Unified CI/CD with Tekton & Argo CD
Key Points
- Tekton (referred to as “tecton”) provides reusable tasks and pipelines that automate the CI/CD workflow, handling steps like cloning repos, testing, building, and pushing Docker images.
- Argo CD operates on a pull‑based, declarative model: it continuously watches a Git repository for YAML manifests and syncs the desired state to a target Kubernetes cluster.
- By combining Tekton’s push‑based image build pipeline with Argo CD’s Git‑driven deployment sync, you get an end‑to‑end GitOps workflow where the Git repo serves as the single source of truth for production.
- This approach reduces manual steps, ensures the live cluster always matches the declared configuration, and streamlines collaboration between developers and operations teams.
Full Transcript
# Unified CI/CD with Tekton & Argo CD **Source:** [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOtxRNQAKXA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOtxRNQAKXA) **Duration:** 00:05:50 ## Summary - Tekton (referred to as “tecton”) provides reusable tasks and pipelines that automate the CI/CD workflow, handling steps like cloning repos, testing, building, and pushing Docker images. - Argo CD operates on a pull‑based, declarative model: it continuously watches a Git repository for YAML manifests and syncs the desired state to a target Kubernetes cluster. - By combining Tekton’s push‑based image build pipeline with Argo CD’s Git‑driven deployment sync, you get an end‑to‑end GitOps workflow where the Git repo serves as the single source of truth for production. - This approach reduces manual steps, ensures the live cluster always matches the declared configuration, and streamlines collaboration between developers and operations teams. ## Sections - [00:00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOtxRNQAKXA&t=0s) **Integrating Tekton with Argo CD** - Brad explains how Tekton’s push‑based CI/CD pipelines combine with Argo CD’s pull‑based, declarative GitOps model to automate and streamline code deployments to Kubernetes production environments. ## Full Transcript
welcome to Tech talk today's topic is
get Ops the single source of Truth for
deploying your code to production a
kubernetes environment and today I'm
joined by Brad tobel who's going to
explain some of the tools that you can
use to make that happen the first of
which is probably familiar to most is
tecton
and the other which Brad is going to
introduce us is called Argo CD could you
explain how these two are going to play
together
absolutely so let's first look at what
tecton gives us if you look at tecton
it's got two main pieces it's got tasks
and pipelines right
and so what happens is we have these
reusable tasks and these are steps like
clone repository run unit tests build
and deploy an image and techton allows
you to take those reusable tasks and
compose them into pipelines and those
pipelines do all the stages of CI CD and
can even deploy to production great okay
so that makes it so you can simplify
your deployments and save a lot of time
not having with manual steps absolutely
okay and so how does Argo come in how
does it help with tecton well the nice
thing about Argo CD is it's a pull-based
model so with tecton it's a push-based
model but Argo CD is one of pull-based
model and it's declarative so just like
kubernetes is declarative you declare
everything
Argo CD allows you to to put your your
yaml files your configuration and a git
repository and declare what you want to
happen and Argo CD so it's gonna
pull things from your repo
right
and then it's also going to have a
little kubernetes cluster
sure okay I got it right so you've got
these two models you can use tecton all
the way up to the step of of building
and deploying an image and putting an
image in a registry and then you can
take all your configuration files put
them in a git repo and all you got to do
with Argo CD is point it at the git repo
and pointed at a kubernetes cluster and
it's going to do the rest so let me play
that back to you see in a tech Don
essentially when I put out my
declarations that's what actually cause
causes the deployment to occur but in
this case you're saying Argo CD is
actually monitoring my declaration
inside the repo itself and then
re-synchronizing it did I get that right
yeah absolutely did it's it's going to
look for what's in that uh the git repo
with your deployment files and it's
going to look with what's running in
production and it's going to make sure
that what runs in production matches the
source of Truth which is what those yaml
files are in that git repository fair
enough but I'm a developer I'm kind of
curious is this something that I need to
be worried about or is that something
that's on the Ops probably is more Ops
focused or is it both
it's really both if you put the two
tools together it's making everyone's
life simpler right so we're doing the
best debris to build up and create and
publish an image and then we're doing
the best of breed of being able to
understand that your git repository is
is a is is a source of Truth and so
um you know being able to do a get Ops
model and it declarative fashion and
what's nice about this is if somebody
comes in and makes changes inside the
cluster Argo CD is going to see those
changes realize that the configuration
is not matching the source of Truth and
it's going to change things it's going
to update the what's running in the
production cluster to ensure it matches
the source of truth I got it so if I
already have an existing deployment
using tecton and I want to introduce
Argo CD what are the steps involved what
do I need to do
so there's not much you need to do so we
need to drop off the last step and this
is really nice the last step would
typically be using Cube control to then
push your application into a kubernetes
cluster and understand with with Cube
control you're going to have to set some
credentials and set up the security so
that you know your automated system has
the authority to publish into the
kubernetes environment you don't have to
do that you don't need to know Cube
control and you don't have to set up
those credentials because what Argo CD
is going to do is it's not going to use
Cube control it's going to look at
what's in the repo and it's going to
pull those configuration files and
understand what it needs to deploy in
the cluster now the one thing you have
to look out for is Largo CD is you
typically have two repos you've got the
repo for the ammo files and the refo for
the source code so the source code of my
actual applications and then for the
infrastructure I have a separate one as
you're saying you've got a separate repo
for the actual source code and a
separate repo for those yaml files that
control the deployment of your
applications okay and so where are the
payoffs for this and I've gone through
this trouble how does it make my life
easier
so how it makes your life easier again
you're not going to have to learn all
those Cube control commands you're not
gonna have to worry about that if
somebody goes into the environment and
make some changes Argo CDs gonna make
sure that those changes are rolled back
and the source of Truth oh you're saying
for example like an operator goes and
accidentally does something thinking
they're going to fix it right that's
right you can sleep well at night
because if that operator who thinks they
know what they're doing goes and makes
some changes Argo CD is going to see
that that's not what in the source of
truth and that's really the best part of
git Ops right is making sure your git
repositories the source of Truth and so
if it's not the source of Truth and they
make some changes it's going to update
what's running in your cluster to match
what's in the git repo I'm all for
sleeping better at night and with that
we're going to go ahead and wrap we've
now told you what it is why it's
important how it works if you'd like to
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