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Helm Chart Installation and Uninstall

Helm Chart Installation and Uninstall refers to the fundamental operations of deploying a packaged application (a Chart) to a Kubernetes cluster and subsequently removing it. These operations manage the lifecycle of a Helm release, which includes the deployment of defined resources such as Deployments, Services, and Ingresses.^[400-devops__06-Kubernetes__devops-helm__terraform-helm__helm__README.md]

Installation Workflow

To install a Helm chart, the repository hosting the chart must first be added to the local Helm configuration.^[400-devops__06-Kubernetes__devops-helm__terraform-helm__helm__README.md] Following this, the helm install command is used to deploy the chart.

A standard installation process involves two steps^[400-devops__06-Kubernetes__devops-helm__terraform-helm__helm__README.md]:

  1. Add Repository: 
    helm repo add kubernetes-dashboard https://kubernetes.github.io/dashboard/
  2. Install Chart: 
    helm install kubernetes-dashboard/kubernetes-dashboard --name my-release

The --name flag is used to assign a specific release name (e.g., my-release); if omitted, a name may be auto-generated.^[400-devops__06-Kubernetes__devops-helm__terraform-helm__helm__README.md]

Configuration

During installation, the chart can be configured to match specific environment requirements using parameters.^[400-devops__06-Kubernetes__devops-helm__terraform-helm__helm__README.md]

There are two primary methods to pass these configuration values to the helm install command:

  • Command-line arguments: Using the --set flag to define key-value pairs (e.g., --set=service.externalPort=8080).^[400-devops__06-Kubernetes__devops-helm__terraform-helm__helm__README.md]
  • YAML Files: Using the -f flag to specify a custom values file (e.g., -f values.yaml).^[400-devops__06-Kubernetes__devops-helm__terraform-helm__helm__README.md]

Configuration parameters typically control settings such as image tags, replica counts, service types, and resource limits.^[400-devops__06-Kubernetes__devops-helm__terraform-helm__helm__README.md]

Uninstallation

To remove a release and its associated resources from the cluster, the helm delete command is used^[400-devops__06-Kubernetes__devops-helm__terraform-helm__helm__README.md].

The command requires the release name as an argument^[400-devops__06-Kubernetes__devops-helm__terraform-helm__helm__README.md]:

helm delete my-release

Executing this command removes all Kubernetes components associated with the release, including pods, services, and other resources created by the chart^[400-devops__06-Kubernetes__devops-helm__terraform-helm__helm__README.md].

Sources