"How to fix 'Error: must either provide a name or specify --generate-name' in Helm"

Question

How to fix Error: must either provide a name or specify --generate-name in Helm

Created sample helm chart name as mychart and written the deployment.yaml, service.yaml, ingress.yaml with nginx service. After that running the command like $ helm install mychart

service.yaml

apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
  name: nginx
spec:
  ports:
  - name: main
    port: 80
    protocol: TCP
    targetPort: 80
  selector:
    app: nginx

deployment.yaml

apiVersion: extensions/v1beta2
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: nginx
spec:
  replicas: 3
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: nginx
    spec:
      containers:
        - name: nginx
          image: nginx:1.13
          ports:
              containerPort: 80

ingress.yaml

apiVersion: extensions/v1beta1
kind: Ingress
metadata:
  name: nginx
  annotations:
    http.port: "443"
spec:
    backend:
        serviceName: nginx
        servicePort: 80

Expected output: ..... status: DEPLOYED

Answer 1

According to the helm documentation for v3.x

helm install --help
Usage:
helm install [NAME] [CHART] [flags]

you want to use:
helm install "your release name" chart

For example:

# helm repo add stable https://kubernetes-charts.storage.googleapis.com/
# helm install wordpress-helm-testing stable/wordpress 
NAME: wordpress-helm-testing
LAST DEPLOYED: 2019-10-07 15:56:21.205156 -0700 PDT m=+1.763748029
NAMESPACE: default
STATUS: deployed
NOTES:
1. Get the WordPress URL:

  NOTE: It may take a few minutes for the LoadBalancer IP to be available.
        Watch the status with: 'kubectl get svc --namespace default -w wordpress-helm-testing'
  export SERVICE_IP=$(kubectl get svc --namespace default wordpress-helm-testing --template "{{ range (index .status.loadBalancer.ingress 0) }}{{.}}{{ end }}")
  echo "WordPress URL: http://$SERVICE_IP/"
  echo "WordPress Admin URL: http://$SERVICE_IP/admin"

2. Login with the following credentials to see your blog

  echo Username: user
  echo Password: $(kubectl get secret --namespace default wordpress-helm-testing -o jsonpath="{.data.wordpress-password}" | base64 --decode)


#helm list
NAME                    NAMESPACE   REVISION    UPDATED                                 STATUS      CHART          
wordpress-helm-testing  default     1           2019-10-07 15:56:21.205156 -0700 PDT    deployed    wordpress-7.3.9

This is a better operational approach since it eliminates randomness in your release names. You might want to use something like a user name or anything that makes it unique and adds meaning to the release other than the GUID the --generate-name option will give you.