Immutable Infrastructure: the new App Deployment

Immutable Infrastructure: the new App Deployment

App deployment and server setup are complex, error-prone and time-consuming. They require OS installers, package managers, configuration recipes, install and deployment scripts, server tuning, hardening and more. But... Is this really necessary? Are we trapped in a mindset of doing things this way just because that's how they've always done?

What if we could start over and radically simplify all this? What if, within seconds, and with a single command, we could wrap our application into the bare minimal machine required to run it? What if this machine could then be transported and run unchanged on our laptop and in the cloud? How do the various platforms and tools like AWS, Docker, Heroku and Boxfuse fit into this picture? What are their strengths and weaknesses? When should you use them?

This talk is for developers and architects wishing to radically improve and simplify how they deploy their applications. It takes Continuous Delivery to a level far beyond what you've seen today. Welcome to Immutable Infrastructure generation. This is the new black.

Transcript

1. Immutable Infrastructure The New App Deployment AXEL FONTAINE @axelfontaine axel@boxfuse.com
2. About Axel Fontaine • Founder and CEO of Boxfuse • Over 15 years industry experience • Continuous Delivery expert • Regular speaker at tech conferences • JavaOne RockStar in 2014 @axelfontaine
3. flywaydb.org
4. boxfuse.com
5. Let’s start with a small story
6. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gluehlampe_01_KMJ.jpg Incandescent Bulb 60 W LED Bulb 10 W
7. Heater that gives off a little bit of light Light that gives off a little bit of heat
9. Edison Screw
10. Simple, stable, standards-compliant interface with a clear contract My responsibility The electricity company’s responsibility
11. Simple, stable, standards-compliant interface with a clear contract Room For Innovation Undifferentiated Heavy Lifting
12. back to IT infrastructure …
13. POLL: what type of infrastructure are you running on? • On Premise • Colocation • Root Server • Cloud
14. How did this evolve ?
15. sometime in the 20th century …
17. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Tdkc60cassette.jpg
19. + = ON PREM + Challenges • Power, Network, Cooling • Physical Security • Physical Space • Procurement, Vendor Management • Capacity Planning • Financing • OS + Patches • App + Updates
20. + = ON PREM + Our responsibility
21. + + Our responsibility Their responsibility = COLO
22. + = COLO + Simple, stable, standards-compliant interface: (19” Rack, AC Power, Ethernet, …)
23. Can change as long as it complies with the interface contract + = COLO + Undifferentiated Heavy Lifting Our responsibility
24. = ROOT SERVER + Undifferentiated Heavy Lifting Our responsibility Can change as long as it complies with the interface contract
25. = ROOT SERVER + Undifferentiated Heavy Lifting Simple, stable, standards- compliant interface Software <-> Hardware
26. Room For Innovation + Undifferentiated Heavy Lifting Could this be our industry’s Edison Screw? Simple, stable, standards- compliant interface
27. Let’s talk about software
28. POLL: which level of automation are you at? • Build • Unit Tests • Continuous Integration • Acceptance Tests • Continuous Deployment (Code) • Continuous Deployment (Code + DB + Configuration) • Infrastructure
29. Build Test
30. • One immutable unit • Regenerated after every change • Promoted from Environment to Environment Classic Mistake: Build per Environment
31. OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App
32. OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App
33. why aren’t we doing the same for the layers this is running on ???
34. what could possibly go wrong in these other layers ???
35. missing software
36. wrong name
37. bad version
38. incorrect permissions
39. http://www.flickr.com/photos/travelinlibrarian/2409633653/sizes/l/ critical resource in use
40. what aren’t we holding our servers to the same standards as our applications ???
42. OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App Build Test
43. OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App Build Test App
44. OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App Multiple instances in multiple Environments
45. OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App Multiple instances in multiple Environments • All instances should be as similar as possible (any difference is a potential source of errors) • That also includes your local Dev environment! • Must be able to reliably provision new ones (and recreate existing ones from scratch)
46. OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App Updates Updates Updates Sysadmin
47. If I had asked my customers what they wanted they would have said a faster horse. Henry Ford
48. OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App Updates Updates Updates Sysadmin
49. OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App Updates Updates Updates Automated Sysadmin
50. fast forward to 2015 …
51. Every day, AWS adds enough server capacity to power the whole $5B enterprise Amazon.com was in 2003. Weekends included.
52. "Advanced Test Reactor" by Argonne National Laboratory - originally posted to Flickr as Advanced Test Reactor core, Idaho National LaboratoryUploaded using F2ComButton. Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Advanced_Test_Reac tor.jpg#mediaviewer/File:Advanced_Test_Reactor.jpg "RIAN archive 341194 Kursk Nuclear Power Plant" by RIA Novosti archive, image #341194 / Sergey Pyatakov / CC-BY-SA 3.0. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:RIAN_archive_341194_ Kursk_Nuclear_Power_Plant.jpg#mediaviewer/File:RIAN_archi ve_341194_Kursk_Nuclear_Power_Plant.jpg Control Plane Data Plane
53. Control Plane Data Plane
54. • Shift to a world of abundance (no more resource scarcity) • Clean Control Plane/Data Plane split with API-based provisioning • Cost-based Architectures with the ability to turn infrastructure off Benefits of the cloud
55. it is time to rethink the faster horse
56. App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server Build Test
57. App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server Build Test Undifferentiated Heavy lifting
58. App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server Build Test
59. App Machine Image OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server Build Test Machine Image
60. OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App Updates
61. Machine Image Machine Image Machine Image Updates
62. but there is one big problem left …
63. Machine Image Network Cable
64. Machine Image Network Cable Multiple GB
65. Running servers in production should be like going backpacking. You take the bare minimum with you. Anything else is going to hurt. A Wise Man
66. what is really adding business value ???
67. Machine Image Network Cable
68. Editors Daemons OS Kernel Libraries Utilities Drivers App App Server Package Mgr Compilers SSH Firewall Compatibility Man Pages Language Log Files Users Shells Network Cable
69. OS Kernel Libraries App App Server Language Bootable App
70. Multiple GB 40 – 80 MB
71. Network Cable Bootable App
72. who is this for ???
73. OS Kernel Libraries Language App Server App 12-factor app
74. demo
75. What are the implications ???
76. Focus shift Individual instances become disposable Instance Service
77. Treat servers like cattle instead of pets
78. high uptime is a liability The longer an instance is up, the harder it becomes to recreate exactly (and it will fail eventually!)
79. How to solve service discovery ? Use a stable entry point with an internal registry Bootable App Bootable App Bootable App ? Elastic Load Balancer
80. What about security ? When was the last time your toaster got hacked?
81. What about security ? • Smallest possible attack surface • Vastly reduced implications due to low uptime and transient nature of instances • Very difficult to exploit other systems because essential tooling is missing
82. • Bake as much configuration as possible for all environments directly in the Bootable App • Use environment detection and auto-configuration • Pass remaining configuration at startup and expose it as environment variables what about configuration ???
83. what about the database ???
84. Bootable App what about the database ???
85. what about the database ??? • Keep all persistent state, including the database, out of the instance • Many good hosted solutions available like Amazon RDS or Google Cloud SQL • Use a database migration tool like Flyway to update on application startup
86. Bootable App what about the logs ??? Ship logs to a central log server where they can be • aggregated • stored and backuped • indexed • searched through a nice web UI Many good hosted solutions • Loggly • Logentries • Papertrail • …
87. what about sessions ??? Bootable App Keep session in an encrypted and signed cookie • avoids session timeouts • avoids server clustering & session replication • avoids sticky sessions & server affinity
88. what about rolling out new versions ???
89. Load Balancer App v1 App v1 Logs Availability Zone 1 Availability Zone 2
90. Load Balancer App v2 App v1 App v2 App v1 Logs Availability Zone 1 Availability Zone 2
91. Load Balancer App v2 App v2 Logs Availability Zone 1 Availability Zone 2
92. what about containers ???
93. understanding modern CPUs Both Intel and AMD have hardware support for virtualization • isolation • performance
94. Bootable App Hardware Hypervisor Bootable App Hardware OS+Container Runtime On Prem On Prem
95. Bootable App Hardware Hypervisor Bootable App Hardware Hypervisor OS+Container Runtime Bootable App Hardware OS+Container Runtime On Prem On Prem / Cloud Cloud Only makes sense if you cannot afford $9.60/month granularity
96. Bootable App Hardware Hypervisor Bootable App Hardware Hypervisor OS+Container Runtime Bootable App Hardware OS+Container Runtime On Prem On Prem / Cloud Cloud Only makes sense if you cannot afford 1.3 cents /hour granularity
97. summary
98. • One immutable unit • Regenerated after every change • Promoted from Environment to Environment Classic Mistake: Build per Environment
99. Bootable App • One immutable unit • Regenerated after every change • Promoted from Environment to Environment Classic Mistake: Build per Environment
100. boxfuse.com
101. Thanks ! AXEL FONTAINE @axelfontaine boxfuse.com