OpenShift for Developers

Chapter 7. Using Application Templates

One of the first things a developer does when starting a new job or when deciding to work on a project already in progress is to spend a good deal of time just getting their environment set up and configured. This can take hours, days, or even a week depending on the complexity of the project before they are able to run a full build and deploy of the application assets. But wouldn’t it be nice if a new developer could get a working environment up in a matter of minutes? This was our goal with application templates on the OpenShift platform, and we have made some great progress. In this chapter will we explain what an application template is and how to use it.

What Is an Application Template?

The official OpenShift 3 documentation states:

A template describes a set of objects that can be parameterized and processed to produce a list of objects for creation by OpenShift. The objects to create can include anything that users have permission to create within a project, for example services, build configurations, and deployment configurations. A template may also define a set of labels to apply to every object defined in the template.

This means that typically a template will include:

• A set of resources that is created as part of “creating/deploying” the template.

• A set of values for the parameters defined in the template.

• A matching label attached to each of the generated resources that provides a convenient way to indicate the resources ...