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Helm

Prerequisites

  • Review Pixie's requirements to make sure that your Kubernetes cluster is supported.

  • Determine if you already have Operator Lifecycle Manager (OLM) deployed to your cluster, possibly to the default olm namespace. Pixie uses the Kubernetes Operator pattern to manage its Vizier, which handles data collection and query execution (see the Architecture diagram). The OLM is used to install, update and manage the Vizier Operator.

1. (Optional) Use the Pixie CLI to Check the Requirements

Install the Pixie CLI following the directions here.

Check if your K8s cluster meets Pixie's requirements by running:

export PX_CLOUD_ADDR=getcosmic.ai
px deploy --check_only

If your cluster fails any checks, you may still proceed with installation, but it is unlikely that Pixie will work on your cluster.

2. Create deployment key

Create a deployment key following the directions here.

3. Deploy Pixie

Deploy Pixie in your target cluster by running:

# Add the Pixie operator chart.
helm repo add pixie-operator https://artifacts.px.dev/helm_charts/operator 
# Get latest information about Pixie chart.
helm repo update 
# Install the Pixie chart (No OLM present on cluster).
helm install pixie pixie-operator/pixie-operator-chart --set cloudAddr=getcosmic.ai --set deployKey=<deploy-key-goes-here> --set clusterName=<cluster-name> --namespace pl --create-namespace 
# Install the Pixie chart (OLM already exists on cluster).
helm install pixie pixie-operator/pixie-operator-chart --set cloudAddr=getcosmic.ai --set deployKey=<deploy-key-goes-here> --set clusterName=<cluster-name> --namespace pl --create-namespace --set deployOLM=false 
# Install the Pixie chart (Self-hosting Pixie Cloud)
helm install pixie pixie-operator/pixie-operator-chart --set deployKey=<deploy-key-goes-here> --set clusterName=<cluster-name> --namespace pl --create-namespace --set devCloudNamespace=plc 
# Install Pixie with a memory limit for the PEM pods (per node). 2Gi is the default, 1Gi is the minimum recommended.
helm install pixie pixie-operator/pixie-operator-chart --set cloudAddr=getcosmic.ai --set deployKey=<deploy-key-goes-here> --set clusterName=<cluster-name> --namespace pl --create-namespace --set deployOLM=false --set pemMemoryLimit=1Gi

Pixie will deploy pods to the pl, px-operator, and olm(if deploying the OLM) namespaces.

More Deploy Options

For more deploy options that you can specify to configure Pixie, refer to our deploy options.

Deploying Non-Operator Pixie

In general, we recommend you deploy the operator-managed version of Pixie. The operator helps roll out configuration changes, surface deployment status, and auto-repair common error states. However, we also offer a non-operator deployment of Pixie. The deploy options and values available with the operator-managed version of Pixie are the same.

# Add the Pixie Vizier chart.
helm repo add pixie-vizier https://artifacts.px.dev/helm_charts/vizier
# Get latest information about Pixie chart.
helm repo update
# Install the Pixie chart (Self-hosting Pixie Cloud)
helm install pixie pixie-vizier/vizier-chart --set deployKey=<deploy-key-goes-here> --set clusterName=<cluster-name> --namespace pl --create-namespace --set devCloudNamespace=plc

4. Verify

To verify that Pixie is running in your environment you can check the admin page or run:

# Check pods are up
kubectl get pods -n pl 
# Check Pixie Platform and PEM status
export PX_CLOUD_ADDR=getcosmic.ai
px get viziers
px get pems
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