Deploy the speedtest helm chart on Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE)

Question

Pulumi · Accepted Answer

To deploy the Speedtest Helm chart on Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE), you'll need to perform the following high-level steps:

Set up a GKE cluster where your Helm chart will be deployed.
Install and configure Helm in your local environment to manage Kubernetes applications.
Deploy the Speedtest Helm chart onto your GKE cluster using Helm.

Below is a Pulumi program in TypeScript that sets up a GKE cluster. After the cluster is set up, I will guide you through the process of configuring Helm and deploying the Speedtest Helm chart.

First, we'll use the gcp.container.Cluster resource to create a new GKE cluster. Make sure you have the @pulumi/gcp package installed in your Node.js project.

Here's the Pulumi program for setting up the GKE cluster:

import * as gcp from "@pulumi/gcp";

// Create a GKE cluster
const cluster = new gcp.container.Cluster("speedtest-cluster", {
    initialNodeCount: 2,
    nodeConfig: {
        preemptible: true,
        machineType: "n1-standard-1",
        oauthScopes: [
            "https://www.googleapis.com/auth/compute",
            "https://www.googleapis.com/auth/devstorage.read_only",
            "https://www.googleapis.com/auth/logging.write",
            "https://www.googleapis.com/auth/monitoring"
        ],
    },
});

// Export the cluster details to access them later
export const kubeconfig = cluster.name.apply(name => {
    return `apiVersion: v1
clusters:
- cluster:
    certificate-authority-data: ${cluster.masterAuth.clusterCaCertificate}
    server: https://${cluster.endpoint}
  name: ${name}
contexts:
- context:
    cluster: ${name}
    user: ${name}
  name: ${name}
current-context: ${name}
kind: Config
preferences: {}
users:
- name: ${name}
  user:
    auth-provider:
      config:
        cmd-args: config config-helper --format=json
        cmd-path: gcloud
        expiry-key: '{.credential.token_expiry}'
        token-key: '{.credential.access_token}'
      name: gcp
`;
});

// Export the cluster's kubeconfig
export const clusterName = cluster.name;

This code will create a new GKE cluster named speedtest-cluster with 2 nodes of type n1-standard-1. The preemptible flag is set to true, which means the nodes are short-lived and less expensive, suitable for testing and development environments.

To apply this Pulumi program, simply run pulumi up in your terminal in the directory where you've saved this file.

After you have created the GKE cluster with Pulumi, you need to set up Helm on your local machine. Helm is a package manager for Kubernetes that enables you to deploy applications (described by Helm charts) to your cluster.

Here's how to set up Helm:

Install Helm on your local machine by following the instructions on the Helm website.
Once Helm is installed, add the repository that contains the Speedtest Helm chart (if it’s not an official chart and you know the repository).
Update your local Helm chart repository list by running helm repo update.
Install the Speedtest Helm chart onto your GKE cluster with a command like helm install speedtest speedtest-chart-repo/speedtest.

Be aware that you'll need the correct repository where the Speedtest Helm chart is located. The name speedtest-chart-repo/speedtest is just an example and you would need to replace it with the actual chart name and repository.

Additionally, you would need to authenticate with your GKE cluster typically by using the gcloud CLI. The exact command can vary, but generally, it will be something along the lines of gcloud container clusters get-credentials <cluster-name> --zone <zone> --project <project-name>.

Once you are authenticated and have Helm set up, you can deploy any Helm chart you like to your GKE cluster.