kubernetes-sigs/cluster-api-provider-aws

Support marking AWSManagedControlPlane as externally managed

Open

#6,031 opened on May 27, 2026

View on GitHub
 (3 comments) (0 reactions) (0 assignees)Go (689 forks)auto 404
help wantedkind/featurepriority/important-longtermtriage/accepted

Repository metrics

Stars
 (723 stars)
PR merge metrics
 (PR metrics pending)

Description

/kind feature

Describe the solution you'd like Support for AWSManagedControlPlane resources to be marked as externally managed through the cluster.x-k8s.io/managed-by: "<name-of-system>" annotation to prevent reconciliation.

Anything else you would like to add: We have EKS clusters managed outside of the CAPI/CAPA ecosystem (via Terraform) but are using CAPI/CAPA to manage the life-cycling of Machines/Nodes (EKS Hybrid Nodes to be precise, another issue/PR/discussion incoming). In this situation AWSManagedControlPlane resources are used a read-only stub of the information needed for the bootstrap controller to do its job.

This concept is already supported for AWSCluster resources as documented here. I am keen to contribute a PR for this if the request has supported 👍 .

Environment:

  • Cluster-api-provider-aws version: all
  • Kubernetes version: (use kubectl version): n/a
  • OS (e.g. from /etc/os-release): n/a

Contributor guide

Research direction
Tech stack
Domain
Issue type
DifficultyEstimated implementation difficulty for a new contributor, from 1 for very small changes to 5 for expert-level work.
Estimated timeA rough time range for an experienced contributor to investigate, implement, test, and prepare a pull request.
Activity statusHow available the issue appears right now: fresh, active, stale, blocked, or waiting on maintainer input.
ClarityHow clearly the issue explains the expected change, acceptance criteria, and next step.
Prerequisites
Newbie friendlinessA 1-100 score estimating how approachable this issue is for first-time contributors.