Kubernetes Panel Discussion Intro

A few slides I used to set the stage for a panel discussion on Application-Oriented Infrastructure at a kubernetes meetup in Reykjavík on the 9th of February.

The questions initially posed to the panel members were; why are we so excited about application-oriented infrastructure, why is kubernetes an improvement over existing cloud technologies, or other container orchestration systems, and finally: are we as engineers and our companies benefitting from these abstractions, and furthermore is kubernetes the right platform to choose if you want those benefits?

Transcript

1. Application-Oriented Infrastructure a.k.a. how we accidentally abstracted hardware away from apps, and everybody loves it!
2. Where does this term come from? • From a 2016 Google paper named: Borg, Omega, and Kubernetes: Application-oriented Infrastructure Over time it became clear that the benefits of containerization go beyond merely enabling higher levels of utilization. Containerization transforms the data center from being machine oriented to being application oriented.
3. Kubernetes is Google's 3rd generation container orchestration system • Schedules containers to a dynamically sized pool of worker nodes • Schedules containers to a dynamically sized pool of worker nodes • Provides: • Service discovery • Zero-downtime deployments • Instant/Automatic rollbacks • Scalability of pods • Scalability of cluster by adding new nodes • Secret and configuration management • Storage orchestration • Batch execution
4. Trend not limited to Google (or even containers) • AWS (traditional cloud) • PaaS (Heroku, etc) • Mesos+Marathon • AWS ECS • Microsoft Service Fabric • Serverless (AWS lambda + AWS API gateway)
5. Why are we interested? • Developers: fast, reliable deployments + easily port applications between environments, without worrying about hardware • SysAdmins: Simpler provisioning, easier administration, homogenous monitoring requirements, less vendor dependence • Management: faster product iterations, bugfixes, stronger bargaining positions with infrastructure vendors => better bottom line
6. Are we there yet? • And is kubernetes the “right” tool of choice? • Is it going to be the “linux kernel” of distributed systems orchestration? • Feels like we’re all building tools to solve the same problems — but do we like kubernetes precisely because it offers powerful primitives, but few opinions?