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Guide For Helm

1. Helm Daily Workflow​

- A. list all your charts​

You start out by listing all your charts with:

helm ls

- B. Delete a deployment + service​

You can uninstall any of the listed charts using:

helm uninstall CHART_NAME

- C. Create a new chart-template with deployment+service for an app​

helm create CHART_NAME

- D. Provision a deployment+service for the first time​

helm install CHART_NAME . --values values.yaml --debug --verify -n NAMESPACE --create-namespace

Or by using force:

helm install CHART_NAME . --values values.yaml --debug --verify -n NAMESPACE --create-namespace --force

- E. Keep track of an installation progress​

helm status CHART_NAME -n NAMESPACE

- F. Upgrade (update) a chart's revision​

helm upgrade CHART_NAME . --install --values values.yaml -n NAMESPACE --create-namespace

Notice the --install flag, which makes helm install command redundant, since you now no longer need to decide between helm install & helm upgrade, just always use helm upgrade.

- G. Abort unsuccessful upgrade of a chart​

When an upgrade is unsuccessful, and the rollingUpdate seems to fail, you might need to abort the upgrade. Here's how you do it:

If you know the revision number of the current successful chart, simply rollback to it:

helm rollback CHART_NAME REVISION_NUMBER -n NAMESPACE

If you need to check the current revision number, you can use the history command:

helm history backend -n NAMESPACE

- H. Decrypt a helm Secret​

kubectl get secret sh.helm.release.v1.mysql-db-service.v1 -o jsonpath="{ .data.release }" | base64 -d | base64 -d | gunzip -c | jq '.chart.templates[].data' | tr -d '"' | base64 -d > hello.txt

2. Helm Commands​

- Command 1: helm ls​

- The command:

helm ls -n NAMESPACE

Or...

helm list -n NAMESPACE

- Description:

This command lists all the releases for a specified namespace (uses current namespace context if namespace not specified).


- Command 2: helm create​

- The command:

helm create CHART_NAME

- Description:

create a new chart with the given name.

This command creates a chart directory along with the common files and directories used in a chart. helm create takes a path for an argument. If directories in the given path do not exist, Helm will attempt to create them as it goes. If the given destination exists and there are files in that directory, conflicting files will be overwritten, but other files will be left alone.

For example, helm create foo will create a directory structure that looks something like this:

foo/
├── .helmignore   # Contains patterns to ignore when packaging Helm charts.
├── Chart.yaml    # Information about your chart
├── values.yaml   # The default values for your templates
├── charts/       # Charts that this chart depends on
└── templates/    # The template files
    └── tests/    # The test files

- Command 3: helm uninstall​

- The command:

helm uninstall RELEASE_NAME -n NAMESPACE

- Description:

Uninstall a release.

This command takes a release name and uninstalls the release. It removes all of the resources associated with the last release of the chart as well as the release history, freeing it up for future use.

The --keep-history flag​

In the past, this was the default. Now, running uninstall deletes everything. If you want to uninstall a chart, but keep its history, use this flag.


- Command 4: helm install​

- The command:

helm install RELEASE_NAME path/to/chart-root --values path/to/values.yaml -n NAMESPACE --debug

- Description:

This command installs a chart archive, and gives it a nickname which you provide.

  • The -f, --values flags specify values in a YAML file or a URL (can specify multiple).
  • The --debug flag enables verbose output.
  • The --dry-run flag simulates an install. --dry-run is similar to --dry-run=client, which means that it will not attempt cluster connections, while setting --dry-run=server attempts to connect the cluster.
  • The --force flag forces resource updates through a replacement strategy.
  • The --verify flag verifies the package before using it.
  • The --wait flag will wait until all Pods, PVCs, Services, and minimum number of Pods of a Deployment, StatefulSet, or ReplicaSet are in a ready state before marking the release as successful. It will wait for as long as --timeout.

The install argument must be a chart reference, a path to a packaged chart, a path to an unpacked chart directory, or a URL.

When using a path to an unpacked chart directory:

  1. The root directory must include a Chart.yaml file.
  2. Inside that Chart.yaml file, you MUST specify:
    • a name field
    • an version field
  3. The root directory needs to include a folder named templates. This isn't required per-say, since the operation won't fail if one does not exist. However, even though running helm ls would show that a chart has been created, nothing would actually be deployed to your cluster! So while technically it is not required, it is sort of required.
  4. The templates folder is where you include all your yaml files, whether it be a config for a deployment, or a service, or a configmap. The names of the files don't matter, since kubernetes/helm looks inside the file and derives what resource it is based on its Kind.
  5. The root folder may include a values.yaml file, to which you would point when invoking the install command, along with the flag of --values.

Another way to set values

To override values in a chart, use either the '--values' flag and pass in a file or use the '--set' flag and pass configuration from the command line, to force a string value use '--set-string'. You can use '--set-file' to set individual values from a file when the value itself is too long for the command line or is dynamically generated. You can also use '--set-json' to set json values (scalars/objects/arrays) from the command line.

- Example Usage:

helm install user ./user --values ./user/values.yaml -n NAMESPACE --create-namespace

- Command 5: helm upgrade​

- The command:

helm upgrade RELEASE_NAME path/to/chart-root --values path/to/values.yaml -n NAMESPACE

- Description:

This command upgrades a release to a new version of a chart.

The upgrade arguments must be a release and chart.

- A. The CHART argument:​

The chart argument can be either: a path to a chart directory, a packaged chart, a fully qualified URL, or a chart reference ('example/mariadb'). For chart references, the latest version will be specified unless the '--version' flag is set.

- B. The --values flag:​

To override values in a chart, use either the --values flag and pass in a file or use the --set flag and pass configuration from the command line, to force string values, use --set-string. You can use --set-file to set individual values from a file when the value itself is too long for the command line or is dynamically generated. You can also use --set-json to set json values (scalars/objects/arrays) from the command line.
You can specify the --values/-f flag multiple times. Priority will be given to the last values.yaml specified (the one on the most-right). If both values.yaml and values-override.yaml contained a key called Test, the value set in values-override.yaml would win.

- C. The --reuse-values flag:​

Re-use values from last release. When upgrading, reuse the last release's values, and merge in any overrides. If --reset-values is specified, this flag ignored.
Imagine this situation: You initially install a chart with...

helm install my-release my-chart --set image.tag=1.0.0 --set replicas=3

Later, you want to only change the image tag:

helm upgrade my-release my-chart --set image.tag=2.0.0

If you don't use --reuse-values, then:

  • replicas will reset to the chart default (e.g., let's say 1),
  • Because you're only passing image.tag, Helm thinks "oh, I should use only these values."

- D. The --dry-run flag​

The --dry-run mode would only go through the first few steps of helm install, meaning it will load the charts, merge values from values.yaml, render the required k8s templates, but it will not submit them to the k8s API server, and thus, will not get created.

To sum up, the --dry-run flag will output all generated chart manifests, including Secrets which can contain sensitive values. You can hide Kubernetes Secrets using the --hide-secret flag. Please carefully consider how and when these flags are used.

- Usage Example:

helm upgrade --install users-service ./toolbox/deploy/charts/users-service --values ./toolbox/deploy/charts/users-service/values.yaml -n application

- Command 6: helm status​

- The command: status

helm status CHART_NAME -n NAMESPACE

- Description:

The helm status commands is useful when using the helm install command. When running helm install, Helm does not wait until all of the resources are running before it exits. Many charts require Docker images that are over 600MB in size, and may take a long time to install into the cluster. So, to keep track of a release's state, or to re-read configuration information, you can use helm status.

Display the status of the named release.

This command shows the status of a named release. The status consists of:

  • last deployment time

  • k8s namespace in which the release lives

  • state of the release (can be: unknown, deployed, uninstalled, superseded, failed, uninstalling, pending-install, pending-upgrade or pending-rollback)

  • revision of the release

  • description of the release (can be completion message or error message, need to enable --show-desc)

  • list of resources that this release consists of (need to enable --show-resources)

  • details on last test suite run, if applicable

  • additional notes provided by the chart


- Command 7: helm history​

- The command:

helm history RELEASE_NAME -n NAMESPACE

- Description:

Fetch a release's history.

history prints out historical revisions for a given release. A default maximum of 256 revisions will be returned. Setting --max configures the maximum length of the revision list returned.


- Command 8: helm rollback​

- The command:

helm rollback RELEASE_NAME REVISION_NUMBER -n NAMESPACE

- Description:

Roll back a release to a previous revision.

The first argument of the rollback command is the name of a release, and the second is a revision (version) number. If this argument is omitted or set to 0, it will roll back to the previous release.


- Command 9: helm template​

- The command:

helm template CHART path/to/chart --values path/to/values.yaml

- Description:

Render chart templates locally and display the output.

Any values that would normally be looked up or retrieved in-cluster will be faked locally. Additionally, none of the server-side testing of chart validity (e.g. whether an API is supported) is done.

The template command outputs clean templates, ready to be used by a kubernetes API server, so if you like doing all the applying job yourself, and just want helm to help you with the creation of the charts, you have an option for that as well.

Note that creating a template does not communicate with the server at all, not even for validating that the resource template yaml is ok. This is as opposed to the --dry-run flag on helm upgrade, which does. This is what makes helm template so useful, that it doesn't need the credentials to talk to a k8x cluster, just to have a template validated.

- Command 10: helm package​

- The command:

helm package path/to/root [flags] --version VERSION_NUMBER --debug

- Description:

Package a chart directory into a chart archive.

This command packages a chart into a versioned chart archive file. If a path is given, this will look at that path for a chart (which must contain a Chart.yaml file) and then package that directory.

Versioned chart archives are used by Helm package repositories.

To sign a chart, use the '--sign' flag. In most cases, you should also provide '--keyring path/to/secret/keys' and '--key keyname'.

helm package --sign ./mychart --key mykey --keyring ~/.gnupg/secring.gpg

If '--keyring' is not specified, Helm usually defaults to the public keyring unless your environment is otherwise configured.


- Command 11: helm get values​

- The command:

helm get values RELEASE_NAME

- Description:

Download the values file for a named release.

Running the command just like that, gives you the values used on this upgrade alone.

The --all flag​

To get all values, use the --all flag.

The --revision flag​

To get values from a specific revision (deployment), use the --revision flag, followed by the number. You can get the number by running helm history CHART.


- Command 12: helm get notes​

- The command:

helm get notes RELEASE_NAME

- Description:

Get the release notes of some named release.


- Command 13: helm get manifest​

- The command:

helm get manifest RELEASE_NAME

- Description:

Download the manifest for a named release.

The manifest is a YAML representation of all the Kubernetes resources that were generated from this release's chart(s).

The --revision flag​

Get the manifest of a specific revision.


3. Helm Architecture​

Prerequisites:

  1. A Kubernetes cluster
  2. Deciding what security configurations to apply to your installation, if any
  3. Installing and configuring Helm.
  4. You must have Kubernetes installed. For the latest release of Helm, we recommend the latest stable release of Kubernetes, which in most cases is the second-latest minor release.

Helm has 4 big concepts to it:

- Concept 1: Chart​

A Chart is a Helm package. It contains all of the resource definitions necessary to run an application, tool, or service inside of a Kubernetes cluster. Think of it like the Kubernetes equivalent of a Homebrew formula, an Apt dpkg, or a Yum RPM file.

- Concept 2: Repository​

A Repository is the place where charts can be collected and shared. It's like Perl's CPAN archive or the Fedora Package Database, but for Kubernetes packages.

- Concept 3: Release​

A Release is an instance of a chart running inside a Kubernetes cluster. One chart can often be installed many times into the same cluster. And each time it is installed, a new release is created. Consider a MySQL chart. If you want two databases running in your cluster, you can install that chart twice. Each one will have its own release, which will in turn have its own release name.

With these concepts in mind, we can now explain Helm like this:

Helm installs charts into Kubernetes, creating a new release for each installation. And to find new charts, you can search Helm chart repositories.

helm show values

- Concept 4: Tiller​

Tiller is a component of Helm that runs inside the Kubernetes cluster. Tiller is what provides the functionality to apply the Kubernetes resource descriptions to the Kubernetes cluster. When you install a release, the helm client essentially packages up the values and charts as a release, which is submitted to Tiller.

4. What is helm?​

Helm is a package manager for kubernetes, that makes it easy to take applications and services that are highly repeatable or get used in a lot of different scenarios and it makes it easier to deploy them to a typical kubernetes cluster. chart = template. Your chart is going to consist of all the files that you're going to be templating here. Helm talks to a component that needs to be installed on your kubernetes cluster called Tiller. Tiller is basically just the server-side component of helm. It's gonna take the commands you've sent with helm client, and turn it into something that your kubernetes cluster will understand. Now, this becomes extra useful when you wanna do things like "upgrade to a new configuration" or "rollback to an older revision". What Helm will also give you is that it actually keeps a version history for you of different configurations you've sent over the wire with help, so you can rollback to the last known working configuration whenever you want to. Good things to template:

  • the namespace
  • the selector name
  • the image:
    • its name
    • its tag
  • the configmap.name Create a NOTES.txt file, which outputs to the user on every upgrade command. This file could also be templated. You can create 1 values.yaml file for production and one for development.

5. Why Helm?​

- Intelligent Deployments​

Helm is very intelligent when it comes to deployments. When we directly work with Kubernetes, we have to mention the order in which the resources should be created. For example, configmaps and secrets should be usually created before deployment and services. Helm knows to consider the correct order in which Kubernetes resources should be created, and it will automatically do it for us.

- Lifecycle Hooks​

Helm also uses lifecycle hooks.

If there is any work, which is not directly related to Kubernetes, but it has to be done during the installation or the upgrade, helm allows us to write hooks that can be hooked into the lifecycle events.

Example lifecycle hooks are installation, upgrade, uninstallation, tests, etc.

This could be writing data to database, backing up a database, or making sure that the Kubernetes cluster is in a required state before we do an installation. Such work can be put into a hook, and it can be hooked into helm's installation or upgrade, or uninstallation lifecycle.

- Security​

Helm has built-in support to ensure that charts which are downloaded from a central repository are secured.

The charts can be signed using cryptography, and hashes can be generated, and when we install these charts, we're pulling them from the central repos, helm will verify that these charts are really from the source we are expecting and that they were not tweaked by any hacker.

6. What helm install is doing behind the scenes?​

- Step 1: Chart resolution​

  • Helm looks for the chart (<chart>) either locally or from a remote chart repository (like https://charts.bitnami.com/bitnami).
  • It loads the chart into memory, including:
    • Chart.yaml: metadata
    • values.yaml: default configuration values
    • templates/: YAML templates with Go templating
    • Any other custom files like NOTES.txt
  • Helm parses the Chart.yaml (chart metadata) and values.yaml (default values) using a YAML parser. If you pass a custom values file (-f my-values.yaml) or --set flags, those are also parsed.

The first thing Helm does when you do a helm install is to load the chart and its dependencies. If it is a local chart, it will simply load it from your local machine. If it is a chart living on a repository, it will pull that chart and it will load it.

- Step 2: Merge Values​

  • Helm merges configuration values:
    • values.yaml
    • Any --values (-f) file provided
    • Any --set CLI overrides
  • The result is a single values map used to render templates.

- Step 3: Template Rendering​

  • Helm renders the Go templates inside templates/ directory using the merged values.
  • This results in standard Kubernetes manifests (YAML) — like Deployments, Services, Ingress, ConfigMaps, etc.
  • The produces final YAML documents are in ** plain text**. These rendered YAMLs are still just strings at this point.

- Step 4: Install Release to Kubernetes​

  • Before sending to Kubernetes, Helm parses the rendered YAMLs to:

    • Validate them structurally (to some degree)
    • Convert them to Kubernetes API-compatible JSON objects (Kubernetes API works with JSON under the hood)
    • Invalid YAMLs here will raise errors (e.g. bad indentation, missing colons).
    • Helm needs to convert YAML to internal objects to check for things like hooks, CRDs, kinds, etc.
    • Kubernetes itself also validates these later, but Helm catches obvious issues first.

  • Helm then connects to the Kubernetes cluster (via ~/.kube/config or context).

  • It sends the rendered manifests to the Kubernetes API server.

  • The Kubernetes API server validates and stores the manifests in etcd.

  • Resources are then created by Kubernetes controllers (e.g., Deployment creates Pods).

- Step 5: Create Release Record (in Cluster)​

  • Helm stores a release object in the cluster using secrets/configmaps in the release namespace. (in older versions, 2 and below, it would store them in the namespace kube-system).
  • The release record includes:
    • Rendered manifests
    • Chart metadata
    • Values used
    • Version info

- Step 6: Run Hooks (if any exists)​

  • Helm checks for lifecycle hooks defined in templates (like pre-install, post-install).
  • These jobs/pods are created and monitored.

- Step 7: Show Output​

If successful, Helm outputs the status. Release name, namespace, resources created, and any messages from NOTES.txt (templated and displayed).

7. A successful installation/upgrade​

helm considers an installation successful as soon as the manifest is received by the kubernetes API server. It doesn't wait for the pods to be up and running.

If you want that to happen, you can use the --wait flag. With it, helm will wait for the services and deployments to be created, and for the pods to be up and running. Only then the installation is considered successful.

By default, helm waits about 5 minutes (300 seconds), and if the installation doesn't complete by that time, the installation is marked as failure. If you want to override the default timeout, you can use the --timeout flag, followed by the time. Examples of valid time values: 5m, 10s, 5m10s (without quotes!).

8. Installation failure​

By default, upon a failure, created resources remain created (i.e. secrets), and the pod is endlessly and desperately trying to live.

In such case, you have a few options:

- Option 1: Do nothing​

Bad idea. You are leaving a dirty environment, and a pod that's endlessly and desperately trying to live takes up resources, which costs money.

- Option 2: Go back to a previous successful release​

If you want to go back to a previous successful release, and keep your deployment as clean as possible, use the --atomic flag. If --atomic is set, the upgrade process rolls back changes made in case of failed upgrade. The --wait flag will be set automatically if --atomic is used.

What this will do:

  • remove secrets
  • kill the pod (euthanize)

A full command would look like:

helm upgrade RELEASE --values values.yaml --wait --timeout 7m --atomic

- Option 3: cleanup on fail​

Cleanup on fail cleans up (i.e.) deletes any secrets and objects created due to the failed upgrade. It is different than go back to a previous release in 2 ways:

  1. It doesn't create a new helm-history item (stored as a secret)
  2. It doesn't kill the pod trying to live.

9. Forceful upgrade​

What does it mean to use --force with upgrade?

we do a helm upgrade, kubernetes receives a request to modify the existing objects. It will restart only the pods whose values have changed. It will NOT restart all the pods all the time. It will only restart the pods if there are any values that have changed for those pods. But if we have a requirement where you want to forcefully restart all pods, you can use the --force option. Internally, helm will delete the current deployment. Instead of modifying the deployment, it will delete the deployment, and it will recreate the deployment. As a result, Kube will delete the old pods and create new ones. So there will be some downtime when you use --force option. This is a major risk of using --forceflag.

10. Creating a Chart​

When you run helm create CHART_NAME, a folder will be created with the following structure:

  • Chart.yaml
  • values.yaml
  • templates/
  • charts/

- A. Chart.yaml​

• Description​

The Chart.yaml for helm is much like what the package.json is for npm.

The Chart.yaml is a required metadata file for every Helm chart. It serves as the manifest that defines the chart itself.

• Purpose of Chart.yaml​

It contains key metadata about your chart so that Helm and other tools know:

  • What the chart is
  • What version it is
  • What it depends on
  • What Kubernetes resources it describes

• Common fields in Chart.yaml​

apiVersion: v2
name: my-app
description: A Helm chart for Kubernetes
type: application
version: 0.1.0
appVersion: "1.16.0"
FieldPurpose
apiVersion(required) Chart API version (v2 for Helm 3).
name(required) Name of the chart.
version(required) Version of the chart itself. Helm uses this for upgrades and rollbacks.
descriptionShort human-readable summary.
typeapplication (default) or library.
appVersionVersion of the actual app being deployed (informational). i.e, MongoDB 8.0

• Why it matters​

  • Helm installs and upgrades charts based on version.
  • dependencies can be listed here, allowing Helm to pull in subcharts automatically.
  • Tools like helm repo and helm package read this file to index and distribute your chart.

• More optional keys​

  • You can specify an icon.
  • You can specify keywords.
  • You can specify home, which is the home url of your project.
  • maintainers: list of people maintaining this chart.

-B. helpers​

_helpers.tpl

It starts with an underscore (_) so that it would always come on top. The tpl stands for template.

The _helpers.tpl contains methods that can be used in a .yaml file. If you open it you can see a bunch of functions defined.

{{/*
Create a default fully qualified app name.
We truncate at 63 chars because some Kubernetes name fields are limited to this (by the DNS naming spec).
If release name contains chart name it will be used as a full name.
*/}}
{{- define "hello.fullname" -}}
{{- if .Values.fullnameOverride }}
{{- .Values.fullnameOverride | trunc 63 | trimSuffix "-" }}
{{- else }}
{{- $name := default .Chart.Name .Values.nameOverride }}
{{- if contains $name .Release.Name }}
{{- .Release.Name | trunc 63 | trimSuffix "-" }}
{{- else }}
{{- printf "%s-%s" .Release.Name $name | trunc 63 | trimSuffix "-" }}
{{- end }}
{{- end }}
{{- end }}
{{/*
Create chart name and version as used by the chart label.
*/}}
{{- define "hello.chart" -}}
{{- printf "%s-%s" .Chart.Name .Chart.Version | replace "+" "_" | trunc 63 | trimSuffix "-" }}
{{- end }}

11. Templating Syntax & tricks​

- A. if statement​

{{- if .Values.ingress.enabled}}

- B. include​

include is a way to invoke a helper function, defined in one of your .tpl files.
You can pass all parameters to it like so: .

{{ include SOME.FUNC.NAME}}

12. helm package​

To package a chart, go to the command line, and type:

helm package path/to/chart-root

The output of this command is a file named: CHART_NAME-0.1.0.tgz.