Deploy the harperdb helm chart on Rancher

Question

Pulumi · Accepted Answer

To deploy the HarperDB Helm chart on Rancher, you'll need a Kubernetes cluster managed by Rancher and the Helm CLI installed on your computer to package and deploy Helm charts. Pulumi does not have a direct integration with Helm for managing Helm chart deployments as of my last update; however, Pulumi can manage Kubernetes resources directly, which Helm charts consist of.

Below is a Pulumi TypeScript program that demonstrates how you would set up a Kubernetes provider that is connected to your Rancher-managed Kubernetes cluster and subsequently apply a generic Helm chart. You would replace the placeholders for `kubeconfig` with your Rancher Kubernetes cluster's kubeconfig and ensure that the HarperDB Helm chart data is accurate as per its repository details (i.e., repository URL and chart version).

Start with importing the required Pulumi packages:

```typescript
import * as k8s from "@pulumi/kubernetes";
```

With the Kubernetes package, you create a provider that represents your Rancher-managed Kubernetes cluster. Replace `"your-kubeconfig-here"` with the actual kubeconfig from your Rancher cluster:

```typescript
// Create a Kubernetes provider instance that uses your cluster's kubeconfig.
const rancherK8sProvider = new k8s.Provider("rancherK8sProvider", {
    kubeconfig: "your-kubeconfig-here", // Your kubeconfig goes here.
});
```

Now you can use this provider to deploy the HarperDB Helm chart. You will need to specify the chart's name, version, and repository. Find these details in the Helm chart's documentation or repository:

```typescript
// Deploy HarperDB using its Helm chart.
const harperDbChart = new k8s.helm.v3.Chart("harperdb", {
    chart: "harperdb-chart-name", // Replace with the actual chart name for HarperDB.
    version: "chart-version", // Specify the version of the chart you wish to deploy.
    fetchOpts: {
        repo: "https://harperdb-helm-repository", // Use the real Helm repository URL for HarperDB.
    },
}, { provider: rancherK8sProvider });
```

Putting it all together, the complete program would look as follows:

```typescript
import * as pulumi from "@pulumi/pulumi";
import * as k8s from "@pulumi/kubernetes";

// Create a Kubernetes provider instance that uses your cluster's kubeconfig.
const rancherK8sProvider = new k8s.Provider("rancherK8sProvider", {
    kubeconfig: "your-kubeconfig-here", // Your kubeconfig goes here.
});

// Deploy HarperDB using its Helm chart.
const harperDbChart = new k8s.helm.v3.Chart("harperdb", {
    chart: "harperdb-chart-name", // Replace with the actual chart name for HarperDB.
    version: "chart-version", // Specify the version of the chart you wish to deploy.
    fetchOpts: {
        repo: "https://harperdb-helm-repository", // Use the real Helm repository URL for HarperDB.
    },
}, { provider: rancherK8sProvider });

// Export any of the necessary resulting resource properties.
export const harperDbEndpoint = harperDbChart.getResourceProperty("v1/Service", "harperdb-service", "status").apply(status => status.loadBalancer.ingress[0].ip || status.loadBalancer.ingress[0].hostname);
```

Make sure to replace the placeholder `"your-kubeconfig-here"` with the actual kubeconfig content from your Rancher cluster, and fill in the correct names and versions for the HarperDB Helm chart. The `harperDbEndpoint` export assumes HarperDB exposes a `Service` with a load balancer; adjust this according to HarperDB's actual service details and how it exposes its endpoint.

Finally, to run this Pulumi program, perform the following steps:

1. Install Pulumi and configure it for use with your preferred cloud provider (in this case, Rancher's Kubernetes).
2. Install Node.js and npm, which are required to run the Pulumi TypeScript program.
3. Save the above program in a file named `index.ts`.
4. Run `npm install` to install the necessary dependencies, including `@pulumi/kubernetes`.
5. Run `pulumi up` to initiate the deployment. Pulumi will prompt you for confirmation before it makes any changes to your cloud resources.

The deployment process will use the Helm chart to create all the requisite Kubernetes resources that make up HarperDB on your Rancher-managed cluster. After the `pulumi up` command finishes successfully, check your Rancher dashboard or use `kubectl` to confirm that HarperDB is running as expected.