Istio: Missing App and Version Label

If you are seeing the error in Istio’s Kialia that says that the app and version label are missing from the deployment then this post will help you. Istio needs an app and version labels to produce accurate telemetry related to your applications. By adding these two labels you will also have your app show up under the Applications tab of Kiali.

Pod Selectors are immutable.

Pods with app and version labels: We recommend adding an explicit app label and version label to the specification of the pods deployed using a Kubernetes Deployment. The app and version labels add contextual information to the metrics and telemetry that Istio collects. (https://istio.io/latest/docs/ops/deployment/requirements/)

Solution: Creating App and Version Labels on the Pods

The easiest way to do this is to modify the values.yaml file to include 2 variables for the pod app and version label. Then map those values into the pod via the deployment.yaml file in the helm charts.

Modifying the values.yaml to for “Pod Labels”

values.yaml

Templating

Next, you will want to modify the _helpers.tpl template file to add this snippet below.

_helpers.tpl

Modifying the Deployment Manifest

Modifying the deployment manifest will make mapping the pod labels in easily.

deployment.yaml