Quick Start

This guide walks you through creating your first infrastructure environment with OpenPrime.

Prerequisites

Gather these before you start — the wizard does not block you on them, but the last step will fail without them:

You need	Why	Where it goes
AWS access key + secret	Creating the Terraform state backend, then provisioning	Settings → Cloud Credentials
An IAM policy covering S3 and DynamoDB, not just EKS/EC2	The state backend is created before Terraform runs	see Cloud Credentials
A Git repository for the generated code	OpenPrime pushes the infrastructure it generates	wizard, Basic Configuration
A deploy key with WRITE access to that repository	The push is a real git push	wizard, Basic Configuration
CI secrets in that repository	The generated pipeline applies the Terraform	your Git provider's settings

The last one is easy to miss: OpenPrime generates and pushes the code, but your own pipeline is what applies it. It needs AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID and AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY configured as repository secrets.

Step 1: Access OpenPrime

Open app.openprime.io in your browser.

You'll be redirected to Keycloak for authentication.

Running locally instead?

If you are running the stack yourself, use http://localhost:3000 — see Installation.

Step 2: Log In or Register

If this is your first time:

1. Click Register on the Keycloak login page
2. Fill in your details
3. Complete registration

Your user account is automatically created in OpenPrime on first login.

Step 3: Create Your First Environment

Navigate to Environments

1. Click Environments in the sidebar
2. Click Create Environment

Configure Basic Settings

Name: my-first-env
Provider: AWS
Region: us-east-1

Add Services

Enable the services you need:

Service	Description
Kubernetes (EKS)	Managed Kubernetes cluster
Database (RDS)	Managed PostgreSQL/MySQL
Storage (S3)	Object storage buckets

Configure Kubernetes (Example)

kubernetes:
  enabled: true
  clusterName: my-cluster
  version: "1.28"
  nodeGroups:
    - name: general
      instanceType: t3.medium
      desiredSize: 2
      minSize: 1
      maxSize: 5

Step 4: Add Helm Charts (Optional)

Navigate to the Helm Charts tab to add applications:

Common Selections

• nginx-ingress - Ingress controller
• cert-manager - TLS certificate automation
• prometheus-stack - Monitoring and alerting

Configure each chart or use defaults:

nginx-ingress:
  enabled: true
  customValues: false

cert-manager:
  enabled: true
  customValues: true
  values: |
    installCRDs: true
    prometheus:
      enabled: true

Step 5: Review and Save

1. Click Review to see your configuration summary
2. Verify all settings are correct
3. Click Save Environment

Step 6: Generate Infrastructure Code

Once saved, you can generate deployment artifacts:

Terraform Files

# Generated structure
environments/
└── my-first-env/
    ├── main.tf
    ├── variables.tf
    ├── outputs.tf
    └── terraform.tfvars

Helm Values

# Generated Helm configurations
helm/
└── my-first-env/
    ├── nginx-ingress-values.yaml
    └── cert-manager-values.yaml

ArgoCD Applications (Optional)

# GitOps manifests
argocd/
└── my-first-env/
    ├── application.yaml
    └── appproject.yaml

Step 7: Deploy (Optional)

Using Terraform

cd environments/my-first-env

# Initialize
terraform init

# Plan
terraform plan

# Apply (requires cloud credentials)
terraform apply

What the Generated Repository Contains

.github/workflows/     GitHub Actions pipeline (fmt, validate, plan, apply)
.gitlab-ci.yml         GitLab CI equivalent
terraform/aws/         Cloud infrastructure (VPC, EKS, RDS, ...)
terraform/kubernetes/  In-cluster resources and Helm releases
argocd/                Application manifests and Helm values

There is no deployment script — the pipeline in .github/workflows/ is what applies the Terraform. Run it from your repository, or use the terraform commands above locally.

What's Next?

• Add Cloud Credentials - Connect to your cloud provider
• Explore Services - Learn about available services
• Understand Templates - How code generation works

Example Configurations

Minimal Development Environment

name: dev-env
provider: aws
region: us-west-2
services:
  kubernetes:
    enabled: true
    nodeGroups:
      - name: dev
        instanceType: t3.small
        desiredSize: 1

Production-Ready Setup

name: prod-env
provider: aws
region: us-east-1
services:
  kubernetes:
    enabled: true
    version: "1.28"
    nodeGroups:
      - name: system
        instanceType: t3.medium
        desiredSize: 3
      - name: workload
        instanceType: t3.large
        desiredSize: 5
        maxSize: 20
  database:
    enabled: true
    engine: postgresql
    version: "15"
    instanceClass: db.r5.large
    multiAZ: true
helmCharts:
  prometheus-stack:
    enabled: true
  cert-manager:
    enabled: true
  external-secrets:
    enabled: true