helmadm

Inspect Helm 3 releases in Kubernetes: list releases, detect manifest drift, generate Argo CD Application YAML, and export reproducible install bundles. Uses the Kubernetes API only — no helm or kubectl binary required.

Requirements: Python 3.12+, kubeconfig (or in-cluster) access to the cluster.

Install

Recommended — uv + uvx (no global install):

uvx helmadm ls

Add a shell alias so helmadm always runs the latest from PyPI:

alias helmadm='uvx helmadm'

Global tool with uv:

uv tool install helmadm
helmadm --help

pip / pipx:

pip install helmadm
# or: pipx install helmadm

From source (development):

# in a clone of this repository
uv sync
uv run helmadm --help

See docs/develop/dev-uv.md for building and publishing.

Commands

helmadm --help
helmadm ls --help

ls

helmadm ls
helmadm ls -n monitoring
helmadm ls --no-detail

Detailed output includes chart, version, and NEEDS_REPO_URL when argocd-yaml / pull need --repo-url.

drift

helmadm drift -n monitoring prometheus
helmadm drift -n monitoring prometheus --detect-extras   # objects not managed by the release
helmadm drift -ia -n kube-system traefik   # show compare notes
helmadm drift --compare-mode legacy -n monitoring prometheus

Default compare uses server-side apply dry-run (merged vs live; like kubectl diff --server-side). Legacy normalization is used automatically when SSA is unavailable, or with --compare-mode legacy.

Exit 1 on drift, missing objects, fetch errors, or extras (with --detect-extras).

Nicer diffs: pipe stdout through delta (-s for side-by-side; --paging never when piping so delta does not open its own pager):

helmadm drift -n monitoring prometheus --detect-extras | delta -s --paging never
uv run helmadm drift -n monitoring prometheus --detect-extras | delta -s --paging never

argocd-yaml

helmadm ls -n monitoring
helmadm argocd-yaml -n monitoring prometheus
helmadm argocd-yaml -n monitoring prometheus \
  --repo-url https://prometheus-community.github.io/helm-charts

Writes overrides to spec.source.helm.valuesObject. Fields you must set (destination, project, …) use CHANGE_ME. --debug adds a .debug block — remove before applying to Argo CD.

pull

helmadm pull -n loki -o ./bundles fluentbit
helmadm pull -n monitoring prometheus --revision 3 -o ./bundles

Creates {namespace}/{release}/ with values files, helmadm-pull-metadata.yaml, and a README.md with plain helm install commands. --tar writes a gzip bundle to stdout; --force overwrites an existing directory.

More documentation

• Command reference — flags, bundle layout, examples
• Configuration — environment variables and kubeconfig
• Developer guide — uv, build, PyPI publish