EC2, Karpenter, and generic WorkloadScaler.
• Security: RBAC-scoped runners, IRSA support, and TokenReview authentication.
• Schedule Exceptions: Temporary overrides for emergency events or maintenance.

Documentation

• 🚀 Usage Guide: Installation, Quick Start, and Configuration.
• 🗺️ Roadmap: Current status, planned features, and known limitations.
• 🤝 Contributing: How to get involved and development guidelines.
• 📚 Reference Documentation: Detailed design RFCs and architecture principles.