[pjmlp]

What sane API, for what Kubernetes runtime, in what version?

Because that is the thing, not only it is a YAML spaghetti, everything changes depending on the puzzle pieces.

I had to follow CNCF related podcasts only to be aware of what cool projects were changing Kubernetes all the time.

Thankfully nowadays I only care about managed containers, regardless how the hyperscalers do it, it is no longer my headache.

Never needed to deal with vSphere directly.

[chuckadams]

Kubernetes is built around a JSON API: those yaml files are just an encoding of the objects that it manipulates with fairly vanilla REST commands. You could actually use JSON in your manifests instead, it's a proper subset and all, though it's not going to help the verbosity. For that you need a better abstraction like Pulumi, cdk8s, Yoke, or even just good old Terraform/OpenTofu. Or just write your own, there's an openapi spec and clients in every language out there.

I'm hardly trying to pretend like I'm a hyperscaler: I usually run k3s on a single node, and most of the time I admin it "clickops" style with k9s, something I find much easier than most other management tools.