Development

Active development on the deployment is currently only available for project members. However, contributions are possible using the CLA process.

Overview

The following sketch provides a high-level overview to get a basic understanding of the deployment-relevant structure of this repository. Understanding that structure is vital if you want to contribute to developing the openDesk platform.

flowchart TD
 J[helmfile.yaml.gotmpl\nor a helmfile outside of this repository]-->A
 J-->K[./helmfile/environemnts/*your_environment*/values.yaml.gotmpl\nor any an environment values file]
 A[./helmfile_generic.yaml.gotmpl]-->B[./helmfile/apps/*all_configured_apps*/helmfile.yaml.gotmpl\nReferences the relevant app Helm\ncharts using details from 'charts.yaml.gotmpl']
 B-->C[./values-*all_configured_components*.yaml.gotmpl\nValues to template the charts\nwith references to the `images.yaml.gotmpl`]
 A-->D[./helmfile/environments/default/*\nwith just some examples below]
 D-->F[charts.yaml.gotmpl]
 D-->G[images.yaml.gotmpl]
 D-->H[global.*]
 D-->I[secrets.yaml.gotmpl\nreplicas.yaml.gotmpl\nresources.yaml.gotmpl\n...]
 A-->|overwrite defaults with your\ndeployment/environment specific values|E[./helmfile/environments/default/values.yaml.gotmpl]

Source

flowchart TD
 J[helmfile.yaml.gotmpl\nor a helmfile outside of this repository]-->A
 J-->K[./helmfile/environemnts/*your_environment*/values.yaml.gotmpl\nor any an environment values file]
 A[./helmfile_generic.yaml.gotmpl]-->B[./helmfile/apps/*all_configured_apps*/helmfile.yaml.gotmpl\nReferences the relevant app Helm\ncharts using details from 'charts.yaml.gotmpl']
 B-->C[./values-*all_configured_components*.yaml.gotmpl\nValues to template the charts\nwith references to the `images.yaml.gotmpl`]
 A-->D[./helmfile/environments/default/*\nwith just some examples below]
 D-->F[charts.yaml.gotmpl]
 D-->G[images.yaml.gotmpl]
 D-->H[global.*]
 D-->I[secrets.yaml.gotmpl\nreplicas.yaml.gotmpl\nresources.yaml.gotmpl\n...]
 A-->|overwrite defaults with your\ndeployment/environment specific values|E[./helmfile/environments/default/values.yaml.gotmpl]

The helmfile.yaml.gotmpl file in the root folder is the foundation for the entire deployment. It references the helmfile_generic.yaml.gotmpl file, which includes app-specific helmfile.yaml.gotmpl files and global values files located in ./environments/default.

helmfile.yaml.gotmpl also refers to three predefined environments: dev, test, and prod.

The helmfile_generic.yaml.gotmpl file is designed to be referenced from external repositories, where custom environments may be defined. An example is demonstrated in the helmfile.yaml.gotmpl file.

Before you investigate any app-specific configuration, it is recommended that you review the contents of ./helmfile/environments/default to understand what configuration details are set there, as the app deployments reference them.

Default branch, develop and other branches

The main branch is configured to be the default branch, as visitors of the project on Open CoDE should see that branch by default.

Please use the develop branch to diverge your branch(es) from. See the workflow guide for more details on naming conventions.

There is a CI bot that automatically creates a merge request once you initially push your branch to Open CoDE. Of course, the merge request will target the develop branch, be in status draft, and you are set as the assignee.

If you do not plan to merge from the branch you have pushed, please close the auto-created MR.

External artifacts - charts.yaml.gotmpl and images.yaml.gotmpl

The charts.yaml.gotmpl and images.yaml.gotmpl files are the central place to reference external artifacts used for the deployment.

Besides the deployment automation itself, some tools work with the contents of the files:

• Linting: Ensures consistency of the file contents for the other tools.
• Renovate: Automatically create MRs that update the components to their latest version.
• Mirror: Mirror artifacts to Open CoDE.

Please find details on these tools below.

Linting

In the project’s CI, there is a step dedicated to lint the two yaml files, as we want them to be in

• alphabetical order regarding the components and
• in a logical order regarding the non-commented lines (registry > repository > tag).

In the linting step, the openDesk CI CLI is used to apply the just mentioned sorting, and the result is compared with the unsorted version. If there is a delta, the linting fails, and you can fix it by running the CLI tool locally, verifying and applying the result to your branch.

Note
Please ensure that in component blocks, you use comments only at the beginning of the block or at its end. Ideally, you stick with the many available examples in the yaml files.

Example:

 synapse:
 # providerCategory: "Supplier"
 # providerResponsible: "Element"
 # upstreamRegistry: "https://registry-1.docker.io"
 # upstreamRepository: "matrixdotorg/synapse"
 # upstreamMirrorTagFilterRegEx: '^v(\d+)\.(\d+)\.(\d+)$'
 # upstreamMirrorStartFrom: ["1", "91", "2"]
 registry: "registry.opencode.de"
 repository: "BMI/opendesk/components/supplier/element/images-mirror/synapse"
 tag: "v1.91.2@sha256:1d19508db417bb2b911c8e086bd3dc3b719ee75c6f6194d58af59b4c32b11322"

Disable linting selectively

If you follow the "push early, push often" paradigm to save your work to the central Git instance, or you just fix a typo in existing documentation, you can avoid the CI and its linting being executed, as it might not offer additional value.

GitLab offers two options to skip the CI on a commit/push:

• Add [ci skip] to your commit message (details). Note: The string has to be removed before merging your feature branch into develop.
• Use the related git push option git push -o ci.skip (details).

Renovate

Uses a regular expression to match the values of the following attributes:

• # upstreamRegistry required: Attribute’s value must be prefixed with https:// for Renovate.
• # upstreamRepository required
• tag required

Checks for newer versions of the given artifact and creates an MR containing the newest version’s tag (and digest).

Mirroring

• See also: https://gitlab.opencode.de/bmi/opendesk/tooling/oci-pull-mirror

Note:
The mirror is scheduled to run every hour at 42 minutes past the hour.

openDesk strives to make all relevant artifacts available on Open CoDE so there is a mirroring process configured to pull artifacts that do not originate from Open CoDE into projects called *-Mirror within the openDesk Components section.

The mirror script takes the information on what artifacts to mirror from the annotation inside the two yaml files:

• # upstreamRegistry required: To identify the source registry
• # upstreamRegistryCredentialId: optional: In case the source registry is not public, the access credentials have to be specified as ENV variables containing the value of this key in their name, so you want to specify that key all uppercase:   - MIRROR_CREDENTIALS_SRC_<upstreamRegistryCredentialId>_USERNAME   - MIRROR_CREDENTIALS_SRC_<upstreamRegistryCredentialId>_PASSWORD
• # upstreamRepository required: To identify the source repository
• # upstreamMirrorTagFilterRegEx required: If this annotation is set, the mirror for the component will be activated. Only tags that match the given regular expression are being mirrored. Note: You must use single quotes for this attribute’s value if you use backslash leading regex notation like \d.
• # upstreamMirrorStartFrom optional: Array of numeric values in case you want to mirror only artifacts beginning with a specific version. You must use capturing group in # upstreamMirrorTagFilterRegEx to identify the single numeric elements of the version within the tag and use per capturing group (left to right) one numeric array element here to define the version the mirror should start with.

Get new artifacts mirrored

If you want new images or charts mirrored that are not yet included in one of the yaml files, you can add them in your branch, including the aforementioned mirror annotations, and ask somebody from the platform development team to trigger the mirror’s CI based on your branch.

Once your branch is merged into develop, your artifacts are mirrored hourly.

Creating new charts/images

When you create new Helm charts, please check out the openDesk Best Practices for Helm charts.

You may also want to make use of our standard CI to quickly get Helm charts and container images that are signed, linted, scanned, and released. Check out the .gitlab-ci.yaml files in the project’s Charts or Images to get an idea how little you need to do yourself.