Learning Path

Build images with the Cloud-Native Toolkit

Install the Cloud-Native Toolkit

Install the toolkit into an OpenShift cluster using the Fast-Start Install

Mark Sturdevant,

Rich Hagarty,

Bobby Woolf

This tutorial shows you how to install the Cloud-Native Toolkit so you can use it to build images. The toolkit only needs to be installed once by the person who manages your development environment or Red Hat OpenShift cluster, and then your whole group can use it.

After installation, you can learn how to build images with the toolkit by following these tutorials:

Toolkit installation options

The Fast-Start Install option is a good option if the main task you want to accomplish with the toolkit is to create images and you already have an OpenShift cluster. This tutorial shows you how to install the Cloud-Native Toolkit into an OpenShift cluster using the Fast Install option. The installed toolkit is contained completely within the OpenShift cluster and uses OpenShift services, including its built-in container image registry.

If you think the Fast-Start Install might not be the best approach for you, explore one of our other install options:

Private Catalog Tiles: For environments within IBM Cloud, you can install the toolkit using tiles in a private catalog similar to installing other software within your account.
Iteration Zero: This is a highly customizable installation that also enables you to install in an environment other than IBM Cloud using Terraform scripts.

Prerequisites for the Fast Install

To use the Fast-Start Install option, you should have access to your OpenShift cluster and be able to log in using the oc login command in a terminal.

Prerequisites:

Access to an OpenShift cluster
Cluster admin permission
The OpenShift CLI (oc)
A Bash or Zsh terminal (or similar)

Install steps

Follow the steps below to do a Fast-Start Install. If you are looking for more details, refer to the Cloud-Native Toolkit Guide.

Open a terminal.
Log in to your cluster:
```
 oc login
```

Download and run the install script with the following commands. Note that the command may take 8-15 minutes to run.

On Linux or macOS

curl -sfL get.cloudnativetoolkit.dev | sh -

On Windows

oc create -f https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ibm-garage-cloud/ibm-garage-iteration-zero/master/install/install-ibm-toolkit.yaml
sleep 5
oc wait pod -l job-name=ibm-toolkit --for=condition=Ready -n default
oc logs job/ibm-toolkit -f -n default

Watch and wait while Terraform sets everything up. When it's finished, you will see a message indicating installation is complete:
Expose the registry.
- After a pipeline runs successfully, a tagged image is copied to the registry. With Fast-Start Install, the toolkit is contained completely within the OpenShift cluster and uses OpenShift services, including its built-in container image registry. You will want to expose the registry to make it more usable for developers. See Exposing the registry for how to expose the registry with a route.
  
  Note: With an IBM Cloud Private Catalog, Iteration-Zero, or custom install, you can use an external registry such as IBM Cloud Container Registry (ICCR). When you use ICCR, the registry is already exposed outside of the cluster, and the images created by pipelines will be pushed there.

A quick tour of what was installed

The following sections provide an brief overview of what was installed.

The tools project

Use the developer topology view to see what was installed in your tools project. In your OpenShift Web Console:

Use the drop-down to select the Developer perspective in the sidebar.
Click on Topology in the sidebar.
Select the tools project.

Application launcher links

The tools are added to the application launcher drop-down menu in the top navigation bar (shown above). This dropdown is available in all projects.

Developer dashboard

Launch the Developer Dashboard for a dashboard that contains tiles for the applications that you saw in the application launcher and more.

From the dashboard, you have access to:

Tools
Starter Kit repos
Learning resources

Check out the pipelines

You should see that Tekton pipelines have been installed in your tools project:

Next steps

The Cloud-Native Toolkit is now ready for use. Refer to the following tutorials to use the Cloud-Native Toolkit to create a universal application image from a starter kit or an existing application: