Helm chart - Wordpress Installation with MariaDB on Kubernetes

calendar Nov 26, 2020 · 10 min read · Helm Chart  ·
Last Modified : Nov 26, 2020
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Author :  Rahul Wagh

Wordpress Helm Chart Installation


In this tutorial, we are going to install WordPress with MariaDB using the Helm Chart on Kubernetes cluster. With this installation, we are going to see - How we can upgrade as well as rollback the Helm Chart release of WordPress. This complete setup inherited the benefits of the Kubernetes .i.e. scalability and availability.

Since we are installing WordPress, so we need to have a database running behind the WordPress application. From the database standpoint, we are going to use MariaDB. Helm chart ships all these components in a single package, so that we need not worry about installing each component separately.

Throughout this session, we are going to use bitnami repo.

Table of Content

  1. Prerequisites
  2. Setup up Kubernetes cluster on GCP (Google Cloud Platform)
  3. Add ‘/bitnami/wordpress’ wordpress repo
  4. Setup User account along with Username and Password for WordPress
  5. Install the WordPress helm chart
  6. Troubleshooting any deployment and service inside the Kubernetes cluster
  7. Conclusion



1. Prerequisites

Before we begin there are certain minimum setup requirements which we need to fulfill -

  1. Kubernetes Cluster - v1.12+
  2. Helm 3.0+
  3. Persistent Volume with Dynamic Volume Provisioning (Click here for more details)
  4. Cloud Service .i.e. - GCP, AWS, DigitalOcean, Openshift

Note 1. - This complete setup cannot be performed on the Kubernetes cluster running on a virtual machine on your desktop or laptop. Since WordPress is a multitier application with a Database, so it needs Dynamic Volume Provisioning and it cannot be done on a local virtual machine.

Note 2. - We are going to use Google Cloud Platform for this setup. But the same steps can be followed on any cloud platform.



2. Setup up Kubernetes cluster on GCP (Google Cloud Platform)

If you are a newbie who just started learning Kubernetes then do not worry Google Cloud platform provides you 300$ credit for 1 Year which you can use for this setup.


2.1 Login the Google Cloud Platform

The first step would be to log in and after the login goto the left navigation menu and look for the Compute section and under that look for Kubernetes Engine->Clusters

Google Cloud kubernetes engine


2.2 Fill in the Cluster Details

After selecting the Kubernetes Engine->Clusters option in the previous step now you need to fill in the details of the clusters

Field Value
1 Name jhooq-wordpress
2 Zone europe-north1-a
3 Master Version Static Version 1.16.13-gke.401(default)

Refer to the following screenshot -

Cluster details form

After filling in the values click on create and your cluster should be ready in couple of minutes.



2.3 Connect to Kubernetes Cluster

Now once your Kubernetes cluster is ready you can click on Connect to connect your Kubernetes cluster.

Connect to Kubernetes cluster

After you click on the Connect, you will be prompted with the option to Connect to the cluster. Go and choose Command-line access -> Run in Cloud Shell

But copy the command before you click on Run in Cloud Shell.

Here is my command which I got -

1gcloud container clusters get-credentials jhooq-wordpress --zone europe-north1-a --project jhooq-sprinboot-k8s-demo

The above command needs three parameters -

  1. Cluster name - jhooq-wordpress
  2. Zone - europe-north1-a
  3. Project - jhooq-sprinboot-k8s-demo

Note - In a single project you can create multiple clusters.



2.4 Authorize Cloud Shell

After you click on Run in Cloud Shell there will be another prompt for Authorize Cloud Shell. Go ahead and click on Authorize and it should connect you to the kubernetes cluster

Authorize Cloud Shell


2.5 Verify the Kubernetes Cluster setup

The last step in the cluster setup would be to verify the cluster.

Run the following command to verify the cluster -

1kubectl get nodes

The command should return you with -

1NAME                                             STATUS   ROLES    AGE   VERSION
2gke-jhooq-wordpress-default-pool-0e0e0b0b-85td   Ready    <none>   27m   v1.16.13-gke.401
3gke-jhooq-wordpress-default-pool-0e0e0b0b-9h99   Ready    <none>   27m   v1.16.13-gke.401
4gke-jhooq-wordpress-default-pool-0e0e0b0b-tzpz   Ready    <none>   27m   v1.16.13-gke.401

Now your Kubernetes cluster setup is complete on Google Cloud Platform



3. Add '/bitnami/wordpress' wordpress repo

The next step would be for you to add the /bitnami/wordpress repo to your helm installation.


3.1 Search for the 'wordpress' repo

First of all you need to check how many wordpress repositories are available on the Helm Hub.

Use the following command to search for the wordpress repositories.

1helm search hub wordpress

After running the above command it should return you with the list of repos available on the Helm Hub.

 1URL                                                CHART VERSION  APP VERSION    DESCRIPTION                                       
 2https://hub.helm.sh/charts/groundhog2k/wordpress   0.1.3          5.5.1-apache   A Helm chart for Wordpress on Kubernetes          
 3https://hub.helm.sh/charts/bitnami/wordpress       10.0.3         5.5.3          Web publishing platform for building blogs and ...
 4https://hub.helm.sh/charts/seccurecodebox/old-w... 2.1.0          4.0            Insecure & Outdated Wordpress Instance: Never e...
 5https://hub.helm.sh/charts/fasterbytecharts/wor... 0.8.4          v0.8.4         FasterBytes WordPress Operator Helm Chart         
 6https://hub.helm.sh/charts/presslabs/wordpress-... 0.10.5         0.10.5         Presslabs WordPress Operator Helm Chart           
 7https://hub.helm.sh/charts/presslabs/wordpress-... 0.10.3         v0.10.3        A Helm chart for deploying a WordPress site on ...
 8https://hub.helm.sh/charts/fasterbytecharts/wor... 0.10.2         v0.10.2        A Helm chart for deploying a WordPress site on ...
 9https://hub.helm.sh/charts/seccurecodebox/wpscan   2.1.0          latest         A Helm chart for the WordPress security scanner...
10https://hub.helm.sh/charts/presslabs/stack         0.10.3         v0.10.3        Open-Source WordPress Infrastructure on Kubernetes
11https://hub.helm.sh/charts/fasterbytecharts/stack  0.10.2         v0.10.2        Open-Source WordPress Infrastructure on Kubernetes

If you look carefully at the results then we are interested in https://hub.helm.sh/charts/bitnami/wordpress.

In case if the URL is too long to see then you can put --max-col-width=0, so that you can view the complete URL

1helm search hub wordpress  --max-col-width=0

3.2 Add 'bitnami/wordpress' to your repo list of Helm Chart

After knowing the repo url now you can add it to your local Helm Chart repo list.

But before adding the bitnami/wordpress first check whether it already exists on your repo list or not?

1helm repo list

If you haven't added the bitnami/wordpress before then it should not show in the list.

Alright, let us add it to your repo list -

1helm repo add bitnami https://charts.bitnami.com/bitnami

Once you add it successfully then you should see the following message.

1"bitnami" has been added to your repositories

To know more about the details of the Bitnami WordPress Helm Chart - Click Here


3.3 Check Wordpress Version

Before we go into the installation step of the chart, let's check the version of the WordPress which we are going to install.

Run the following command to get all the available versions -

1helm search repo wordpress --versions

It will return a long list of all the version available for WordPress

1NAME               CHART VERSION  APP VERSION    DESCRIPTION                                       
2bitnami/wordpress  10.0.3         5.5.3          Web publishing platform for building blogs and ...
3bitnami/wordpress  10.0.2         5.5.3          Web publishing platform for building blogs and ...
4bitnami/wordpress  10.0.1         5.5.3          Web publishing platform for building blogs and ...
5bitnami/wordpress  9.10.0         5.5.3          Web publishing platform for building blogs and ...
6bitnami/wordpress  9.9.3          5.5.3          Web publishing platform for building blogs and ...

We will go with the latest version which is 10.0.3

3.4 Readme and Values

There are a few more details which are provided along with the helm chart package.

Readme.md

This Readme.md contains the installation instructions and it can be viewed using the following command

1helm show readme bitnami/wordpress --version 10.0.3
Values

If you are familiar with WordPress before then you need username and password to access the WordPress CMS, so you can view the default values

1helm show values bitnami/wordpress --version 10.0.3

Note - Here you will get a long list of values but you can skip this part because we are going to set up the username and password in the next step.


4. Setup User account along with Username and Password for WordPress

As Wordpress is CMS, so we need to have a user account to access it.

To achieve this we are gonna create a complete user account and store it in wordpress-values.yaml. (This YAML config will be used later during the installation)

Here is the list of values for user account -

Field Value
1 wordpressUsername jhooq
2 wordpressPassword jhooq
3 wordpressEmail contact@jhooq.com
4 wordpressFirstName Rahul
5 wordpressLastName Wagh
6 wordpressBlogName Jhooq.com
7 service.type LoadBalancer

Here are steps for creating the wordpress-values.yaml

  1. Create wordpress-values.yaml
1touch wordpress-values.yaml
  1. Open in vi mode to update the file
1touch wordpress-values.yaml
  1. Copy and paste the following values
1wordpressUsername: jhooq
2wordpressPassword: jhooq
3wordpressEmail: contact@jhooq.com
4wordpressFirstName: Rahul
5wordpressLastName: Wagh
6wordpressBlogName: Jhooq.com
7service: 
8  type: LoadBalancer
  1. Save and Exit the file

5. Install the WordPress helm chart

Now we have completed all the pre-requisites for the installation. Let's start installing the WordPress helm chart


5.1 Create a namespace - nswordpress

I would like to install WordPress in the fresh workspace so run the following command to create the workspace.

1kubectl create namespace nswordpress

5.2 Verify the namespace

You can verify the workspace by listing it out all the available workspace -

1kubectl get namespace

It should return you with the nswordpress in the list

1NAME              STATUS   AGE
2default           Active   29d
3kube-node-lease   Active   29d
4kube-public       Active   29d
5kube-system       Active   29d
6nswordpress       Active   17s

5.3 Install wordpress helm chart

Run the following command for installation

1helm install wordpress bitnami/wordpress --values=wordpress-values.yaml --namespace nswordpress --version 10.0.3

Here is the break down of the command

wordpress installation command

Once you execute this command then it should return you with the following output

 1NAME: wordpress
 2LAST DEPLOYED: Mon Nov 23 19:39:36 2020
 3NAMESPACE: nswordpress
 4STATUS: deployed
 5REVISION: 1
 6NOTES:
 7** Please be patient while the chart is being deployed **
 8
 9Your WordPress site can be accessed through the following DNS name from within your cluster:
10
11    wordpress.nswordpress.svc.cluster.local (port 80)
12
13To access your WordPress site from outside the cluster follow the steps below:
14
151. Get the WordPress URL by running these commands:
16
17   export NODE_PORT=$(kubectl get --namespace nswordpress -o jsonpath="{.spec.ports[0].nodePort}" services wordpress)
18   export NODE_IP=$(kubectl get nodes --namespace nswordpress -o jsonpath="{.items[0].status.addresses[0].address}")
19   echo "WordPress URL: http://$NODE_IP:$NODE_PORT/"
20   echo "WordPress Admin URL: http://$NODE_IP:$NODE_PORT/admin"
21
222. Open a browser and access WordPress using the obtained URL.
23
243. Login with the following credentials below to see your blog:
25
26  echo Username: jhooq
27  echo Password: $(kubectl get secret --namespace nswordpress wordpress -o jsonpath="{.data.wordpress-password}" | base64 --decode)

Do not worry we are gonna again break it down to understand it more -


5.4 How to find access URL for WordPress?

If you look at the previous output then here is a command which you need to execute from the output

1export NODE_PORT=$(kubectl get --namespace nswordpress -o jsonpath="{.spec.ports[0].nodePort}" services wordpress)
2   export NODE_IP=$(kubectl get nodes --namespace nswordpress -o jsonpath="{.items[0].status.addresses[0].address}")
3   echo "WordPress URL: http://$NODE_IP:$NODE_PORT/"

It will return you with URL with IP address (This IP address can be different in your case)-

1http://23.231.938.998

5.5 How to find access URL for WordPress Admin Portal?

Its also given in the previous output, so you just need to copy and execute the following command

1echo "WordPress Admin URL: http://$NODE_IP:$NODE_PORT/admin"

It will return you with URL with IP address -

1http://23.231.938.998/admin

And you can use the username - jhooq and password - jhooq for accessing the WordPress.


6. Troubleshooting any deployment and service inside the Kubernetes cluster

During the complete installation process if you run into any issue then I would recommend starting with the following steps for trouble shooting


6.1 Check all the Kubernetes resources status?

You can run the following command to know all the status of all the deployed resources inside the namespace - nswordpress

1watch -x kubectl get all --namespace nswordpress

All the deployment and service status should be Running


7. Conclusion

Here is what we did

  1. Setup the Kubernetes cluster on Google Cloud Platform
  2. Added /bitnami/wordpress repo to helm repo list
  3. Setup the user account for WordPress CMS
  4. Performed the WordPress installation
  5. Finally looked at the troubleshooting steps

Read More -

  1. Helm chart - How to Add/Install plugins
  2. Getting started with Helm Chart
  3. Helm chart - WordPress Installation with MariaDB on Kubernetes
  4. Helm chart - Build you first helm chart with Spring Boot
  5. Helm Chart - Convert Kubernetes YAML into Helm Chart YAML
  6. Helm Chart - Pass environment variables
  7. Helm Chart - Plugin
  8. Helm Chart - Dry Run Install
  9. Helm Chart - How to create multiple values files inside helm chart?
  10. Helmfile - How to use Helmfile for managing helm chart?

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