Node.js sample Helm Chart

This sample is for demonstrative purposes only and is NOT for production use.

Introduction

This Helm Chart deploys a sample Node.js web application hosting its own documentation which guides you through the process of creating and deploying your own Node.js applications into IBM Cloud Private.

This sample was created using idt create and more information can be found within the application itself.

• This example uses appmetrics and appmetrics-dash: the endpoint being /appmetrics-dash.
• This example features the "scrape" annotation in the <chart directory>/templates/service.yaml file. In combination with the appmetrics-prometheus module inclusion and usage, this enables the sample to be automatically scraped by a deployed instance of Prometheus in order for metrics to be gathered and displayed using the Prometheus web UI. You can view the raw data that will be available to Prometheus at the /metrics endpoint. This allows developers to quickly determine how the application is performing across potentially many Kubernetes pods.
• This example uses appmetrics-zipkin. If Zipkin is deployed (e.g. with the Microservice Builder fabric), trace information will be available under the service name "icp-nodejs-sample". To enable this feature, modify Dockerfile and set USE_ZIPKIN. You can dynamically modify applications as well using the IBM CLoud Private web UI - this includes the setting of environment variables and it's recommended you restart the pod for the change to take effect.
• This example can be deployed using the IBM Cloud Developer Tools.

Prerequisites

There is only one optional requirement to make the most out of this sample: you should have Prometheus deployed into your IBM Cloud Private cluster where this sample will be installed. This is not a mandatory step and can be done after deployment, happy installing!

Installing the Chart

The Helm chart can be installed from the app center by finding the nodejs-sample and following the installation steps.

If you prefer to use the command line instead, run the following command from the directory containing Chart.yaml:

helm install --name tester . where tester can be anything: this is the desired name of the release so it won't be an automatically generated one.

You can find more information about deployment methods in the IBM Cloud Private documentation.

Verifying the Chart

You can view the deployed sample in your web browser, for all features to be available the sample application is best viewed in Google Chrome or Safari.

To retrieve the IP and port of this deployed application: export SAMPLE_NODE_IP=$(kubectl get nodes --namespace {{ .Release.Namespace }} -o jsonpath="{.items[0].status.addresses[0].address}")

export SAMPLE_NODE_PORT=$(kubectl get --namespace {{ .Release.Namespace }} -o jsonpath="{.spec.ports[0].nodePort}" services {{ template "fullname" . }})

Open your web browser at http://${SAMPLE_NODE_IP}:${SAMPLE_NODE_PORT} to view the sample.

Uninstalling the Chart

If you installed it with helm install --name tester . you'd remove the sample with helm delete --purge tester. You can find the deployment with helm list --all and searching for an entry with the chart name "ibm-nodejs-sample".

Testing the Chart with Helm

You can programatically run the test in the following ways.

• cd chart/ibm-nodejs-sample then do ./test-chart.sh OR
• helm test tester: assuming you've deployed it with the release name sample.

Configuration

The following table lists the configurable parameters of the ibm-nodejs-sample chart and their default values.

Parameter	Description	Default
image.repository	image repository	ibmcom/icp-nodejs-sample
image.tag	Image tag	latest
image.pullPolicy	Image pull policy	Always
livenessProbe.initialDelaySeconds	How long to wait before beginning the checks our pod(s) are up	30
livenessProbe.periodSeconds	The interval at which we'll check if a pod is running OK before being restarted	10
service.name	k8s service name	Node
service.type	k8s service type exposing port	NodePort
service.port	TCP Port for this service	3000
resources.limits.memory	Memory resource limits	128m
resources.limits.cpu	CPU resource limits	100m

Configuring Node.js applications

See the Node.js @ IBM developer center for all things Node.js - including more samples, tutorials and blog posts. For configuring Node.js itself, consult the official Node.js community documentation.

Deploying on platforms other than x86-64

• Multiarch images are used so the correct Node.js Docker image will be pulled based on your platform. Supported platforms for this sample include ppc64le, x86-64 and s390x.
• Note that the IBM Cloud Developer Tools are not available for every platform: consult the CLI docs to find out more.

Disclaimers

Node.js is an official trademark of Joyent. Images are used according to the Node.js visual guidelines - no copyright claims are made. You can view the guidelines here.

This sample is not formally related to or endorsed by the official Node.js open source or commercial project.