Management Web CLI

Welcome to this OpenShift management overview for absolute beginners. This lesson explains the three primary ways to interact with an OpenShift cluster — the web console, the oc command-line client, and the REST API — and includes practical examples and links to documentation for further reading. There are three primary ways to interact with an OpenShift cluster:

The web console — the most direct and user-friendly option.
The command-line interface using the oc client tool.
The REST API — useful for integrations, automation, and scripting.

A presentation slide titled "Management Tools" showing three red icons labeled "Web Console," "CLI," and "REST API." Each icon visually represents its tool (browser window, command-line prompt, and a network/node diagram).

Quick comparison

Management Method	Best for	Typical use cases
Web Console	Visual management	Browsing catalog, creating projects, CI/CD pipeline overview
`oc` CLI	Interactive or scripted operations	Builds, deployments, logs, debugging, admin tasks
REST API	Automation & integrations	Programmatic access, custom tooling, third-party integrations

Web Console

The OpenShift web console provides a browser-based UI for managing your cluster and applications. It is usually served over HTTPS. In many OpenShift 3.x setups the console listens on port 8443 (for example, https://<cluster-ip>:8443), though production deployments often expose it via a route or load balancer on standard HTTPS port 443 or a custom hostname. Key capabilities available from the console:

Create and manage projects (namespaces).
Manage builds, deployments, and services.
Configure routes and external access.
Create and monitor CI/CD pipelines and build logs.
Browse a service catalog of quickstart images and templates.

Projects (namespaces) group related resources and provide isolation. Default system projects such as kube-system and openshift-web-console host internal components, including the console itself.

A screenshot of the OpenShift Origin web console homepage showing a "Browse Catalog" of application images and templates (e.g., .NET, Jenkins, MongoDB, Node.js). The right sidebar lists "My Projects" with entries like kube-system and openshift-web-console and a "Create Project" button.

For step-by-step tasks (creating an app, configuring routes, or viewing build logs) the web console is the fastest way to get a visual overview and perform common operations.

CLI (oc)

The oc client is the primary command-line tool for interacting with OpenShift clusters. It works for both developers and administrators and is available for download from the OpenShift CLI docs: https://docs.openshift.com/container-platform/3.11/cli_reference/openshift_cli/getting-started-cli.html oc is included with local developer tools such as Minishift (OpenShift 3.x) or CodeReady Containers (CRC for OpenShift 4.x). Common oc workflows:

Authenticate and switch projects
Start builds, follow build logs
Create resources from templates and source repositories
Inspect and tail logs, exec into running pods
Admin tasks via oc adm

Examples Login interactively:

$ oc login
OpenShift server [https://localhost:8443]: https://openshift.example.com
Username: developer
Password: ******
Login successful.

$ oc login -u developer -p developer https://openshift.example.com
Login successful.

Logout:

$ oc logout
Logged out from https://openshift.example.com (openshift)

Create a new application from a source repo and an image stream:

$ oc new-app centos/ruby-22-centos7~https://github.com/openshift/ruby-ex.git

Follow build logs for a build config named ruby-ex:

$ oc logs -f bc/ruby-ex

Table of useful oc commands

Task	Command
Show current user token	`oc whoami -t`
List projects	`oc get projects`
Switch project	`oc project <project-name>`
Get pods	`oc get pods`
Describe a resource	`oc describe pod/<pod-name>`
Execute command in pod	`oc exec -it <pod> -- /bin/bash`

REST API

OpenShift exposes a RESTful API for programmatic access. This is ideal when building automation, CI pipelines, or integrations with external systems. In OpenShift 3.x, several endpoints live under /oapi (while Kubernetes core API endpoints are under /api or /apis). Example: list users via the API (replace the token placeholder with a valid token):

$ curl https://localhost:8443/oapi/v1/users \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer <token>"

Obtain a token for the current oc login:

$ oc whoami -t
27pZjHWn9GU5B5De4H3ICP6ZBd_7txQJMvz79dH0tsY

Token lifetimes depend on cluster configuration. Many clusters issue short-lived tokens (often 24 hours). For automation, consider service accounts or long-lived credentials configured according to your organization’s security policy.

Example API response (truncated):

{
  "kind": "UserList",
  "apiVersion": "v1",
  "metadata": {
    "selfLink": "/oapi/v1/users"
  },
  "items": [
    {
      "metadata": {
        "name": "developer",
        "selfLink": "/oapi/v1/users/developer",
        "uid": "271e2b49-47f0-11e8-afb8-4a1a95a6dbc1",
        "resourceVersion": "1289",
        "creationTimestamp": "2018-04-24T18:49:00Z"
      },
      "identities": [
        "anypassword:developer"
      ],
      "groups": null
    },
    {
      "metadata": {
        "name": "mmumshad",
        "selfLink": "/oapi/v1/users/mmumshad",
        "uid": "c905343d-48a6-11e8-afb8-4a1a95a6dbc1",
        "resourceVersion": "108365",
        "creationTimestamp": "2018-04-25T16:36:20Z"
      },
      "identities": [
        "anypassword:mmumshad"
      ],
      "groups": null
    }
  ]
}

For full API details and resource schemas consult the OpenShift REST API docs: https://docs.openshift.com/container-platform/3.11/rest_api/index.html

For automation, prefer service accounts or OAuth tokens scoped to minimal privileges. Use the REST API for integrations and the oc CLI for interactive tasks and scripted workflows.

Wrapping up

This lesson covered the three primary OpenShift management options:

Web Console for visual management and the service catalog
oc CLI for developer and admin workflows
REST API for automation and integrations

Next steps:

Explore the OpenShift web console and create a sample project.
Use oc new-app to build and deploy a small application and follow build logs.
Review the REST API documentation to learn how to query and script cluster operations.

Introduction

Pre-Requisite - Docker and Kubernetes

Getting Started with OpenShift

OpenShift Concepts - Projects and Users

Concepts - Builds and Deployments

Networks, Services, Routes and Scaling

Storage, Templates and Catalog

Conclusion and APPENDIX

Management Web CLI

Quick comparison

Web Console

CLI (oc)

REST API

Wrapping up

Watch Video

​Quick comparison

​Web Console

​CLI (oc)

​REST API

​Wrapping up

Watch Video

Quick comparison

Web Console

CLI (oc)

REST API

Wrapping up