Helm Chart Development

Comprehensive guidance for creating, testing, and packaging custom Helm charts with best practices for maintainability and reusability.

When to Use

Use this skill automatically when:

• User wants to create a new Helm chart
• User needs to validate chart structure or templates
• User mentions testing charts locally
• User wants to package or publish charts
• User needs to manage chart dependencies
• User asks about chart best practices

Chart Creation & Structure

Create New Chart

# Scaffold new chart with standard structure
helm create mychart

# Creates:
# mychart/
# ├── Chart.yaml          # Chart metadata
# ├── values.yaml         # Default values
# ├── charts/             # Chart dependencies
# ├── templates/          # Kubernetes manifests
# │   ├── NOTES.txt       # Post-install instructions
# │   ├── _helpers.tpl    # Template helpers
# │   ├── deployment.yaml
# │   ├── service.yaml
# │   ├── ingress.yaml
# │   └── tests/
# │       └── test-connection.yaml
# └── .helmignore         # Files to ignore