Deploying the Platform UI using the CLI

Deploying the Platform UI allows you to deploy and manage instances from a central location. This task must be performed by a cluster administrator. For more information see Roles and permissions.

This procedure describes how to deploy and configure a Platform UI using the CLI. To deploy using the OpenShift web console, see Deploying the Platform UI using the OpenShift console.

Prerequisites
Deploying with the CLI

Troubleshooting: For a list of possible errors and solutions when performing the steps in this section, see Troubleshooting Platform UI deployment.

Prerequisites

You are on a supported version of Red Hat Openshift. See Operating environment for details.
For online clusters, if you have not already created a secret called ibm-entitlement-key in the namespace where the instance will be created, see Applying your entitlement key.
An OpenShift cluster administrator has created one or more storage classes that support ReadWriteMany (RWX) and allows read and write access to non-root users. Supported storage providers include ibmc-file-gold-gid, OpenShift Data Foundation (formerly OpenShift Container Storage), Spectrum, and Portworx. For additional details about storage support and configuration, see Storage considerations.
Tip: For OpenShift Data Foundation in a production environment, the optimal minimum deployment is 4 storage nodes, with 3 Object Storage Daemons (OSDs) on each node. This provides much greater data resiliency in the event of any OSD failures.

To deploy the Platform UI with an RWO storage class, follow the procedures in Deploying the Platform UI with RWO storage.

Deploying with the CLI

Creating the Platform UI instance
Getting the URL required to access the Platform UI
Getting the initial admin password

Creating the Platform UI instance

Log into your cluster, using your OpenShift user credentials:
```
oc login
```
If you installed the operators in All namespaces on the cluster mode, you will need to use a project other than openshift-operators in which to deploy the instance.
- If needed, create a new project for this purpose by running:
```
oc new-project <project_name>
```
  For example:
```
oc new-project integration
```
Create a PlatformNavigator YAML file. For example, you could create a file called platform-ui-instance.yaml with the following example configuration. Update the values as indicated:
- For metadata.namespace, enter your project (namespace) name.
- Change the value of spec.license.accept to true if you accept the Cloud Pak for Integration license agreement. For details, see Licensing.
- For spec.storage.class, specify a storage class that supports ReadWriteMany (RWX) volumes and allows read and write access to non-root users. To get a list lf available storage classes, run the command:
```
oc get storageclasses
```
A list of available storage classes appears. For details about storage support and configuration, see Storage considerations.
- Change any other configuration details as required.
```
apiVersion: integration.ibm.com/v1beta1
kind: PlatformNavigator
metadata:
  name: integration-quickstart
  namespace: integration
spec:
  license:
    accept: false
    license: L-YBXJ-ADJNSM
  mqDashboard: true
  replicas: 1
  storage:
    class: <storage_class>
  version: 2023.2.1
```
If you need advanced configuration options, consult Using the Platform UI.
Apply the YAML file to the cluster:
```
oc apply -f platform-ui-instance.yaml
```
Check the status of the Platform UI instance by running the following command in the project (namespace) where it was deployed:
```
oc get platformnavigator
```

Getting the URL required to access Platform UI

Get a list of console links for the Platform UI in the cluster:

oc get consolelink | grep "IBM Cloud Pak for Integration"

This returns a list of URLs, one for each instance of the Platform UI on the cluster. For example:

NAME                                                           TEXT                                  URL                   
integration1-console-link-ibm-integration-platform-navigator   IBM Cloud Pak for Integration [dev]   https://cpd-integration-dev.apps.cluster.com
integration2-console-link-ibm-integration-platform-navigator   IBM Cloud Pak for Integration [uat]   https://cpd-integration-uat.apps.cluster.com
integration3-console-link-ibm-integration-platform-navigator   IBM Cloud Pak for Integration [prod]  https://cpd-integration-prod.apps.cluster.com

For the instance you want to access, copy the URL into your browser.

If you are unable to log in to Platform UI with OpenShift cluster admin credentials (for example, if you are installing in a cluster using Red Hat OpenShift Service on AWS (ROSA)), run the following command to get the password:

oc -n ibm-common-services get secret platform-auth-idp-credentials -o jsonpath='{.data.admin_password}' | base64 -d && echo

The password is now printed in your command line tool.

What's next?

After you complete other deployment tasks in the Platform UI, you can perform additional post-installation configuration such as:

Managing users. For more information, see Adding users in the IBM Cloud Pak Platform UI and the other topics in the Identity and access management section.
Create additional admin users authenticated by your identity provider and change the initial admin credentials. For more information, see Changing the cluster administrator access credentials.
Configuring the foundational services. See Configuring Cloud Pak foundational services.
For additional tasks, see Administering.

After configuring the platform, deploy IBM Cloud Pak for Integration capabilities. See Deploying instances of capabilities.