Getting started with Juju and Charmed Operators: three awesome videos

by Michael C. Jaeger on 30 March 2022

Getting started with software can be confusing – depending on the complexity of the software, of course. Despite the extensive documentation available for Charmed Operator SDK and Juju some just prefer to watch video material to start with. So, let’s take the opportunity to have a look at available tutorials and presentations available on the Internet.

An introduction to Juju by Tim Penhey

Considering the number of likes and views, Tim Penhey has recorded one of the most popular presentations among the available introductions about Juju and Charmed Operators. It is a presentation recording explaining Juju and Charmed Operators from the beginning. The recording takes roughly half an hour and is a very clear and approachable presentation. It switches also to hands-on elements. It is an excellent start for persons entirely new to the topic.

Charmed Operator development workshop by Jon Seager

This video shows the most likes among recently recorded tutorials available on Youtube. Written and presented by Jon Seager, this two-hours tutorial session explains how to start developing a Charmed Operator for Kubernetes. The recorded material covers an introduction about Charmed Operators and Juju. Then, it explains what is important when writing a Charmed Operator, and covers the concept of relations for composing applications. The entire video lasts for 2h and 12 minutes and is a mix of slides, code, and hands-on. And in addition to the video, the development setup, the slides, and the example code are also available online. When starting the development, this tutorial is the number one candidate for watching!

The Juju controller and models on OpenStack by Sean Shuping

Sean Shuping has published an awesome collection of videos about Juju and Charmed Operators. He has recorded a number of sessions explaining Juju, Charmed OpenStack, and MAAS in order to build up a lab. An excellent video to start with is his introduction to Juju, controllers, and OpenStack. Generally, his videos are a very interesting mix of slides and hands-on parts using the juju dashboard or the command line. In addition, the recording quality and the music and memes added make the recording very entertaining as well.

It is worth checking out the homepage of Sean Shuping at https://devzero.co.za/ for more content. For example, the video about Deploying Openstack with Juju and MAAS. In fact, it all starts with an introduction about the overall goals in a video titled “Over-engineering your home lab”. This episode is very much recommended to watch first to get the context.

Of course, there is more…

Of course, there is more to pick from the existing gems on the Internet about Juju, Charmed Operators and writing operators. Stay tuned for a follow-up, introducing more interesting content. If you would have suggestions or want us to share your own content, please consider contacting me! And last but not least, you can always consider our blogs, forums and chat.