Jobs and CronJobs

Not all workloads run forever. Some need to run once to completion (batch jobs), or run on a schedule (like backups). Kubernetes provides Jobs and CronJobs for these scenarios.

Jobs

A Job creates one or more Pods and ensures that a specified number of them successfully terminate. It is used for tasks like data migration, processing, or any run‑to‑completion work.

Example: A Job that runs a simple command:

apiVersion: batch/v1
kind: Job
metadata:
  name: pi
spec:
  template:
    spec:
      containers:
      - name: pi
        image: perl
        command: ["perl", "-Mbignum=bpi", "-wle", "print bpi(2000)"]
      restartPolicy: Never
  backoffLimit: 4

Create the Job:

kubectl apply -f job.yaml

Check Job status:

kubectl get jobs
kubectl get pods

View logs of the completed Pod:

kubectl logs pi-xxxxx

CronJobs

A CronJob creates Jobs on a repeating schedule. It is useful for periodic tasks like backups, reports, or cleanup.

Example: Run a job every minute:

apiVersion: batch/v1
kind: CronJob
metadata:
  name: hello
spec:
  schedule: "* * * * *"
  jobTemplate:
    spec:
      template:
        spec:
          containers:
          - name: hello
            image: busybox
            command: ["echo", "Hello from CronJob"]
          restartPolicy: OnFailure

Create the CronJob:

kubectl apply -f cronjob.yaml

Check CronJob status:

kubectl get cronjobs

See jobs created by the CronJob:

kubectl get jobs

Cleanup

Jobs and CronJobs can accumulate completed Pods. You can set ttlSecondsAfterFinished to automatically clean up completed Jobs, or delete them manually.

Two Minute Drill

Jobs run Pods to completion, ideal for batch processing.
CronJobs run Jobs on a schedule using cron syntax.
Define restartPolicy as Never or OnFailure for Jobs.
Use kubectl get jobs and kubectl get cronjobs to view them.
Jobs can auto‑cleanup with ttlSecondsAfterFinished.

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Jobs and CronJobs

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