**Q: Why aren't there Debian/Fedora/... native packages of Helm?**
We'd love to provide these or point you toward a trusted provider. If you're
interested in helping, we'd love it. This is how the Homebrew formula was
started.
**Q: Why do you provide a `curl ...|bash` script?**
A: There is a script in our repository (`scripts/get`) that can be executed as
a `curl ..|bash` script. The transfers are all protected by HTTPS, and the script
does some auditing of the packages it fetches. However, the script has all the
usual dangers of any shell script.
We provide it because it is useful, but we suggest that users carefully read the
script first. What we'd really like, though, are better packaged releases of
Helm.
## Installing
I'm trying to install Helm/Tiller, but something is not right.
**Q: How do I put the Helm client files somewhere other than ~/.helm?**
Set the `$HELM_HOME` environment variable, and then run `helm init`:
```console
export HELM_HOME=/some/path
helm init --client-only
```
Note that if you have existing repositories, you will need to re-add them
with `helm repo add...`.
**Q: How do I configure Helm, but not install Tiller?**
By default, `helm init` will ensure that the local `$HELM_HOME` is configured,
and then install Tiller on your cluster. To locally configure, but not install
Tiller, use `helm init --client-only`.
**Q: How do I manually install Tiller on the cluster?**
Tiller is installed as a Kubernetes `deployment`. You can get the manifest
by running `helm init --dry-run --debug`, and then manually install it with
`kubectl`. It is suggested that you do not remove or change the labels on that
deployment, as they are sometimes used by supporting scripts and tools.
## Getting Started
I successfully installed Helm/Tiller but I can't use it.
**Q: Trying to use Helm, I get the error "client transport was broken"**
```
E1014 02:26:32.885226 16143 portforward.go:329] an error occurred forwarding 37008 -> 44134: error forwarding port 44134 to pod tiller-deploy-2117266891-e4lev_kube-system, uid : unable to do port forwarding: socat not found.
2016/10/14 02:26:32 transport: http2Client.notifyError got notified that the client transport was broken EOF.
Error: transport is closing
```
A: This is usually a good indication that Kubernetes is not set up to allow port forwarding.
**Q: On GKE (Google Container Engine) I get "No SSH tunnels currently open"**
```
Error: Error forwarding ports: error upgrading connection: No SSH tunnels currently open. Were the targets able to accept an ssh-key for user "gke-[redacted]"?
```
Another variation of the error message is:
```
Unable to connect to the server: x509: certificate signed by unknown authority
```
A: The issue is that your local Kubernetes config file must have the correct credentials.
When you create a cluster on GKE, it will give you credentials, including SSL
certificates and certificate authorities. These need to be stored in a Kubernetes
config file (Default: `~/.kube/config` so that `kubectl` and `helm` can access
them.
**Q: When I run a Helm command, I get an error about the tunnel or proxy**
A: Helm uses the Kubernetes proxy service to connect to the Tiller server.
If the command `kubectl proxy` does not work for you, neither will Helm.
Typically, the error is related to a missing `socat` service.
When I run a command on Helm, Tiller crahes with an error like this:
```
Tiller is listening on :44134
Probes server is listening on :44135
Storage driver is ConfigMap
Cannot initialize Kubernetes connection: the server has asked for the client to provide credentials 2016-12-20 15:18:40.545739 I | storage.go:37: Getting release "bailing-chinchilla" (v1) from storage
panic: runtime error: invalid memory address or nil pointer dereference
