RHOAIENG-38505 | build: update image placeholder strategy

[kahowell]

Description

Jira: RHOAIENG-38505

Change the kustomize image reference from a hardcoded "controller" name to a "REPLACE_IMAGE" placeholder.

The previous strategy didn't work properly for CI, because the substitution logic modifies YAML files in the repo.

How Has This Been Tested?

1. Ran make bundle-build locally, verified bundle contents have image: set according to my IMG/IMAGE_BASE_TAG, etc settings.
2. Hope to use CI logs to verify what image gets deployed.

Screenshot or short clip

Merge criteria

• You have read the contributors guide.
• Commit messages are meaningful - have a clear and concise summary and detailed explanation of what was changed and why.
• Pull Request contains a description of the solution, a link to the JIRA issue, and to any dependent or related Pull Request.
• Testing instructions have been added in the PR body (for PRs involving changes that are not immediately obvious).
• The developer has manually tested the changes and verified that the changes work
• The developer has run the integration test pipeline and verified that it passed successfully

E2E test suite update requirement

When bringing new changes to the operator code, such changes are by default required to be accompanied by extending and/or updating the E2E test suite accordingly.

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E2E update requirement opt-out justification

build change

Summary by CodeRabbit

• Chores
  • Updated manager container image replacement mechanism to use a direct image substitution approach instead of field-based transformation, enabling more flexible image resolution for CI/pullspec and local builds.

[coderabbitai]

Walkthrough

The pull request consolidates image replacement logic by transitioning from a transformation-based approach using the "controller" key to direct "REPLACE_IMAGE" substitution across the Makefile, kustomization configuration, and manager deployment manifest.

Changes

Cohort / File(s)	Summary
Image replacement configuration Makefile, config/manager/kustomization.yaml.in	Makefile updated to replace controller=$(IMG) with REPLACE_IMAGE=$(IMG) for kustomize image set operation; corresponding image transformation block removed from kustomization.yaml.in
Deployment manifest config/manager/manager.yaml	Container image value changed from controller:latest to REPLACE_IMAGE:latest with explanatory comment about CI/pullspec or local build substitution

Estimated code review effort

🎯 2 (Simple) | ⏱️ ~8 minutes

• Verify the "REPLACE_IMAGE" substitution is consistently applied across all three files
• Confirm that Kustomize properly recognizes and replaces the "REPLACE_IMAGE" key in the deployment manifest
• Check that the removal of the image transformation block doesn't break existing deployment workflows

Poem

🐰 A carrot of config, so cleanly refined,
From controller to REPLACE_IMAGE aligned,
Three files now sing in simpler refrain,
The Makefile, kustomization, and manifest maintain
One path to injection, no transformation strain! ✨

Pre-merge checks and finishing touches

✅ Passed checks (3 passed)

Check name	Status	Explanation
Description Check	✅ Passed	Check skipped - CodeRabbit’s high-level summary is enabled.
Docstring Coverage	✅ Passed	No functions found in the changed files to evaluate docstring coverage. Skipping docstring coverage check.
Title check	✅ Passed	The title accurately describes the main change: updating the image placeholder strategy from 'controller' to 'REPLACE_IMAGE' in kustomize configuration.

✨ Finishing touches

• 📝 Generate docstrings

🧪 Generate unit tests (beta)

• Create PR with unit tests
• Post copyable unit tests in a comment

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[codecov]

Codecov Report

✅ All modified and coverable lines are covered by tests.
✅ Project coverage is 50.07%. Comparing base (90c809c) to head (e6caf41).
⚠️ Report is 4 commits behind head on main.

Additional details and impacted files

@@           Coverage Diff           @@
##             main    #2842   +/-   ##
=======================================
  Coverage   50.07%   50.07%           
=======================================
  Files         144      144           
  Lines       10469    10469           
=======================================
  Hits         5242     5242           
  Misses       4669     4669           
  Partials      558      558           

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[openshift-ci]

[APPROVALNOTIFIER] This PR is APPROVED

This pull-request has been approved by: davidebianchi

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• OWNERS [davidebianchi]

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[zdtsw]

LGTM