I have two pods, which run each an instance of ServiceA. ServiceA uses a db wich runs on a single seperate pod. With this setup, I'm able to deploy fluently and I'd also have a fall back service.

Now my ServiceA has a regular task GatheringTask, where it gathers information from an external service, processes them and stores it to it's db. What I'd like to prevent is that both pods that run ServiceA do this at the same time.

The first solution that comes to my mind is relativly easy. I create a new table in my db pod where I store the state of GatheringTask so each instance of ServiceA checks the state persisted in the db before starting its' GatheringTask. If on is already running, don't do it anymore. This creates quite a bit of overhead, as I have to update and read the db all the time. Also there is more code.

Now I was wondering, is there a more direct way to share a state between pods? Is there a way, I can share a env property or even map a shared memory between pods, so I do not need the detour over a third pod? My pods are managed with kuberenetes.