Find service owner of a kubernetes endpoints

Question

I have an endpoints that I can see via (for example) :

kubectl get endpoints busybox-service

This endpoints is "backed" by a service:

kubectl get services busybox-service

Is there a way for me via the endpoints object, to find the "backing" service, without finding it by name?

What I mean by that, is having just the information from (for example):

kubectl get endpoints busybox-service -o=json

or anything like that, to be able to tell what the metadata.uid of the service is?

So, if I do : kubectl get endpoints busybox-service -o=json, I would get:

"metadata": {
        "annotations": {
            "endpoints.kubernetes.io/last-change-trigger-time": "2023-03-19T19:40:08Z"
        },
        "creationTimestamp": "2023-03-19T19:40:08Z",
        "labels": {
            "a": "b"
        },
        "name": "busybox-service",
        "namespace": "default",
        "resourceVersion": "277476",
        "uid": "8d76841b-ad74-4697-8d47-e7449b2cea24"
    }

that is, I get the uid of the endpoints: "uid": "8d76841b-ad74-4697-8d47-e7449b2cea24". Is there an extended call of some kind to the endpoints that would give me the uid of the service that this endpoints is based on.

Something like this does not exist, but may be there is a certain call that I miss:

"metadata": {
        "annotations": {
            "endpoints.kubernetes.io/last-change-trigger-time": "2023-03-19T19:40:08Z"
        },
        "creationTimestamp": "2023-03-19T19:40:08Z",
        "labels": {
            "a": "b"
        },
        "name": "busybox-service",
        "namespace": "default",
        "resourceVersion": "277476",
        "uid": "8d76841b-ad74-4697-8d47-e7449b2cea24"
        "ownerReference": "<UID_OF_THE_SERVICE>"
    }

Notice the last field: "ownerReference": "<UID_OF_THE_SERVICE>" - in reality it does not exist, but may be I miss some kind of a call that would give me this information.

Thank you.

Unfortunately in [official k8](https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/overview/working-with-objects/owners-dependents) documentation they only mention that [EndpointSlice](https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/services-networking/endpoint-slices/#ownership) has **ownerReference** but not the [Endpoints](https://kubernetes.io/docs/reference/kubernetes-api/service-resources/endpoints-v1/). — Dharani Dhar Golladasari, Mar 21 '23 at 12:48
@DharaniDharGolladasari yeah, `EndpointSlices` would have solved this for me, as they have support for both `ownerReferences` and `endpointslice.kubernetes.io/managed-by` and `kubernetes.io/service-name` which the controller would inject. If you want you can answer this question in this manner and I will be glad to accept it. — Eugene, Mar 21 '23 at 13:38

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 22 '23 at 05:59

Endpointslice object may suit this kind of requirement as it has the ownerRefernce metadata and also the annotations like kubernetes.io/servie-name and endpointslice.kubernetes.io/managed-by which helps to get the source metadata.

`kubernetes.io/servie-name helps to indicate the name of the service object from which the Endpointslice is created.
endpointslice.kubernetes.io/managed-by which can be used to indicate controller or operator which is managing the Endpointslice object.

You can use kubectl describe command to get the details of ownerReferences and annotations as shown here

ownerReferences:

$ kubectl get endpointslice <endpointslice-name> -o=jsonpath='{.metadata.ownerReferences}'

Annotations:

 $ kubectl describe enpointslice <endpointslice-name> | grep kubernetes.io/servie-name

 $ kubectl describe enpointslice <endpointslice-name> | grep endpointslice.kubernetes.io/managed-by

For more detailed information refer to these documents Endpointslice, Ownerships

Find service owner of a kubernetes endpoints

1 Answers1