Infrastructure & Engineering

ArgoCD with Helm: GUI Access Guide for Kubernetes Environment

Otama
2 min read
Modified
Progress 5 / 18
Table of Contents

Recently, I started thinking “I want to try GitOps-like operation soon.” Doing kubectl apply manually is honestly getting tedious… So, I thought “Let’s take the first step of GitOps using ArgoCD!”, but the hurdle of introduction felt a bit high and I was dragging my feet.

This time, I will try simply “installing ArgoCD just with commands and making GUI accessible from local”. Bootstrapping, repository addition etc. will be in another article! I will proceed with the shortest distance aiming first to see ArgoCD’s face.

Prerequisites

Assume kubernetes is already introduced. If not yet, refer to below etc.

おうちKubernetesを構築してみた話【kubeadm + CRI-O + Cilium】

>-

blog.otama-playground.com

Procedure

Introduce ArgoCD

Use helm to make it easy.

Ref: https://github.com/argoproj/argo-helm/tree/main/charts/argo-cd

Terminal window
kubectl create namespace my-namespace


helm repo add argo https://argoproj.github.io/argo-helm
helm install argocd argo/argo-cd --namespace argocd

Change ArgoCD Service type to NodePort

Modify manifest via CLI.

Terminal window
kubectl get svc argocd-server -n argocd

Modify following parts. If port number is omitted, it’s automatically assigned.

spec:
  ports:
  - name: http
    nodePort: 30992 # Add line (Optional)
    port: 80
    protocol: TCP
    targetPort: 8080
  - name: https
    nodePort: 30080  # Add line (Optional)
    port: 443
    protocol: TCP
    targetPort: 8080
  type: NodePort # Change from ClusterIP

Note: Default editor is vim, so if not used to it, good luck. I feel you can edit if you grasp at least below.

  • i Move to edit mode
  • esc Exit edit mode
  • :w Save
  • :q Quit editor
  • :wq Save and Quit
  • :q! Force Quit

Access GUI

Access https://{Node_IP_Address}:30080 from browser. Since it’s self-signed certificate, warning appears upon connection but ignore it. If screen like below appears, success.

Access GUI 1
Access GUI 1

Try Logging In

Get initial password for admin

kubectl -n argocd get secret argocd-initial-admin-secret -o jsonpath="{.data.password}" | base64 -d

Login

Login with following info

  • user: admin
  • password: Password obtained earlier
Screen after ArgoCD Login
Screen after ArgoCD Login

Points of Concern

Redirects to example.argocd.com after logout

Since there is a setting item in configmap, modify it.

Terminal window
kubectl edit configmap argocd-cm -n argocd

Change following part to actual value.

data:
  # Change from https://argocd.example.com
  url: https://{Node_IP_Address}:30080

Conclusion

So, this time I tried up to touching ArgoCD locally for now just with CLI. Install with Helm, make Service type NodePort, access GUI. If you can pick up login info and enter the dashboard, I think you can call yourself “ArgoCD User” (probably).

There are still many “things I want to do”, but I’ll pause here for now. I plan to write articles when I touch things like Bootstrapping or auto-sync of apps and think “Oh”, so please come play again if you like!

Related Posts