Deploy the fastapi-app helm chart on Rancher

Question

Pulumi · Accepted Answer

To deploy a Helm chart on a Kubernetes cluster managed by Rancher using Pulumi, you need to perform a series of steps. The following guide will provide a comprehensive explanation of deploying the "fastapi-app" Helm chart on Rancher.

Prerequisites:

You must have access to a Kubernetes cluster managed by Rancher.
You need to have Pulumi CLI installed and configured for use with your cloud provider and Rancher.
Helm must be available in your environment to use Helm charts.
The "fastapi-app" Helm chart should be available in the Helm repository or have a local copy.

Explanation:

We will use the rancher2 Pulumi package to interact with your Rancher instance.
We'll first add the Helm chart repository to Rancher if it's not already available.
Then, we'll deploy the Helm chart to the Kubernetes cluster managed by Rancher using the HelmChart resource from the Pulumi Rancher 2 provider.
Make sure to replace placeholder values (<PLACEHOLDER>) with actual values for your setup.

Now, let's walk through the Pulumi TypeScript program.

import * as rancher2 from "@pulumi/rancher2";
import * as k8s from "@pulumi/kubernetes";

// Initialize the Rancher provider. Make sure your environment variables or Pulumi configuration is set with Rancher access details.
const rancherProvider = new rancher2.Provider("rancher", {
    apiUrl: "https://<RANCHER_API_URL>",
    accessKey: "<RANCHER_ACCESS_KEY>",
    secretKey: "<RANCHER_SECRET_KEY>",
    /* apiUrl, accessKey, and secretKey are sensitive values.
       Replace <RANCHER_API_URL>, <RANCHER_ACCESS_KEY>, and <RANCHER_SECRET_KEY>
       with the appropriate values for your Rancher instance. */
});

// Create a reference to your target Kubernetes cluster managed by Rancher.
// Replace <CLUSTER_ID> with your actual cluster ID.
const cluster = new rancher2.Cluster("my-cluster", {
    clusterId: "<CLUSTER_ID>",
}, { provider: rancherProvider });

// In case the "fastapi-app" chart is from a custom Helm repository,
// add the repository to Rancher. Skip this step if the chart is already in a known repo.
const helmRepo = new rancher2.CatalogV2("fastapi-app-repo", {
    catalogName: "fastapi-app",
    url: "https://<HELM_REPO_URL>",
    clusterId: cluster.id,
}, { provider: rancherProvider });

// Deploy the "fastapi-app" Helm chart.
const fastapiApp = new k8s.helm.v3.Chart("fastapi-app-chart", {
    chart: "fastapi-app",
    version: "<CHART_VERSION>",
    fetchOpts: {
        repo: helmRepo.url,
    },
    // Specify the values for the Helm chart deployment. Replace <VALUES> with the appropriate values for the chart.
    values: {
        // example value
        service: {
            type: "ClusterIP",
            port: 80,
        },
        // Add other values according to the "fastapi-app" Helm chart's requirements
    },
    // The namespace where you want to install your Helm chart. Replace <NAMESPACE> with your namespace.
    namespace: "<NAMESPACE>",
    // Setting the Rancher Kubernetes provider.
    // Ensure that this provider uses the correct kubeconfig context or credentials for the Rancher-managed cluster.
}, { provider: cluster });

// Export the endpoint of the service. Assumes the Helm chart creates a service for the FastAPI app.
export const fastapiAppEndpoint = fastapiApp.getResourceProperty("v1/Service", "fastapi-app-service", "status").apply(status => status.loadBalancer.ingress[0].hostname || status.loadBalancer.ingress[0].ip);

Remember to install the @pulumi/rancher2 and @pulumi/kubernetes packages using npm if they aren't already installed:

npm install @pulumi/rancher2 @pulumi/kubernetes

Explanation of the resources:

rancher2.Provider: This initializes the Pulumi provider for Rancher, enabling Pulumi to communicate with the Rancher API.
rancher2.CatalogV2: If your Helm chart is in a custom repository, this resource adds that Helm repo to Rancher's known repositories.
k8s.helm.v3.Chart: Deploys the "fastapi-app" Helm chart to the Rancher-managed Kubernetes cluster.

In the fastapiApp chart deployment, the values field specifies the configuration for the Helm chart. You need to replace the <VALUES> with the actual values that are appropriate for the "fastapi-app" Helm chart. The namespace field specifies the namespace in which the chart will be deployed. The provider argument is passed to ensure the Helm chart is deployed to the correct Rancher-managed Kubernetes cluster.

Finally, we export the fastapiAppEndpoint. This assumes that the "fastapi-app" Helm chart creates a service with an externally accessible endpoint. The hostname or IP of the load balancer ingress is extracted for you to be able to access the FastAPI app.

Make sure to replace all the <PLACEHOLDER> values with actual ones that match your Helm chart and Rancher setup. Once you’ve done that, you can run the Pulumi program to deploy the FastAPI app onto your Rancher-managed Kubernetes cluster.