What?

This is a Maven plugin for testing, packaging and uploading HELM charts.

"HELM is a tool for managing Kubernetes charts. Charts are packages of pre-configured Kubernetes resources."

Visit https://docs.helm.sh for detailed information.

Currently the upload to ChartMuseum and Artifactory is supported.

Helm v3

From version 5.0 Helm v3 is required. There is no longer support for Helm v2. For convenience reasons the stable repo is added by default.

Helm v2 users can still use plugin version 4.13.

Why?

Currently (October 2017) there is no simple Maven plugin to package existing HELM charts.

How?

By default, the plugin automatically downloads Helm at the specified version. You can also manually specify the download URL. Next to that it is possible to specify a local Helm binary. In all cases Helm will be executed in the background.

Add following dependency to your pom.xml:

<dependency>
  <groupId>com.kiwigrid</groupId>
  <artifactId>helm-maven-plugin</artifactId>
  <version>5.6</version>
</dependency>

Configuration Examples

Helm URL Auto Detection

The default setting is to construct the Helm download URL based upon the detected OS and architecture:

<build>
  <plugins>
    <plugin>
      <groupId>com.kiwigrid</groupId>
      <artifactId>helm-maven-plugin</artifactId>
      <version>5.6</version>
      <configuration>
        <chartDirectory>${project.basedir}</chartDirectory>
        <chartVersion>${project.version}</chartVersion>
        <helmVersion>3.2.0</helmVersion>
      </configuration>
    </plugin>
  </plugins>
</build>

Usage with Downloaded Binary

<build>
  <plugins>
  ...
    <plugin>
      <groupId>com.kiwigrid</groupId>
      <artifactId>helm-maven-plugin</artifactId>
      <version>5.6</version>
      <configuration>
        <chartDirectory>${project.basedir}</chartDirectory>
        <chartVersion>${project.version}</chartVersion>
        <!-- This is the related section when using binary download -->
        <helmDownloadUrl>https://get.helm.sh/helm-v3.0.0-linux-amd64.tar.gz</helmDownloadUrl>
      </configuration>
    </plugin>
  ...
  </plugins>
</build>

Usage with Local Binary

When useLocalHelmBinary is enabled, the plugin by default will search for the helm executable in PATH:

<build>
  <plugins>
  ...
    <plugin>
      <groupId>com.kiwigrid</groupId>
      <artifactId>helm-maven-plugin</artifactId>
      <version>5.6</version>
      <configuration>
        <chartDirectory>${project.basedir}</chartDirectory>
        <chartVersion>${project.version}</chartVersion>
        <!-- This is the related section to use local binary with auto-detection enabled. -->
        <useLocalHelmBinary>true</useLocalHelmBinary>
      </configuration>
    </plugin>
  ...
  </plugins>
</build>

The following is an example configuration that explicitly sets the directory in which to look for the helm executable, and disables the auto-detection feature:

<build>
  <plugins>
  ...
    <plugin>
      <groupId>com.kiwigrid</groupId>
      <artifactId>helm-maven-plugin</artifactId>
      <version>5.6</version>
      <configuration>
        <chartDirectory>${project.basedir}</chartDirectory>
        <chartVersion>${project.version}</chartVersion>
        <!-- This is the related section to use local binary with auto-detection disabled. -->
        <useLocalHelmBinary>true</useLocalHelmBinary>
        <autoDetectLocalHelmBinary>false</autoDetectLocalHelmBinary>
        <helmExecutableDirectory>/usr/local/bin</helmExecutableDirectory>        
      </configuration>
    </plugin>
  ...
  </plugins>
</build>

Configure Plugin to Use Credentials from settings.xml for Upload

<build>
  <plugins>
  ...
    <plugin>
      <groupId>com.kiwigrid</groupId>
      <artifactId>helm-maven-plugin</artifactId>
      <version>5.6</version>
      <configuration>
        <chartDirectory>${project.basedir}</chartDirectory>
        <chartVersion>${project.version}</chartVersion>
        <!-- This is the related section to configure upload repos -->
        <uploadRepoStable>
            <name>stable-repo</name>
            <url>https://repo.example.com/artifactory/helm-stable</url>
            <type>ARTIFACTORY</type>
        </uploadRepoStable>
        <uploadRepoSnapshot>
            <name>snapshot-repo</name>
            <url>https://my.chart.museum:8080/api/charts</url>
            <type>CHARTMUSEUM</type>
        </uploadRepoSnapshot>
        <helmDownloadUrl>https://get.helm.sh/helm-v3.0.0-linux-amd64.tar.gz</helmDownloadUrl>
      </configuration>
    </plugin>
  ...
  </plugins>
</build>

More Complex Example

<build>
  <plugins>
  ...
    <plugin>
      <groupId>com.kiwigrid</groupId>
      <artifactId>helm-maven-plugin</artifactId>
      <version>5.6</version>
      <configuration>
        <chartDirectory>${project.basedir}</chartDirectory>
        <chartVersion>${project.version}</chartVersion>
        <uploadRepoStable>
            <name>stable-repo</name>
            <url>https://repo.example.com/artifactory/helm-stable</url>
            <!-- Artifacotry requires basic authentication --> 
            <!-- which is supported from HELM version >= 2.9 -->
            <type>ARTIFACTORY</type>
            <username>foo</username>
            <password>bar</password>
        </uploadRepoStable>
        <uploadRepoSnapshot>
            <name>snapshot-repo</name>
            <url>https://my.chart.museum/api/charts</url>
            <type>CHARTMUSEUM</type>
        </uploadRepoSnapshot>
        <helmDownloadUrl>https://get.helm.sh/helm-v3.0.0-linux-amd64.tar.gz</helmDownloadUrl>
        <helmHomeDirectory>${project.basedir}/target/helm/home</helmHomeDirectory>
        <registryConfig>~/.config/helm/registry.json</registryConfig>
        <repositoryCache>~/.cache/helm/repository</repositoryCache>
        <repositoryConfig>~/.config/helm/repositories.yaml</repositoryConfig>
        <!-- Lint with strict mode -->
        <lintStrict>true</lintStrict>
        <!-- Disable adding of default repo stable https://charts.helm.sh/stable -->
        <addDefaultRepo>false</addDefaultRepo>
        <!-- Exclude a directory to avoid processing -->
        <excludes>
          <exclude>${project.basedir}/excluded</exclude>
          <exclude>${project.basedir}/**/excluded*</exclude>
        </excludes>
        <!-- Add an additional repo -->
        <helmExtraRepos>
          <helmRepo>
            <name>kiwigrid</name>
            <url>https://kiwigrid.github.io</url>
          </helmRepo>
        </helmExtraRepos>
        <!-- extra value settings for the lint command -->
        <values>
          <overrides>
            <component1.install.path>/opt/component1</component1.install.path>
          </overrides>
          <yamlFile>${project.basedir}/src/test/resources/myOverrides.yaml</yamlFile>
        </values>
      </configuration>
    </plugin>
  ...
  </plugins>
</build>

Features

• Package Helm charts from standard folder structure
• Test Helm charts (Helm lint)
• Recursive chart detection (subcharts)
• Helm does not need to be installed
• Upload to ChartMuseum or Artifactory
• Repository names are interpreted as server IDs to retrieve basic authentication from server list in settings.xml.

Usage

Goals

• helm:init initializes Helm by downloading a specific version
• helm:dependency-build resolves the chart dependencies
• helm:package packages the given charts (chart.tar.gz)
• helm:lint tests the given charts
• helm:dry-run simulates an install
• helm:upload upload charts via HTTP PUT

Configuration

Parameter	Type	User Property	Required	Description
<chartDirectory>	string	helm.chartDirectory	true	root directory of your charts
<chartVersion>	string	helm.chartVersion	true	Version of the charts. The version have to be in the SEMVER-Format, required by helm.
<appVersion>	string	helm.appVersion	false	The version of the app. This needn't be SemVer.
<helmDownloadUrl>	string	helm.downloadUrl	false	URL to download helm. Leave empty to autodetect URL based upon OS and architecture.
<helmVersion>	string	helm.version	false	Version of helm to download. Defaults to 3.2.0
<excludes>	list of strings	helm.excludes	false	list of chart directories to exclude
<useLocalHelmBinary>	boolean	helm.useLocalHelmBinary	false	Controls whether a local binary should be used instead of downloading it. If set to true path has to be set with property executableDirectory
<autoDetectLocalHelmBinary>	boolean	helm.autoDetectLocalHelmBinary	true	Controls whether the local binary should be auto-detected from PATH environment variable. If set to false the binary in <helmExecutableDirectory> is used. This property has no effect unless <useLocalHelmBinary> is set to true.
<helmExecutableDirectory>	string	helm.executableDirectory	false	directory of your helm installation (default: ${project.build.directory}/helm)
<outputDirectory>	string	helm.outputDirectory	false	chart output directory (default: ${project.build.directory}/helm/repo)
<registryConfig>	string	helm.registryConfig	false	path to the registry config file
<repositoryCache>	string	helm.repositoryCache	false	path to the file containing cached repository indexes
<repositoryConfig>	string	helm.repositoryConfig	false	path to the file containing repository names and URLs
<helmExtraRepos>	list of HelmRepository	helm.extraRepos	false	adds extra repositories while init
<uploadRepoStable>	HelmRepository	helm.uploadRepo.stable	true	Upload repository for stable charts
<uploadRepoSnapshot>	HelmRepository	helm.uploadRepo.snapshot	false	Upload repository for snapshot charts (determined by version postfix 'SNAPSHOT')
<lintStrict>	boolean	helm.lint.strict	false	run lint command with strict option (fail on lint warnings)
<addDefaultRepo>	boolean	helm.init.add-default-repo	true	If true, stable repo (https://charts.helm.sh/stable) will be added
<skip>	boolean	helm.skip	false	skip plugin execution
<skipInit>	boolean	helm.init.skip	false	skip init goal
<skipLint>	boolean	helm.lint.skip	false	skip lint goal
<skipDryRun>	boolean	helm.dry-run.skip	false	skip dry-run goal
<skipDependencyBuild>	boolean	helm.dependency-build.skip	false	skip dependency-build goal
<skipPackage>	boolean	helm.package.skip	false	skip package goal
<skipUpload>	boolean	helm.upload.skip	false	skip upload goal
<security>	string	helm.security	false	path to your settings-security.xml (default: ~/.m2/settings-security.xml)
<values>	ValueOverride	helm.values	false	override some values for linting with helm.values.overrides (--set option), helm.values.stringOverrides (--set-string option), helm.values.fileOverrides (--set-file option) and last but not least helm.values.yamlFile (--values option)

Packaging with the Helm Lifecycle

To keep your pom files small you can use 'helm' packaging. This binds helm:init to the initialize phase, helm:lint to the test phase, helm:package to the package phase and helm:upload to the deploy phase.

<pom>
  <artifactId>my-helm-charts</artifactId>
  <version>0.0.1</version>
  <packaging>helm</packaging>
  ...
  <build>
    <plugins>
      <plugin>
        <groupId>com.kiwigrid</groupId>
        <artifactId>helm-maven-plugin</artifactId>
        <!-- Mandatory when you use a custom lifecycle -->
        <extensions>true</extensions>
        <configuration>
          ...
        </configuration>
      </plugin>
    </plugins>
    ....
  </build>
</pom>