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I’d suggest to look into Kluctl (https://kluctl.io / https://github.com/kluctl/kluctl/) which I created after I’ve gone the way of Helm -> Kustomize -> Kustomize+Scripting and finally realised that this needs a dedicated tool so that no scripting is required anymore. Here is hands-on introduction:

Thanks! Going to take a look and watch. Was also pointed to https://kubevela.io/docs/getting-started/core-concept We were considering a DIY app manifest template engine so to speak if nothing was found/fit our needs

What would be the goal in generating YAML? Helm, Kustomize, Cue are all abstractions but you end up needing abstractions on top of that and you start with scripting it. Eventually the logic is complex enough you need tests and expertise in the templating tool. You can either stay at the abstraction level or put another one on top. Which solution depends on your users. Is it a platform that end users use or a more testable and flexible program like an operator. Right now we are expecting our teams to learn helm + k8s but we’d rather create an operator and Go and then have teams learn k8s so they know what it creates and how to observe it. Kubevela is an alternative to creating an operator but you have to use all its specific constraints which is the tradeoff of a platform