Unclear when k3s automatically deploys manifests/Helm charts

k3s, k3OS, and k3d
1

In the documentation it says that

Any Kubernetes manifests found in /var/lib/rancher/k3s/server/manifests will automatically be deployed to K3s in a manner similar to kubectl apply . Manifests deployed in this manner are managed as AddOn custom resources, and can be viewed by running kubectl get addon -A . You will find AddOns for packaged components such as CoreDNS, Local-Storage, Traefik, etc. AddOns are created automatically by the deploy controller, and are named based on their filename in the manifests directory.

It is also possible to deploy Helm charts as AddOns. K3s includes a Helm Controller that manages Helm charts using a HelmChart Custom Resource Definition (CRD).

However it’s unclear when k3s does this.

  • Only when first installed (e.g. using curl -sfL https://get.k3s.io | sh -)?
  • Every time the k3s service is restarted (e.g. using systemctl restart)?
  • As soon as a -config.yaml file is added (i.e. something is watching the directory for new files)?

I added a /var/lib/rancher/k3s/server/manifests/traefik-config.yaml with the following content and nothing seems to happen:

apiVersion: helm.cattle.io/v1
kind: HelmChartConfig
metadata:
  name: traefik
  namespace: kube-system
spec:
  valuesContent: |-
    externalIP: 192.168.1.100
2

and to take this question further - the docs could do with more specific detail so the new user can find the logs that tell them what happened (and thus, what went wrong)