Deploy the jambonz helm chart on Linode Kubernetes Engine

Question

Pulumi · Accepted Answer

To deploy the Jambonz Helm chart on a Linode Kubernetes Engine (LKE), we'll go through several steps using Pulumi with TypeScript. Pulumi provides an infrastructure as code tool that lets us define our cloud resources in a programming language, rather than through manual processes or scripts.

We'll be doing the following:

1. **Setting up a new Linode Kubernetes cluster**: We'll use Pulumi's `@pulumi/linode` package to create a new Kubernetes cluster on Linode.
2. **Installing Helm and the Jambonz Helm chart**: Helm is a package manager for Kubernetes, which simplifies the process of defining, installing, and upgrading even the most complex Kubernetes applications. We'll use the Pulumi Kubernetes provider to deploy Helm charts.

Here's the Pulumi program to accomplish this:

```typescript
import * as linode from "@pulumi/linode";
import * as kubernetes from "@pulumi/kubernetes";

// Step 1: Provision a new Linode Kubernetes cluster.
const cluster = new linode.LkeCluster("my-cluster", {
    k8sVersion: "1.20", // Ensure this version is supported by Linode and the Helm chart
    region: "us-central", // Use the region closest to you or your users
    nodePools: [{
        type: "g6-standard-2", // Choose the type based on your expected workload
        count: 2, // You can set the number of nodes based on your load requirements
    }],
});

// Step 2: Configure the Kubernetes provider to connect to the Linode cluster.
const kubeconfig = cluster.kubeconfig.apply(JSON.stringify);
const provider = new kubernetes.Provider("my-provider", {
    kubeconfig: kubeconfig,
});

// Step 3: Deploy the Jambonz Helm chart using the Helm provider.
const jambonzChart = new kubernetes.helm.v3.Chart("jambonz", {
    chart: "jambonz",
    version: "x.y.z", // Specify the version of the chart you want to deploy
    fetchOpts: {
        repo: "http://helm-repo-url/", // Replace with the actual Helm repo URL for Jambonz
    },
}, { provider });

// Export the kubeconfig to access the cluster with kubectl
export const kubeconfigOutput = kubeconfig;
```

Let's break down what each section of the code is doing:

- **Linode Kubernetes Cluster**: We start by using the `@pulumi/linode` package to create an LKE Cluster. You need to replace `"1.20"` with the Kubernetes version supported by Linode and the Jambonz chart. Also, select a region that's appropriate for you. For the `nodePools`, choose a node type that suits your workload and decide on the number of nodes.

- **Kubernetes Provider**: We then instantiate a Pulumi Kubernetes Provider, which is required to interact with the Kubernetes cluster. We pass the kubeconfig that we obtain from the Linode cluster to this provider in order to authenticate.

- **Helm Chart**: We deploy the Jambonz application using its Helm chart. This `Chart` resource refers to the Helm chart we want to deploy (`"jambonz"`), its version (`"x.y.z"`), and fetch options that include the repo URL, which you'll need to replace with the URL where the Jambonz Helm chart is hosted.

- **Exporting Kubeconfig**: At the end of the program, the kubeconfig is exported. This will be useful for accessing your Kubernetes cluster with kubectl after your Pulumi program has run.

To run this Pulumi program:

1. Install Pulumi and set up the Linode provider.
2. Save this code in a file with a `.ts` extension.
3. Run `pulumi up` from the command line in the same directory as your file.

This program will create a new LKE cluster and deploy the specified version of the Jambonz Helm chart to that cluster. Remember to replace placeholder values with actual values specific to your setup (e.g., Kubernetes version, node type, and Helm chart version).