Deploy the kiali helm chart on Kubernetes

Question

Pulumi · Accepted Answer

Deploying a Helm chart on a Kubernetes cluster using Pulumi involves several steps. You will leverage Pulumi's Kubernetes provider to handle the deployment. Specifically, the Chart resource enables you to install a Helm chart into your Kubernetes cluster. In the program below, I will show you how to deploy the Kiali Helm chart – Kiali being a tool for service mesh observability and configuration.

Before you begin, ensure you have the following prerequisites:

Pulumi CLI installed
A configured Kubernetes cluster and the kubeconfig file pointing to it
Helm and its related dependencies configured if needed

Here's a Pulumi program in TypeScript that deploys the Kiali Helm chart:

Importing dependencies: Start by importing the necessary Pulumi and Kubernetes packages in TypeScript.
Instantiating a Chart: Use the Chart resource from the @pulumi/kubernetes/helm/v3 package to deploy the Kiali chart.
Provide Configuration: You'll need to configure the chart with necessary values, which might involve specifying the version of the chart and any settings in the values property.

Below is the detailed Pulumi TypeScript program:

import * as pulumi from '@pulumi/pulumi';
import * as k8s from '@pulumi/kubernetes';

// Initialize a Pulumi Kubernetes provider by referencing the configuration context of your cluster,
// This is typically picked up from the kubeconfig file in the standard location as understood by kubectl.
const provider = new k8s.Provider('k8s-provider', {
    kubeconfig: pulumi.output(process.env.KUBECONFIG).apply(JSON.stringify),
});

// Deploy the Kiali Helm chart into the Kubernetes cluster.
// Note the `chart` here refers to the chart name in the Helm repository.
const kialiChart = new k8s.helm.v3.Chart('kiali', {
    chart: 'kiali',
    version: '<VERSION>', // Replace with the desired chart version
    fetchOpts: {
        // Specify where to find the Kiali Helm chart. This can also be a Helm repo URL if required.
        repo: 'https://kiali.org/helm-charts',
    },
    // Provide custom values to override the chart's default configuration.
    // You should modify these values based on your requirements.
    values: {
        dashboard: {
            viewOnlyMode: false,
        },
        // You can specify additional custom values for your Kiali deployment
    },
}, { provider });

// Export the resulting resource's status, which includes the deployment name and other details.
export const kialiDeploymentName = kialiChart.status.name;

This program creates an instance of a Helm chart using the Kiali Helm repository. Replace <VERSION> with the actual version of the chart that you want to deploy. The values object is used to set configurations specific to the Kiali chart, and what I've provided is just a placeholder – you need to replace them with actual configuration values for Kiali.

This code assumes that you have a KUBECONFIG environment variable pointing to a kubeconfig file that Pulumi can use to communicate with your Kubernetes cluster. You will replace the placeholder values (especially the version number) with the chart's actual desired version, and customize the values based on your specific configuration requirements for Kiali.

Upon running this Pulumi program, Pulumi CLI will perform a series of steps to deploy the Kiali Helm chart on your Kubernetes cluster. It will interpret the program, communicate with the Kubernetes cluster defined in your kubeconfig, and orchestrate the necessary actions to deploy Kiali as defined in the Helm chart.