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This Helm workshop is designed to help you make better use of Helm in your Kubernetes deployments.

Shared CLI tools image (OpenShift 102 showroom)

If you prefer not to install oc, kubectl, helm, istioctl, and related tools on your laptop, run the workshop CLI tools image on the cluster. You do not need a local oc client: apply the manifest from the web console (see below). An interactive bash session prints a short list of bundled tools when the shell starts (for example after opening Terminal on the pod and running bash or bash -l if the default shell is sh).

The image build copies the showroom Helm chart into ~/chart so you can run helm upgrade --install from the pod without cloning the git repository; use --set tools.enabled=false when installing from this pod so the chart does not start a second tools Deployment.

Default image (change the tag to match your deployed showroom chart or offline bundle):

ghcr.io/shpwrck/openshift-102-tools:latest

To apply the workload without a local oc client:

  1. In the OpenShift console, select your Project.

  2. Click + in the top bar, then Import YAML.

  3. Paste the manifest below, adjust the image: line if you mirror images, then click Create.

  4. Go to Workloads → Deployments → openshift-102-workshop-tools, open the Pods tab, select the running pod, then Terminal (or Actions → Debug pod). Run bash or bash -l if you need the interactive bash banner.

The same manifest lives in the repository as deploy/openshift-102-tools-deployment.yaml and is shipped in the offline release tarball.

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: openshift-102-workshop-tools
  labels:
    app.kubernetes.io/name: openshift-102-workshop-tools
    app.kubernetes.io/part-of: openshift-102-workshop
spec:
  replicas: 1
  revisionHistoryLimit: 2
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app.kubernetes.io/name: openshift-102-workshop-tools
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app.kubernetes.io/name: openshift-102-workshop-tools
    spec:
      containers:
        - name: tools
          image: "ghcr.io/shpwrck/openshift-102-tools:latest"
          imagePullPolicy: IfNotPresent
          resources:
            requests:
              cpu: 50m
              memory: 128Mi
            limits:
              cpu: "1"
              memory: 512Mi

The container image CMD keeps the process alive (sleep via the image entrypoint) so the pod stays running until you delete the Deployment. The image includes a small docker CLI shim for Helm OCI exercises (no Docker Engine); manifest operations use skopeo under the hood. For disconnected clusters, mirror the tools image and UBI base listed in the release tarball TOOLS.md and images-mirror.txt.

Prerequisites

This workshop assumes the following:

  • You have basic familiarity with what Helm is and what it does.

  • You have experience running a Helm chart in your own Kubernetes cluster.

If you are new to Helm, we recommend reviewing the official Helm documentation before proceeding.

Expectations

After completing this workshop, you will be able to:

  • Create and install a Helm chart.

  • Perform basic and advanced templating of resources.

  • Package a Helm chart as a set of files or an OCI artifact.