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Glossary

This page covers Rancher-specific terminology and symbols which might be unfamiliar, or which differ between Rancher versions.

Icons & Symbols

☰: The navigation menu toggle, a button in the far top left corner of the Rancher UI. Clicking the ☰ opens a sidebar that provides access to the main sections of the Rancher interface.
⋮: The submenu toggle, a button found at the far right of many table rows throughout the Rancher UI. Clicking the ⋮ opens a submenu containing a contextual list of tasks related to the item in that row.

A

Apps: When describing navigation within Rancher, the section of the Rancher UI where you manage Helm charts and Helm chart repositories. In earlier versions of Rancher, this section was called Apps & Marketplace, or Catalogs.
Apps & Marketplace: The section of the Rancher UI where you manage Helm charts and Helm chart repositories. In earlier versions of Rancher, this section was called Catalogs. In later versions, it is called Apps.

C

Catalogs: The section of the Rancher UI where you manage Helm charts and Helm chart repositories. In later versions of Rancher, this section is called Apps & Marketplace, or Apps.
Community: A build of Rancher that's available to the entire Rancher community.

D

Downstream cluster: An alternative name for a managed cluster, a Kubernetes cluster that is managed by a Rancher server.

E

Extension: Helm charts that can extend and enhance the Rancher UI, and tailor Rancher to your specific environment. Some Extensions require manual installation on a cluster, while others are built into Rancher. Built-in Extensions include Fleet and Harvester. Manually installed Extensions include Kubewarden and Elemental.
Extension catalogs: Container image repositories that can be imported to add UI extensions to your Rancher instance.

H

Hosted cluster: A managed cluster that is hosted in the cloud, by a Kubernetes provider. Rancher supports a variety of hosted Kubernetes providers, including Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS), Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), and Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE). Rancher integrates with the hosted Kubernetes provider's cloud APIs, so that you can manage the cluster from the Rancher UI.

I

Imported cluster: An existing cluster that was provisioned by a third party, then set up to be managed by Rancher. Registered clusters in later versions of Rancher are roughly synonymous with imported clusters. The main difference is that there are more management features exposed in the Rancher UI for registered clusters than for imported clusters.

K

K3s: A lightweight Kubernetes distribution chiefly designed for workloads that run unattended under tight resource constraints.

L

Local cluster: An alternative name for a Rancher server, the Kubernetes cluster that hosts Rancher and manages other clusters. Here, local refers to the location of the Rancher installation, not to the user's local workstation. Local clusters can be hosted on-premises, in air-gapped environments, or in the cloud.

M

Managed cluster: A Kubernetes cluster that is managed by a Rancher server. Managed clusters can run on a variety of infrastructure and can be located anywhere, including in the cloud, on-premises, or in air-gapped environments.

R

Rancher: A Kubernetes management tool to deploy and run clusters anywhere and on any provider. Rancher includes all the software and downstream cluster components used to manage the entire Rancher deployment.
Rancher Kubernetes Engine (RKE): A CNCF-certified Kubernetes distribution that runs entirely within Docker containers. There are two main versions of RKE available. The 1.x software line is sometimes called RKE1, or simply RKE. The next-generation line is called RKE2.
Rancher Prime: Rancher Prime is a new edition of the commercial, enterprise offering built on the the same source code. Installation assets are hosted on a trusted registry owned and managed by Rancher with additional value coming in from security assurances, extended lifecycles, access to focused architectures and Kubernetes advisories.
Rancher server: The Kubernetes cluster that hosts Rancher and manages the other clusters in the Rancher deployment.
Registered cluster: An existing cluster that was provisioned by a third party, then set up to be managed by Rancher. Older versions of Rancher use Imported cluster to refer to a similar concept. The main difference is that there are more management features exposed in the Rancher UI for registered clusters than for imported clusters.
RKE1: An alternative name for the v1.x software line of Rancher Kubernetes Engine (RKE). Sometimes called RKE for short. RKE1 is a certified Kubernetes distribution and CLI/library which creates and manages a Kubernetes cluster.
RKE2: A fully conformant version of the Rancher Kubernetes Engine (RKE) that is designed for security and compliance with US federal government standards.
Roles: Roles determine what actions a Rancher user can make within a cluster or project.

U

Upstream cluster: An alternative name for the Rancher server, the Kubernetes cluster that hosts Rancher and manages the other clusters in the Rancher deployment.

W

Workload: Objects that set deployment rules for pods. Based on these rules, Kubernetes performs the deployment and updates the workload with the current state of the application. Workloads let you define the rules for application scheduling, scaling, and upgrade.

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Icons & Symbols

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