In the world of modern Kubernetes, things have come a long way from the days of a single cluster handling one app. Now, it's common to see setups that span multiple clusters across different clouds. Initially, managing those clusters was a complicated operation with many moving parts. Using tools such as SUSE Rancher, RedHat OpenShift or AWS EKS, made managing multiple clusters somewhat easier.

For many developers and engineers, Kubernetes is the de facto choice for container orchestration. That’s primarily because of its efficiency in handling and scaling container workloads. However, the complexity of managing nodes in a Kubernetes cluster can cause recurring headaches for even the most experienced and skilled IT teams. This is where `kubectl cordon` comes into play.

As software engineers, we all know that troubleshooting often involves sifting through heaps of data points — scanning metrics, reading logs, checking resource status and analyzing events. We manually connect the dots, and if we're experienced enough, we might spot an issue that's about to become a problem. At StackState, we've faced these same challenges.

If you work with Kubernetes, you know that any number of issues can pose a serious threat to the stability and security of your deployments. One that's subtly damaging is configuration drift, which occurs when the actual state of how your system is set up — its configuration — strays from the way you defined. Configuration drift in Kubernetes can happen when people make changes manually, systems aren't synchronized properly or monitoring falls short.