In this article, we will be talking about Approach 3 i.e. how to get multiple helm charts installed using a simple bash utility.
If you haven't read the previous article where I discussed other approaches, feel free to read it over.
- Ref: Installing multiple helm charts in one go [Approach 1 - using parent/child charts]
- Ref: Installing multiple helm charts in one go [Approach 2 - using helmfile]
Motive
Why I thought of a simple bash utility?
- In some of the air-gapped environments it is sometimes a bit difficult to use the tools/utilities available because moving things inside an air-gapped environment is a challenge.
- Some of the environments are so secure that one may need to follow a whole process of getting all the security clearances and approval before using a tool/utility, which altogether is a nightmare.
- I chose bash, the reason being it is pretty common among engineers and it is easily understandable.
- The source code can be found here: https://github.com/sunnybhambhani/helmister
- You can copy it, and tweak it based on your requirements.
PS: I chose a name for this utility as well helmister
or helm-minister
but you can call it whatever you want 🙂
Prerequisites
- A running Kubernetes cluster with proper permissions, here I have used minikube.
-
kubectl
andhelm
installed on your machine to interact with the Kubernetes cluster. - A clone of helmister repository.
- yq(required) and cowsay(optional) packages installed on your machine.
Helmister
- This is a small bash utility that can help to install and uninstall multiple helm charts in one go. The idea is inspired by
helmfile
. - Its usage is quite simple, just run the utility followed by the option like install or uninstall i.e.
./helmister [install/uninstall]
. - Under the hood, it calls
helm
binary. Therefore it is kind of a wrapper aroundhelm
. - It consumes a
config.yaml
file which contains all the necessary details about the releases, and common parameters. - This supports both
oci://
andhttps://
helm registries. - PS: In the future, I am planning to add some more options/functionalities to this.
Directory structure
.
├── config.yaml
├── helmister
├── logs
│ ├── archive
│ │ └── helmister_20240227_170201.tar.gz
│ └── helmister.log
├── README.md
└── values
├── argo-cd.yaml
└── nginx-values.yaml
- helmister, this is the script written in bash you can just cat and see what all things it contains.
- config.yaml, this is the main configuration file or you can call the state file which contains the list of all releases you want to install in a cluster, plus it also contains some additional key:value pairs that are generic and common across all the releases. I first kept this configuration file in csv format, but later decided to convert it to yaml because it is more readable.
- logs, this is a directory that holds the logs of this utility, it contains the information about the execution of the last iteration, plus any archived/past logs (if required for reference).
- README.md, contains bit of a documentation about this utility, and what options are present.
- values, this is the directory where all the values files are placed (it can be anywhere in your system but for simplicity, I have placed them in the same directory).
- Now let's talk about
config.yaml
which is the main ingredient.
config.yaml
dry_run: false
create_namespace: true
wait: false
timeout: false # If true, defaults to 20 mins
charts:
- release_name: nginx
chart_name: nginx
chart_repo: oci://registry-1.docker.io/bitnamicharts
values_file: values/nginx-values.yaml
- release_name: argocd
chart_name: argo-cd
chart_repo: https://argoproj.github.io/argo-helm
values_file: values/argo-cd.yaml
version: 6.4.0
namespace: argo-cd
- The initial key:value pairs are common across all the releases.
- charts, is an array that contains a list of what all releases need to be installed in a Kubernetes cluster.
- dry_run, it is a boolean [true or false], and if true, none of the Kubernetes resources will be created it will just do a dry_run.
- create_namespace, it is a boolean [true or false], and if true it will automatically create a namespace for the release specified in the charts array.
-
wait, it is a boolean [true or false], and if true it acts similar to
helm --wait
wherein the shell will be kept occupied until all the Kubernetes resources are created. -
timeout, it is a boolean [true or false], and if true it acts similar to
helm --timeout=20m
i.e. if all the resources are not created within 20 mins the execution will fail. By default, I have kept the timeout as 20 minutes which is more than enough. -
charts, it is an array that contains details around individual releases. Except for version and namespace all the key:value pairs are mandatory.
- release_name, this is the name of the release.
- chart_name, this is the name of the chart that needs to be installed.
-
chart_repo, this is the helm registry where the chart is located. It can be any
oci://
orhttps://
registry. - values_file, which contains the path of the values file for individual releases.
-
version, this is the version of the chart that needs to be installed. This is optional and if not provided, It will consider the
latest
chart version. -
namespace, this is where the chart will be installed. This is optional as well and if not provided it will be installed in the
default
namespace.
Let's see this in action
- I will use the same
config.yaml
which will install one helm release from anoci://
registry indefault
namespace (since I haven't specified any namespace for that release) and another one fromhttps://
registry inargo-cd
namespace. Note the version as well for nginx, there as well I haven't specified any version, it will pick the latest available one automatically. - This is my cluster's current status.
$ k get ns
NAME STATUS AGE
default Active 28s
kube-node-lease Active 28s
kube-public Active 29s
kube-system Active 29s
$ helm list -A
NAME NAMESPACE REVISION UPDATED STATUS CHART APP VERSION
$ ./helmister install
[2024-07-23 15:02:47] [INFO] Using file: config.yaml
____________________________
< Helmister, Install charts! >
----------------------------
\
\
.--.
|o_o |
|:_/ |
// \ \
(| | )
/'\_ _/`\
\___)=(___/
[2024-07-23 15:02:47] [INFO] Generic/common values based on config.yaml file
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Dry Run: false
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Create Namespace: true
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Wait: false
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Timeout: false
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] ****************************
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Chart specific values based on config.yaml file
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Release Name: nginx
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Chart Name: nginx
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Chart Repo: oci://registry-1.docker.io/bitnamicharts
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Values File: values/nginx-values.yaml
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Version: null
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Namespace: null
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] ****************************
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Installing nginx with release name nginx from oci://registry-1.docker.io/bitnamicharts with version null using values file: values/nginx-values.yaml in default namespace
...
...
OUTPUT TRIMMED
- Actual stdout output can be found here.
- Here you will see that it provides all the minute details of what exactly it is doing.
- For example: Generic values
- Here I have marked create_namespace as true because I don't already have argo-cd namespace wherein I want to install argocd release.
[2024-07-23 15:02:47] [INFO] Generic/common values based on config.yaml file
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Dry Run: false
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Create Namespace: true
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Wait: false
[2024-07-23 15:02:48] [INFO] Timeout: false
- Next, you will see, chart/release specific values of all the items in charts array one by one:
[2024-07-23 15:03:31] [INFO] Chart specific values based on config.yaml file
[2024-07-23 15:03:31] [INFO] Release Name: argocd
[2024-07-23 15:03:31] [INFO] Chart Name: argo-cd
[2024-07-23 15:03:31] [INFO] Chart Repo: https://argoproj.github.io/argo-helm
[2024-07-23 15:03:31] [INFO] Values File: values/argo-cd.yaml
[2024-07-23 15:03:31] [INFO] Version: 6.4.0
[2024-07-23 15:03:31] [INFO] Namespace: argo-cd
- Here I have explicitly added an additional check that will check if the pods are up and healthy (this is just specific to pods it won't consider any other k8s objects).
- It will continuously check for next 20mins and will check every 5 secs. If the pods are still in non-running state it will terminate the process.
[2024-07-23 15:03:47] [WARN] Pods for release argocd are not yet in Running state, checking again in 5 seconds
- Once all the pods are in running state and it has deployed all the releases it will show a successful message.
[2024-07-23 15:05:20] [INFO] All actions completed successfully
- Once this is done, if required you can see the logs as well from the logs directory. A sample can be found here.
- And here is my cluster's current status now:
$ helm list -A
NAME NAMESPACE REVISION UPDATED STATUS CHART APP VERSION
argocd argo-cd 1 2024-07-23 15:03:34.46715742 +0530 IST deployed argo-cd-6.4.0 v2.10.1
nginx default 1 2024-07-23 15:02:53.590367521 +0530 IST deployed nginx-18.1.5 1.27.0
$ k get ns
NAME STATUS AGE
argo-cd Active 58m
default Active 62m
kube-node-lease Active 62m
kube-public Active 62m
kube-system Active 62m
$ k get pods -n argo-cd
NAME READY STATUS RESTARTS AGE
argocd-application-controller-0 1/1 Running 0 58m
argocd-applicationset-controller-68cd75bc89-d4q8x 1/1 Running 0 58m
argocd-dex-server-84b5bbdcbf-c4qv2 1/1 Running 0 58m
argocd-notifications-controller-7bc55c495d-xz6gt 1/1 Running 0 58m
argocd-redis-5d5cdcfd54-2rx26 1/1 Running 0 58m
argocd-repo-server-756ff4cd7d-rpvh7 1/1 Running 0 58m
argocd-server-7587d49b7b-9h47l 1/1 Running 0 58m
$ k get pods -n default
NAME READY STATUS RESTARTS AGE
nginx-569b6bc698-48qqt 1/1 Running 0 59m
nginx-569b6bc698-9qzpv 1/1 Running 0 59m
nginx-569b6bc698-wflrj 1/1 Running 0 59m
- If you want to uninstall it, simply do:
$ ./helmister uninstall
- It will get everything cleaned for all the releases that are specified in
config.yaml
. - The sample log can be found here.
Feel free to use it, and tweak it based on your requirements.
I will soon add some more functionalities to it.
Happy learning!
References:
- Google/Stackoverflow/Linux man pages/etc
Top comments (4)
Try docs.helmwave.app/ go executive for helm charts
Sure, I will give it a try.
Here goes approach 2:
Here goes approach 1: