Argo CD is a declarative, GitOps continuous delivery tool for Kubernetes based application manifests. You can define Kubernetes manifests in plain text yaml files, or use package managers like Helm, or use configuration management tools like Kustomize, JSonnet, etc. in a declarative way.

Argo CD brings everything together by using basic concept of GitOps – Application definitions, configurations, and environments should be declarative and version controlled in a Git repository. Using Argo CD to deploy Kubernetes manifests, you can automate application lifecycle management and enable continuous deployment and delivery in very simple steps. You also do not need to define any CI/CD pipelines for it.

This is an index post for series of blog posts on enabling application lifecycle management with Argo CD. Below are the various posts and topics covered in this series:

Part 1 – Setup Continuous Deployment for Application with Kubernetes and Argo CD

• Argo CD overview and architecture
• Details of important components in Argo CD
• Creating multi-node Kubernetes cluster with Kind
• Install and setup Argo CD
• Connect and login to the Argo CD UI
• Install and setup Argo CD CLI
• Connect and login with Argo CD CLI
• Verify version of Argo CD server
• Create an application from GitHub repository
• Viewing application state after setup
• Synchronize / Deploy application to Kubernetes cluster
• Viewing deployment progress, application health after deployment
• Confirming application resources deployed with kubectl
• Access application outside Kubernetes cluster

Part 2 – Manage Application Lifecycle and Health on Kubernetes with Argo CD

• Viewing application health in the Argo CD
• View / Edit application configuration in the Argo CD
• View deviation / difference of resources from desired state
• View details for last sync operation
• View synchronization history
• Performing rollback for the application releases
• Delete the application from Kubernetes cluster
• Changing application view in Argo CD
• Details of the Pods view feature
• Viewing logs and events for Kubernetes resources
• View streaming logs with CLI
• Displaying application status badge

Part 3 – Control Resource Deployment and Lifecycle on Kubernetes with Sync Options in Argo CD

• Details of automated sync policy
• Resource pruning capability
• Enabling / Disabling self-heal capability
• Perform selective sync for resources
• Defining sync windows
• Add / View / Update / Delete sync windows
• Sync phases and waves

Part 4 – Deploy Helm Charts on Kubernetes Clusters with Argo CD

• Add Helm repositories to Argo CD
• Create an application based on Helm Chart
• Viewing application state after setup
• Modify Helm chart values and parameters
• Synchronize / Deploy application to Kubernetes cluster
• Viewing deployment progress, application health after deployment
• Confirming application resources deployed with kubectl
• Access application outside Kubernetes cluster

Part 5 – Deploy Application with Kustomize Manifests on Kubernetes Clusters with Argo CD

• About Kustomize
• Create an application based on Kustomize manifest
• Viewing application state after setup
• Synchronize / Deploy application to Kubernetes cluster
• Viewing deployment progress, application health after deployment
• Confirming application resources deployed with kubectl
• Access application outside Kubernetes cluster

We have also covered a separate tool from Argo CD team called Argo CD Image Updater. It can be used to auto update container images for application deployed with Kustomize or Helm manifests. You can find the blog post for the same here. This covers:

• Argo CD Image Updater basics
• Installation of image updater
• Deploying application with kustomize manifests
• Marking application for auto-update for container images
• See image updater in action
• Limitations of image updater