| ❗ This project is not maintained anymore and will be archived soon. |
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Please note: This repository and the related documentation is very much work-in-progress, so expect to find unfinished work ahead! All releases are currently only test releases and not intended for use.
Potter - The K8s Applications and Services Hub, is a Kubernetes extension to manage deployments in Kubernetes clusters. It’s a central component in a Gardener Kubernetes landscape which doesn’t require any additional components running in the managed cluster.
A complete Potter installation offers a UI (maintain in this repository, heavily based on the kubeapps project), which can be used to manually deploy Helm Charts to Clusters. The UI has been enhanced to work centrally, so that only one Potter installation is required to manage a multitude of Clusters in a remote fashion.
The UI also displays status information about the deployments running in a Cluster. Additionally, it offers a Catalog, in which Helm Charts of connected Helm Chart Repositories can be browsed and deployed. The Repositories offered in the Catalog can easily be configured to match specific usecases.
The end user documentation could be found here.
Apart from the UI, Potter introduces the concept of so-called "Cluster Bill-of-Materials" (in short: 'Cluster-BoMs'). These entities are YAML files, describing a list of Kubernetes Deployments which should run in a specific Cluster. Such a YAML file describes the "desired state" of all applications which should be running in a Cluster. Cluster-BoMs can easily be applied to a Cluster with kubectl. After applying such a Cluster-BoM, the Potter-Controller (located in this repository) will start deploying whatever is part of the Cluster-BoM. A Status Section at the end of the BoM provides the detailed deployment states.
Ideally, Cluster-BoMs are used to fully automate the management of deployments for a Kubernetes Cluster. By using Cluster-BoMs, not only Helm Charts, but also Kapp-Deployments can be managed.
The underlying architecture enables easy extensibility, so that further Kubernetes deployment types can be integrated, Helm Chart and Kapp support is provided out-of-the-box. The deployment itself is technically based on the Landscaper Project.
Potter is distributed and installed via Helm. For detailed installation instructions, visit the Helm Chart's README.md. To make the most out of a Potter Deployment, you should also take a look at the README.md of the corresponding Potter-Controller.
The current version of the Potter project has the following limitations:
- Kapp deployments are not displayed in the UI. Integration of kapp deployments into the UI is planned, but not yet available.
- Existing Cluster-BoMs for a Cluster can be displayed in the UI, but not edited. This is also on our roadmap.
- Support for Potter installations outside of Gardener landscapes is untested.
If you encounter any problems using Potter or if you have feature requests, please don't hesitate to contact us via both GitHub repositories. We will offer further methods for getting in touch with us, which you will find here.
Potter is offered as Open Source, using the Apache 2.0 license model.
If you would like to contribute, please check out the Gardener contributor guide.