If you are using a released version of Kubernetes, you should refer to the docs that go with that version.
The latest release of this document can be found [here](http://releases.k8s.io/release-1.1/docs/user-guide/kubectl/kubectl_annotate.md).Documentation for other releases can be found at releases.k8s.io.
Update the annotations on a resource
Update the annotations on one or more resources.
An annotation is a key/value pair that can hold larger (compared to a label), and possibly not human-readable, data. It is intended to store non-identifying auxiliary data, especially data manipulated by tools and system extensions. If --overwrite is true, then existing annotations can be overwritten, otherwise attempting to overwrite an annotation will result in an error. If --resource-version is specified, then updates will use this resource version, otherwise the existing resource-version will be used.
Possible resources include (case insensitive): pods (po), services (svc), replicationcontrollers (rc), nodes (no), events (ev), componentstatuses (cs), limitranges (limits), persistentvolumes (pv), persistentvolumeclaims (pvc), horizontalpodautoscalers (hpa), resourcequotas (quota) or secrets.
kubectl annotate [--overwrite] (-f FILENAME | TYPE NAME) KEY_1=VAL_1 ... KEY_N=VAL_N [--resource-version=version]
# Update pod 'foo' with the annotation 'description' and the value 'my frontend'.
# If the same annotation is set multiple times, only the last value will be applied
$ kubectl annotate pods foo description='my frontend'
# Update a pod identified by type and name in "pod.json"
$ kubectl annotate -f pod.json description='my frontend'
# Update pod 'foo' with the annotation 'description' and the value 'my frontend running nginx', overwriting any existing value.
$ kubectl annotate --overwrite pods foo description='my frontend running nginx'
# Update all pods in the namespace
$ kubectl annotate pods --all description='my frontend running nginx'
# Update pod 'foo' only if the resource is unchanged from version 1.
$ kubectl annotate pods foo description='my frontend running nginx' --resource-version=1
# Update pod 'foo' by removing an annotation named 'description' if it exists.
# Does not require the --overwrite flag.
$ kubectl annotate pods foo description-
--all[=false]: select all resources in the namespace of the specified resource types
-f, --filename=[]: Filename, directory, or URL to a file identifying the resource to update the annotation
--no-headers[=false]: When using the default output, don't print headers.
-o, --output="": Output format. One of: json|yaml|wide|name|go-template=...|go-template-file=...|jsonpath=...|jsonpath-file=... See golang template [http://golang.org/pkg/text/template/#pkg-overview] and jsonpath template [http://releases.k8s.io/HEAD/docs/user-guide/jsonpath.md].
--output-version="": Output the formatted object with the given version (default api-version).
--overwrite[=false]: If true, allow annotations to be overwritten, otherwise reject annotation updates that overwrite existing annotations.
--resource-version="": If non-empty, the annotation update will only succeed if this is the current resource-version for the object. Only valid when specifying a single resource.
-l, --selector="": Selector (label query) to filter on
-a, --show-all[=false]: When printing, show all resources (default hide terminated pods.)
--sort-by="": If non-empty, sort list types using this field specification. The field specification is expressed as a JSONPath expression (e.g. 'ObjectMeta.Name'). The field in the API resource specified by this JSONPath expression must be an integer or a string.
--template="": Template string or path to template file to use when -o=go-template, -o=go-template-file. The template format is golang templates [http://golang.org/pkg/text/template/#pkg-overview].
--alsologtostderr[=false]: log to standard error as well as files
--api-version="": The API version to use when talking to the server
--certificate-authority="": Path to a cert. file for the certificate authority.
--client-certificate="": Path to a client certificate file for TLS.
--client-key="": Path to a client key file for TLS.
--cluster="": The name of the kubeconfig cluster to use
--context="": The name of the kubeconfig context to use
--insecure-skip-tls-verify[=false]: If true, the server's certificate will not be checked for validity. This will make your HTTPS connections insecure.
--kubeconfig="": Path to the kubeconfig file to use for CLI requests.
--log-backtrace-at=:0: when logging hits line file:N, emit a stack trace
--log-dir="": If non-empty, write log files in this directory
--log-flush-frequency=5s: Maximum number of seconds between log flushes
--logtostderr[=true]: log to standard error instead of files
--match-server-version[=false]: Require server version to match client version
--namespace="": If present, the namespace scope for this CLI request.
--password="": Password for basic authentication to the API server.
-s, --server="": The address and port of the Kubernetes API server
--stderrthreshold=2: logs at or above this threshold go to stderr
--token="": Bearer token for authentication to the API server.
--user="": The name of the kubeconfig user to use
--username="": Username for basic authentication to the API server.
--v=0: log level for V logs
--vmodule=: comma-separated list of pattern=N settings for file-filtered logging
- kubectl - kubectl controls the Kubernetes cluster manager