Helm Commands

The nself helm command group generates Helm charts from your ɳSelf stack and provides shortcuts for chart installation, upgrades, and release management. It works alongside nself k8s — Helm is the preferred deployment method when you need templated values across multiple environments.

Quick Start

# 1. Build your stack first
nself build

# 2. Generate the Helm chart
nself helm generate --output ./charts/nself

# 3. Install to your cluster
nself helm install --release my-nself --namespace production

# Or use helm CLI directly
helm install my-nself ./charts/nself -f charts/nself/values.prod.yaml

Chart Generation

nself helm generate

Generate a Helm chart from the current ɳSelf stack.

nself helm generate [options]

# Options:
#   --output <dir>        Output directory (default: nself-chart/)
#   --name <name>         Chart name (default: nself)
#   --version <version>   Chart version (default: CLI version)
#   --env <env>           Source environment for default values

# Examples
nself helm generate
nself helm generate --output ./charts --name myapp
nself helm generate --version 1.0.0 --env staging

Chart Layout

nself-chart/
├── Chart.yaml
├── values.yaml              # Merged from active .env
├── values.dev.yaml          # Dev overrides
├── values.staging.yaml      # Staging overrides
├── values.prod.yaml         # Production overrides
└── templates/
    ├── NOTES.txt
    ├── _helpers.tpl          # Named templates
    ├── configmap.yaml        # Non-secret config
    ├── secret.yaml           # Kubernetes Secret
    ├── namespace.yaml
    ├── postgres/
    │   ├── statefulset.yaml
    │   ├── service.yaml
    │   └── pvc.yaml
    ├── hasura/
    │   ├── deployment.yaml
    │   └── service.yaml
    ├── auth/
    │   ├── deployment.yaml
    │   └── service.yaml
    ├── nginx/
    │   ├── deployment.yaml
    │   ├── service.yaml
    │   ├── configmap.yaml
    │   └── ingress.yaml
    └── plugins/
        └── ai/
            ├── deployment.yaml
            └── service.yaml

Installation and Upgrade

nself helm install

Install the ɳSelf chart to a cluster. Wraps helm install with ɳSelf defaults.

nself helm install [options]

# Options:
#   --release <name>    Helm release name (default: nself)
#   --namespace <ns>    Kubernetes namespace (default: nself)
#   --env <env>         Values file to overlay (staging, prod, etc.)
#   --chart <dir>       Chart directory (default: nself-chart/)
#   --dry-run           Template without installing

# Examples
nself helm install --release myapp --namespace production --env prod
nself helm install --dry-run                 # Preview rendered templates

nself helm upgrade

Upgrade an existing Helm release. Safe to run repeatedly.

nself helm upgrade [options]

# Options:
#   --release <name>    Helm release name (default: nself)
#   --namespace <ns>    Namespace (default: nself)
#   --env <env>         Values overlay
#   --atomic            Roll back automatically on upgrade failure

# Examples
nself helm upgrade --release myapp --env prod
nself helm upgrade --release myapp --env prod --atomic

nself helm diff

Show what would change before upgrading. Requires the helm-diff plugin.

nself helm diff [options]

# Options:
#   --release <name>    Helm release name
#   --env <env>         Values overlay

# Example
nself helm diff --release myapp --env prod

Release Management

nself helm status

Show the status of a deployed Helm release.

nself helm status [options]

# Options:
#   --release <name>    Release name (default: nself)
#   --namespace <ns>    Namespace (default: nself)

# Output:
# Release: myapp
# Namespace: production
# Status: deployed
# Revision: 5
# Deployed: 2026-05-01 10:30 UTC
#
# Resources:
#   Deployment/hasura    2/2 running
#   StatefulSet/postgres  1/1 running

nself helm history

List the history of a Helm release (all revisions).

nself helm history [options]

# Options:
#   --release <name>    Release name
#   --max <n>           Max revisions to show (default: 10)

# Output:
# REVISION  UPDATED            STATUS     CHART        DESCRIPTION
# 5         2026-05-07 10:30   deployed   nself-1.0.4  Upgrade complete
# 4         2026-05-01 08:00   superseded nself-1.0.3  Upgrade complete
# 3         2026-04-22 16:45   superseded nself-1.0.2  Upgrade complete

nself helm rollback

Roll back to a previous Helm release revision.

nself helm rollback [revision] [options]

# Options:
#   --release <name>    Release name (default: nself)
#   --namespace <ns>    Namespace (default: nself)

# Examples
nself helm rollback              # Roll back one revision
nself helm rollback 3            # Roll back to revision 3

Uninstall

nself helm uninstall

Remove a Helm release from the cluster. This does not delete PersistentVolumeClaims by default, so your data survives.

nself helm uninstall [options]

# Options:
#   --release <name>    Release name (default: nself)
#   --namespace <ns>    Namespace (default: nself)
#   --purge-data        Also delete PVCs (IRREVERSIBLE)

# Example
nself helm uninstall --release myapp

Values Reference

Key values in the generated values.yaml:

# values.yaml (excerpt)
global:
  domain: myapp.example.com
  environment: production
  storageClass: standard

postgres:
  image: postgres:16-alpine
  resources:
    requests: { memory: 512Mi, cpu: 250m }
    limits: { memory: 2Gi, cpu: 1000m }
  storage: 20Gi

hasura:
  replicas: 2
  resources:
    requests: { memory: 256Mi, cpu: 100m }
    limits: { memory: 1Gi, cpu: 500m }

nginx:
  replicas: 2
  ingress:
    class: nginx
    tls: true

plugins:
  ai:
    enabled: true
    replicas: 1

Environment Variables

Next Steps

• Kubernetes Commands — raw manifest generation
• Deploy Commands — VPS-based deployments
• Cloud Commands — managed ɳSelf Cloud hosting
• Services Reference — what each service does