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Guide: Implementing Staging and Production Environments in Kubernetes with Helm

This guide will walk you through:

• Setting up staging and production environments
• Using Helm for deployment, updates, and rollback
• Troubleshooting crashes with kubectl rollout restart
• Live log streaming with Stern

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🟢 1️⃣ Environment Setup: Staging & Production

We’ll use Kubernetes Namespaces to separate environments.

Create Namespaces:

kubectl create namespace staging
kubectl create namespace production

• Namespaces ensure that:

• Staging and production workloads don’t interfere

• You can easily manage and monitor each environment separately

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2 Create Helm Chart

Assuming you have a Helm chart for your app (e.g., vite-app):

helm create vite-app

Your chart structure:

vite-app/
  Chart.yaml
  values.yaml
  templates/

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3 Helm Install (First-time deployment)

Staging:

helm install vite-app ./vite-app --namespace staging \
  --set replicaCount=2 \
  --set image.tag=staging

Production:

helm install vite-app ./vite-app --namespace production \
  --set replicaCount=5 \
  --set image.tag=latest

• This deploys your app with environment-specific values.

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4 Helm Upgrade (Updating your app)

When you change the chart or image version:

helm upgrade vite-app ./vite-app --namespace staging \
  --set image.tag=staging-v2

For production:

helm upgrade vite-app ./vite-app --namespace production \
  --set image.tag=1.2.0

• Tip: Use -f values.yaml for more complex overrides:

helm upgrade vite-app ./vite-app --namespace staging -f values.staging.yaml

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5 Helm Rollback (Reverting to previous release)

If something goes wrong:

helm rollback vite-app <REVISION> --namespace staging

To see all revisions:

helm history vite-app --namespace staging

Example rollback:

helm rollback vite-app 2 --namespace staging

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6 Live Logs: Using Stern for Real-time Monitoring

Stern is an amazing tool for live streaming logs from multiple pods at once — color-coded and labeled!

Install Stern:

• macOS: brew install stern
• Windows: choco install stern
• Linux: Download from GitHub: https://github.com/stern/stern/releases

Example: Live logs from all pods in staging

stern . -n staging

Filter by app label:

stern vite-app -n staging

• Stern will:

• Tail logs in real-time

• Group logs by pod name

• Color-code logs for easy reading

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7 Troubleshooting CrashLoopBackOff After Rollback

Sometimes, even after rollback, pods might enter CrashLoopBackOff because of:

• Bad environment variables
• ConfigMap/Secret changes
• Database issues

Check logs:

kubectl logs -n staging <pod-name>

Restart the deployment:

kubectl rollout restart deployment vite-app -n staging

• This forces Kubernetes to recreate pods cleanly with the current config.

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Key Takeaways & Best Practices

Task	Command / Tool
Separate environments	Namespaces (staging, production)
Initial deployment	helm install
Update application version	helm upgrade
Revert to stable version	helm rollback
Live log streaming	stern
Troubleshoot restarts	kubectl logs, kubectl rollout restart
Use staging to validate	Deploy to staging before production

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Conclusion

• With these tools, you’ll have:

• Controlled staging & production environments

• Live log monitoring to detect issues in real-time

• A streamlined workflow for upgrades, rollbacks, and fixes