Cloud / HELM Interview Questions
What are Helm release lifecycle policies and how do you manage release history?
Helm v3 stores release history as Secrets, each revision containing complete state. Managing this history is important for etcd performance and compliance.
Viewing release history:
helm history my-release
helm history my-release --max 20
helm list --all-namespaces --date # Show all releases sorted by date
helm list --deployed # Currently deployed releases only
helm list --failed # Failed releases
helm list --pending # Pending releases
Limiting history with --history-max:
# During install
helm install my-release ./chart --history-max 10
# During upgrade
helm upgrade my-release ./chart --history-max 10
# Configure default in helm CLI
export HELM_HISTORY_MAX=10
helm upgrade my-release ./chart
Cleaning up old revisions manually:
# Find old revisions
kubectl get secrets -n my-namespace | grep "sh.helm.release.v1.my-release" | grep -v "v[0-9]\+$"
# Delete old secrets (keep last 10)
kubectl get secrets -n my-namespace -o name | grep "sh.helm.release.v1.my-release" | \
head -n -10 | xargs kubectl delete -n my-namespace
Setting global history limit in Helm:
# Environment variable
export HELM_HISTORY_MAX=10
# In values (for CI/CD)
helm upgrade --install myapp ./chart --set global.historyMax=10
# Chart default in values.yaml
historyMax: 10
Release cleanup automation with CronJob:
apiVersion: batch/v1
kind: CronJob
metadata:
name: helm-cleanup
spec:
schedule: "0 0 * * 0" # Weekly
jobTemplate:
spec:
template:
spec:
containers:
- name: cleanup
image: alpine/helm:3.12.0
command:
- sh
- -c
- |
for ns in $(kubectl get ns -o name | cut -d/ -f2); do
for release in $(helm list -n $ns -q); do
helm history $release -n $ns --max $HELM_HISTORY_MAX
done
done
Compliance and auditing: - Keep minimum 5 revisions for rollback capability - Retain failed release history for debugging - Implement retention policies based on environment: - Dev: 10 revisions - Staging: 20 revisions - Production: 30 revisions - Export release state to external audit system periodically
Disabling history (not recommended): --history-max=0 disables history entirely - prevents rollback.
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