Using Flux

Install Flux 

There are several ways to install Flux. This setup uses the community Helm chart. To install it another way, see the official Flux documentation⁠.

Install the chart into your workload cluster:

				$ helm repo add fluxcd-community https://fluxcd-community.github.io/helm-charts
$ helm repo update
$ helm install flux2 fluxcd-community/flux2 --namespace flux-system --create-namespace
			

This brings up the source, kustomize, helm, notification, image automation and image reflector controllers in the flux-system namespace.

Unlike Argo CD, Flux needs no allow-list of the resource groups it may watch. It only touches the objects a Kustomization applies.

Install the Flux CLI 

Run the installation command for your environment:

				$ curl -s https://fluxcd.io/install.sh | sudo bash
			

				$ brew install fluxcd/tap/flux
			

				choco install flux
			

You can test if the installation was successful with the flux --version command.

Verify the installation 

Flux has no API server and no web UI of its own. There is nothing to port-forward or log in to. Check the controllers and the custom resource definitions instead:

				$ flux check
► checking prerequisites
✔ Kubernetes 1.36.5 >=1.33.0-0
► checking version in cluster
✔ distribution: flux-2.9.5
✔ bootstrapped: false
► checking controllers
✔ helm-controller: deployment ready
✔ kustomize-controller: deployment ready
✔ notification-controller: deployment ready
✔ source-controller: deployment ready
► checking crds
✔ all checks passed
			

Add the Syself Autopilot cluster as a remote target 

Flux applies to its own cluster by default. To let it manage your Syself Autopilot resources, give it a kubeconfig for the management cluster. Use a scoped kubeconfig, obtained through Headless access for pipelines . The gitops service account it uses is limited to your organization namespace. Do not grant it cluster-admin. Flux only needs to apply your Cluster declarations.

Store that kubeconfig in a Secret, under the key value:

				$ kubectl create secret generic autopilot-kubeconfig \
--namespace flux-system \
--from-file=value=<./path-to/autopilot/kubeconfig>
secret/autopilot-kubeconfig created
			

The key must be named value. Flux reads the kubeconfig from that key only.

What follows is an example setup. You can operate it in the same way you would any other Flux installation, in accordance with your preferred practices.

Add a repository 

To use your new Flux setup, the first thing you need to do is add a repository. Flux reads from a GitRepository object. A private repository also needs a Secret with the credentials. You can create that Secret with the CLI:

				$ flux create secret git gitops-repo-auth \
--url=https://github.com/your-company/gitops-repo.git \
--username=<your-git-username> \
--password=<your-git-token> \
--namespace=flux-system
✔ git secret 'gitops-repo-auth' created in 'flux-system' namespace
			

You can also create the Secret declaratively and apply it directly to your cluster. Do not commit it to your GitOps repository, since it contains credentials. If you need to store it in Git, use a sealed secret or an external secret store instead:

				apiVersion: v1
kind: Secret
metadata:
  name: gitops-repo-auth
  namespace: flux-system
stringData:
  username: mygitusername
  password: ghp_mytoken
type: Opaque
			

Now point a GitRepository at the repository and reference that Secret:

				apiVersion: source.toolkit.fluxcd.io/v1
kind: GitRepository
metadata:
  name: gitops-repo
  namespace: flux-system
spec:
  interval: 1m
  url: https://github.com/your-company/gitops-repo.git
  ref:
    branch: main
  secretRef:
    name: gitops-repo-auth
			

You can see all the options for adding a repository in the Flux documentation⁠.

Create a Kustomization 

With a repository added, you can tell Flux to apply the manifests it holds to the management cluster. Those manifests include your Cluster object itself. Flux therefore syncs the cluster's declaration from Git, which is the pattern described in Introduction to GitOps .

				apiVersion: kustomize.toolkit.fluxcd.io/v1
kind: Kustomization
metadata:
  name: autopilot-clusters
  namespace: flux-system
spec:
  interval: 5m
  path: ./clusters
  prune: false
  sourceRef:
    kind: GitRepository
    name: gitops-repo
  kubeConfig:
    secretRef:
      name: autopilot-kubeconfig
  targetNamespace: org-<your-company>
			

Check that Flux fetched the repository and applied it:

				$ flux get kustomizations
NAME                 REVISION            SUSPENDED  READY  MESSAGE
autopilot-clusters   main@sha1:a3d1ca23  False      True   Applied revision: main@sha1:a3d1ca23
			

Flux is now fully configured to work with Syself Autopilot.