Installing the chart

Prerequisites

• Kubernetes 1.32+ (Any actively supported version⁠)
• Helm 3.2+

Installation steps

All examples in this guide use the public chart and images. If you've mirrored the repository for your own use (for example, to your Docker Hub namespace), update your commands to reference the mirrored chart instead of the public one.

For example:

• Public chart: dhi.io/<repository>:<tag>
• Mirrored chart: <your-namespace>/dhi-<repository>:<tag>

For more details about customizing the chart to reference other images, see the documentation⁠.

Step 1: Optional. Mirror the Helm chart and/or its images to your own registry

To optionally mirror a chart to your own third-party registry, you can follow the instructions in How to mirror an image⁠ for either the chart, the image, or both.

The same regctl tool that is used for mirroring container images can also be used for mirroring Helm charts, as Helm charts are OCI artifacts.

For example:

 regctl image copy \
     "${SRC_CHART_REPO}:${TAG}" \
     "${DEST_REG}/${DEST_CHART_REPO}:${TAG}" \
     --referrers \
     --referrers-src "${SRC_ATT_REPO}" \
     --referrers-tgt "${DEST_REG}/${DEST_CHART_REPO}" \
     --force-recursive

Step 2: Create a Kubernetes secret for pulling images

The Docker Hardened Images that the chart uses require authentication. To allow your Kubernetes cluster to pull those images, you need to create a Kubernetes secret with your Docker Hub credentials or with the credentials for your own registry.

Follow the authentication instructions for DHI in Kubernetes⁠.

For example:

kubectl create secret docker-registry helm-pull-secret \
  --docker-server=dhi.io \
  --docker-username=<Docker username> \
  --docker-password=<Docker token> \
  --docker-email=<Docker email>

Step 3: Install the Helm chart

To install the chart, use helm install. Make sure you use helm login to log in before running helm install. Optionally, you can also use the --dry-run flag to test the installation without actually installing anything.

Note: The chart's default imagePullSecrets value matches upstream (an empty array []). You need to override it with your pull secret name.

helm install my-crossplane oci://dhi.io/crossplane-chart --version <version> \
  --namespace crossplane-system \
  --create-namespace \
  --set "imagePullSecrets[0].name=helm-pull-secret"

If the chart is in your own registry or repository, replace dhi.io with your own registry and namespace. Replace helm-pull-secret with the name of the image pull secret you created earlier.

Optional: Install a Provider during installation

You can optionally install one or more Providers at the same time as Crossplane by setting the provider.packages value:

helm install my-crossplane oci://dhi.io/crossplane-chart --version <version> \
  --namespace crossplane-system \
  --create-namespace \
  --set "imagePullSecrets[0].name=helm-pull-secret" \
  --set "provider.packages={xpkg.crossplane.io/crossplane-contrib/provider-aws-s3:<version>}"

For multiple providers, use a comma-separated list:

helm install my-crossplane oci://dhi.io/crossplane-chart --version <version> \
  --namespace crossplane-system \
  --create-namespace \
  --set "imagePullSecrets[0].name=helm-pull-secret" \
  --set "provider.packages={xpkg.crossplane.io/crossplane-contrib/provider-aws-s3:<version>,xpkg.upbound.io/upbound/provider-gcp:<version2>}"

Step 4: Verify the installation

After installation, verify that Crossplane is running:

kubectl get pods -n crossplane-system

You should see the Crossplane and RBAC Manager pods running:

NAME                                      READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
crossplane-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxx               1/1     Running   0          1m
crossplane-rbac-manager-xxxxxxxxxx-xxxxx  1/1     Running   0          1m

Step 5: Next steps for functioning

After installing Crossplane, you need to install Providers to enable infrastructure provisioning. Providers extend Crossplane to manage resources on external services like AWS, Azure, GCP, and more.

Install a Provider:

Crossplane uses Provider packages to add support for different cloud providers. You can install providers using the Crossplane CLI or by creating Provider resources.

For example, to install the AWS provider:

kubectl apply -f - <<EOF
apiVersion: pkg.crossplane.io/v1
kind: Provider
metadata:
  name: provider-aws
spec:
  package: xpkg.upbound.io/upbound/provider-aws:v0.40.0
EOF

Verify the Provider installation:

kubectl get providers

Configure Provider credentials:

After installing a provider, you need to configure it with credentials to access your cloud provider. Refer to the Crossplane documentation⁠ for detailed instructions on configuring providers.

Next steps:

• Install additional Providers for other cloud platforms
• Create Compositions to define infrastructure templates
• Define Composite Resources (XRs) for your platform APIs
• Explore the Crossplane documentation⁠ for advanced usage

For more information on getting started with Crossplane, visit the official documentation at https://docs.crossplane.io/latest/getting-started/⁠.