Uncharted Config

intermediateCreateContainerConfigError

Objective

Escape Room: Uncharted Config

The application pod is stuck and cannot start. Something it needs was never created.

Your Mission

Identify why the pod cannot start
Figure out what it needs
Fix the problem so the pod runs successfully

Success Criteria

The pod escape-app is in Running state
The pod shows "Application configured successfully!" in its logs

Getting Started

# Check the pod status
kubectl get pods -n escape-room-uncharted-config

# You'll see something like:
# NAME         READY   STATUS                       RESTARTS   AGE
# escape-app   0/1     CreateContainerConfigError   0          30s

Namespace

All resources are in the escape-room-uncharted-config namespace.

Good luck, engineer. Something is missing, and the app won't start without it.

Quick Start

Run this command in your terminal to set up the room:

$ make room-apply ROOM=room-uncharted-config

This creates the namespace escape-room-uncharted-config with the broken resources.

Other useful commands:

$ make room-test ROOM=room-uncharted-config

Verify the room is in the expected broken state

$ make room-escape-test ROOM=room-uncharted-config

Test if you have successfully fixed all issues

$ make room-reset ROOM=room-uncharted-config

Reset the room to try again

Useful Commands

Check pod status

$ kubectl get pods -n escape-room-uncharted-config

See the current state of pods in the namespace

View events

$ kubectl get events -n escape-room-uncharted-config --sort-by='.lastTimestamp'

Check recent events for error details

Describe pods

$ kubectl describe pods -n escape-room-uncharted-config

Get detailed information about pods

Check logs

$ kubectl logs -l app.kubernetes.io/part-of=K8sEscapeRoom -n escape-room-uncharted-config

View the application logs

Hints

0/4 revealed

Submit Proof

View Solution (Spoiler)

Solution preview locked

Complete the room to unlock the full solution here

Run this to see the full solution:

$ make room-solution ROOM=room-uncharted-config

Show solution anyway (spoiler)

Solution: ConfigMap Missing

Root Cause

The pod specification includes an envFrom block that references a ConfigMap named app-config:

envFrom:
  - configMapRef:
      name: app-config

This ConfigMap was never created, so Kubernetes cannot start the container. The CreateContainerConfigError status indicates that the container runtime couldn't configure the container environment because a required resource is missing.

Diagnosis Steps

# Step 1: Check pod status
kubectl get pods -n escape-room-uncharted-config
# Output: escape-app   0/1   CreateContainerConfigError   0   ...

# Step 2: Check events for details
kubectl describe pod escape-app -n escape-room-uncharted-config
# Look at Events section - you'll see:
# Warning  Failed  ...  configmap "app-config" not found

# Step 3: Verify ConfigMap doesn't exist
kubectl get configmaps -n escape-room-uncharted-config
# Output: No resources found

# Step 4: Check what the pod expects
kubectl get pod escape-app -n escape-room-uncharted-config -o yaml | grep -A5 envFrom

The Fix

Create the missing ConfigMap:

kubectl create configmap app-config -n escape-room-uncharted-config

The pod will automatically retry and start once the ConfigMap exists. No delete/recreate needed.

Best Practice: Populating ConfigMap Values

In production, you'd populate the ConfigMap with the values your application expects. The pod's command references APP_NAME, APP_ENV, and LOG_LEVEL, so a properly configured ConfigMap would look like:

kubectl create configmap app-config \
  --from-literal=APP_NAME=escape-app \
  --from-literal=APP_ENV=production \
  --from-literal=LOG_LEVEL=info \
  -n escape-room-uncharted-config

Or declaratively:

apiVersion: v1
kind: ConfigMap
metadata:
  name: app-config
  namespace: escape-room-uncharted-config
data:
  APP_NAME: escape-app
  APP_ENV: production
  LOG_LEVEL: info

Verification

# Check the ConfigMap was created
kubectl get configmap app-config -n escape-room-uncharted-config

# Watch the pod recover
kubectl get pods -n escape-room-uncharted-config -w

# Check the logs once running
kubectl logs escape-app -n escape-room-uncharted-config
# Should show: "Application configured successfully!"

Lessons Learned

CreateContainerConfigError usually means a ConfigMap or Secret reference is broken
Always check kubectl describe pod events for the specific error message
Pods referencing ConfigMaps/Secrets will fail to start if those resources don't exist
ConfigMaps must be created in the same namespace as the pod that uses them

Real-World Considerations

This commonly happens when:

Deploying to a new namespace without the required ConfigMaps
ConfigMap was accidentally deleted
Typo in the ConfigMap name (case-sensitive!)
GitOps pipeline applied Pod before ConfigMap (ordering issue)

Best practices:

Use Helm or Kustomize to ensure ConfigMaps are created with deployments
Consider using optional: true on configMapRef if the config is truly optional
Validate manifests reference existing resources before deployment