Tilt Development

Tilt provides a real-time web UI that offers better visibility into logs, health status, and dependencies, making debugging easier compared to relying solely on terminal outputs. With a single tilt up command, developers can spin up all required services without managing multiple processes manually, simplifying the local development workflow. Tilt also integrates seamlessly with Docker and Kubernetes, allowing for efficient container-based development. Unlike goreman, which lacks dynamic config reloading, Tilt can detect and apply changes to Kubernetes YAML and Helm charts without full restarts, making it more efficient for iterative development.

Prerequisites

kubernetes environment (kind, minikube, k3d, etc.)
tilt (brew install tilt)
kustomize
kubectl

Running

Spin up environment by running tilt up in the root directory of the repo
- Resources will be deployed into the argocd namespace in the cluster that your kubeconfig is currently pointed to.
Use ctrl+c to close tilt which stops watching files for changes and closes port-forwards. Everything deployed to the local cluster will be left in tact and continue to run. Run tilt up again to start up another session and pick up where you left off.

Cleanup

To remove all deployed resources in your local cluster including CRDs, run tilt down from the root of the repo.

Port Forwarding

Port forwarding is automatically setup from the cluster to localhost host for the following ports:

Deployment	API	Metrics	Webhook	Debug
argocd-server	8080	8083		9345
argocd-repo-server	8081	8084		9346
argocd-redis	6379
argocd-applicationset-controller		8085	7000	9347
argocd-application-controller		8086		9348
argocd-notifications-controller		8087		9349
argocd-commit-server	8089	8088		9350

Debugging ArgoCD

Each deployed pod running ArgoCD components uses delve to expose a debug port. Tilt is configured to forward each of those ports locally to localhost. IDEs can attach to the corresponding application to set break points and debug code running inside the cluster.

Deployment	Debug Host Port
argocd-server	localhost:9345
argocd-repo-server	localhost:9346
argocd-applicationset-controller	localhost:9347
argocd-application-controller	localhost:9348
argocd-notifications-controller	localhost:9349
argocd-commit-server	localhost:9350

VS Code

Add a .vscode/launch.json file with these configurations to support attaching to running pods corresponding to the service.

json

{
    "version": "0.2.0",
    "configurations": [
        {
            "name": "Connect to server",
            "type": "go",
            "request": "attach",
            "mode": "remote",
            "remotePath": "${workspaceFolder}",
            "port": 9345,
            "host": "127.0.0.1"
        },
        {
            "name": "Connect to repo-server",
            "type": "go",
            "request": "attach",
            "mode": "remote",
            "remotePath": "${workspaceFolder}",
            "port": 9346,
            "host": "127.0.0.1"
        },
        {
            "name": "Connect to applicationset-controller",
            "type": "go",
            "request": "attach",
            "mode": "remote",
            "remotePath": "${workspaceFolder}",
            "port": 9347,
            "host": "127.0.0.1"
        },
        {
            "name": "Connect to application-controller",
            "type": "go",
            "request": "attach",
            "mode": "remote",
            "remotePath": "${workspaceFolder}",
            "port": 9348,
            "host": "127.0.0.1"
        },
        {
            "name": "Connect to notifications-controller",
            "type": "go",
            "request": "attach",
            "mode": "remote",
            "remotePath": "${workspaceFolder}",
            "port": 9349,
            "host": "127.0.0.1"
        },
        {
            "name": "Connect to commit-server",
            "type": "go",
            "request": "attach",
            "mode": "remote",
            "remotePath": "${workspaceFolder}",
            "port": 9350,
            "host": "127.0.0.1"
        }
    ]
}

Goland

Add a .run/remote-debugging.run.xml file with these configurations to support attaching to running pods corresponding to the service.

xml

<component name="ProjectRunConfigurationManager">
    <configuration default="false" name="Connect to server" type="GoRemoteDebugConfigurationType" factoryName="Go Remote" focusToolWindowBeforeRun="true" port="9345">
        <option name="disconnectOption" value="LEAVE" />
        <disconnect value="LEAVE" />
        <method v="2" />
    </configuration>
    <configuration default="false" name="Connect to repo-server" type="GoRemoteDebugConfigurationType" factoryName="Go Remote" focusToolWindowBeforeRun="true" port="9346">
        <option name="disconnectOption" value="LEAVE" />
        <disconnect value="LEAVE" />
        <method v="2" />
    </configuration>
    <configuration default="false" name="Connect to applicationset-controller" type="GoRemoteDebugConfigurationType" factoryName="Go Remote" focusToolWindowBeforeRun="true" port="9347">
        <option name="disconnectOption" value="LEAVE" />
        <disconnect value="LEAVE" />
        <method v="2" />
    </configuration>
    <configuration default="false" name="Connect to application-controller" type="GoRemoteDebugConfigurationType" factoryName="Go Remote" focusToolWindowBeforeRun="true" port="9348">
        <option name="disconnectOption" value="LEAVE" />
        <disconnect value="LEAVE" />
        <method v="2" />
    </configuration>
    <configuration default="false" name="Connect to notifications-controller" type="GoRemoteDebugConfigurationType" factoryName="Go Remote" focusToolWindowBeforeRun="true" port="9349">
        <option name="disconnectOption" value="LEAVE" />
        <disconnect value="LEAVE" />
        <method v="2" />
    </configuration>
    <configuration default="false" name="Connect to commit-server" type="GoRemoteDebugConfigurationType" factoryName="Go Remote" focusToolWindowBeforeRun="true" port="9350">
        <option name="disconnectOption" value="LEAVE" />
        <disconnect value="LEAVE" />
        <method v="2" />
    </configuration>
</component>