Shulou(Shulou.com)06/02 Report--

In the commercial container market competition, Docker set off a wave of container technology with its easy-to-use packaging design, became the standard of container technology one after another, and led to the reform of IT architecture in the next decade.

Although Google, which started to develop container technology as early as 2006, is a step behind, the experience of large-scale deployment of at least 2 billion containers per week has put Google on another path of container development, that is, the Kubernetes plan, which mainly provides large-scale container scheduling and cluster management.

Four years later, the positions of Docker and Kubernetes are obviously interchangeable. In the past, Docker was the most catchy term for container technology, but now the protagonist has become Kubernetes. Adrian Cockcroft, vice president of cloud architecture strategy for AWS, the cloud godfather, once pointed out that although both use container technology, the biggest difference is that Docker is to solve the application development (Developing) problem, while Kubernetes is to solve the application operation and maintenance problem (Operation) at a higher level. The development problem is an early pain point, but as enterprises rely more and more on container technology, and more and more internal applications are cloud native applications, operation and maintenance will be a new pain point for enterprise IT.

Operation and maintenance management requirements are the key for Kubernetes to catch up from behind.

Because most cloud native applications are designed with micro-service architecture, combined with container technology, an application often requires dozens of, or even complex, hundreds of containerized micro-service programs. If an enterprise has 100 applications, it has to manage thousands or even tens of thousands of containerized micro-services. Operation and maintenance management has become the biggest challenge. This is the key to the success of Kubernetes, which later focused on large-scale container cluster management.

Enterprise software companies have also joined the Kubernetes platform battle, whether in cloud services or private PaaS platform, to develop their own Kubernetes products. For example, Microsoft has directly hired Brendan Burns, the co-founder of Kubernetes, to lead the Azure container service team, and its own hybrid cloud product Azure Stack also strongly supports Kubernetes. IBM also relies on the PaaS software IBM Cloud Private with Kubernetes as the core to seize the market of enterprise private cloud container platforms, especially micro-service management requirements.

Red Hat, which supports Kubernetes for a long time, did not hesitate to give up its container scheduling tool and began to support Kubernetes in OpenShift version 3.0 launched in 2015, and now it has become an enterprise-class general application management platform that can cross multi-cloud and hybrid cloud architecture, and can also take bare metal, container and VM. VMware, the leader of virtualization, is not left behind. Recently, it has also changed its efforts to promote the container service PKS software managed by many IaaS public clouds and Kubernetes clusters. Even Oracle supports Kubernetes in its cloud services.

Cloud container hosting services have entered a new competitive stage in the past two years. Many cloud operators have replaced Container in their container hosting services with Kubernetes. For example, Azure's ACS was replaced by AKS,IBM last year, and in May this year, CloudContainer Service was renamed Cloud Kubernetes Service, referred to as IKS. Kubernetes has replaced Container as a new synonym for container service.

Let Helm format become Kubernetes App encapsulated format first.

However, the Kubernetes layout of Google has not stepped out of the cloud for a long time. In addition to actively participating in Kubernetes open source projects, it is trying to develop GKE in an attempt to create a leading position in cloud container escrow services. Until a week before this year's Next cloud products conference, Google quietly announced that it had renamed GCP's service quick installation portal (Cloud Launcher) to the Google Cloud application market and began to sell commercial software developed by a variety of third-party software vendors.

One of the most special is that the enterprise Kubernetes App type is set up in this App market, that is, the Kubernetes App market. Enterprises that use GCP can buy the Kubernetes App they want to use directly in this App market. Thirteen software companies, including Nginx, Spark, Elasticsearch, WordPress and Cassandra, began to sell enterprise software in the form of Kubernetes App.

Google also foresees the development of a Kubernetes App standard, just like the packaging form of container applications such as OCI container images. Google tries to make Kubernetes App packaged through Kubernetes encapsulation management suite Helm to become a distribution encapsulation format.

For different Docker containerized applications, all programs need to be encapsulated into a single image. Helm can package the images of multiple micro-service programs that combine an application system into a set of application packages, which is more in line with the needs of large enterprise applications or complex cloud native applications.

With the generalization of Helm packaging form and the emergence of dedicated market form, Kubernetes App has become a new format for containerized applications, which is the first foundation for the formation of a new generation of AP layer in Google.

GKE On-Prem host is disclosed for the first time

During the opening speech on the first day of the Next conference, when Google was demonstrating how to manage the GKE container clusters deployed in the two places, it suddenly showed that one of the GKE deployment sites was in Moscone Center, the location where the Next conference was held. Immediately, the GKE host appeared on the stage, and Urs H ö lzle, Senior Vice President of Google Cloud Cloud Infrastructure, announced on the spot that the cloud GKE service will launch a software version of GKE On-Prem, which can be installed in the enterprise's internal computer room server.

Urs H ö lzle announced that Google will use GKE On-Prem software, coupled with open source micro-service management platform Istio, to form a hybrid cloud software called Cloud Services Platform. The management interface of GKE On-Prem is exactly the same as that of cloud GKE services. Enterprises can move the services on cloud GKE to their own computer room without changing the management, operation and maintenance methods. Through GoogleCloud Console, enterprise operation and maintenance personnel can manage both the GKE service in the cloud and the GKE On-Prem environment deployed in their own computer room.

On the other hand, Istio is a set of software that adopts service grid (Service Mesh) architecture to manage a large number of micro services, which can manage multiple Kubernetes clusters into a single service grid, and can support online access across Kubernetes clusters, and ensure that consistent management policies are applied to each cluster. Not only Google, Red Hat also wants to support Istio on its own OpenShift, which is also focused on the needs of a large number of micro-service management in the future.

Not only that, GKE On-Prem software also strengthens a number of hybrid cloud integration mechanisms, such as enterprises can use or integrate with cloud GKE, without the need to build a complex VPN. You can also use your cloud identity or your own authentication service to log in to GKE On-Prem.

Computing work can be moved between different GKE cloud clusters or your own GKE clusters. Enterprises can build a local-side Prometheus to monitor GKE On-Prem, or use cloud-based Stackdriver services to monitor local GKE On-Prem clusters.

Unlike cloud-based GKE, local GKE software can access persistent storage services to deploy large applications, such as complex databases. Google cloud deployment tool Cloud Build can also be used to deploy container applications on local GKE On-Prem. And Kubernetes applications in the Kubernetes application market, sure enough, can also be deployed to the local GKE On-Prem environment.

Google's Cloud Services Platform strategic layout not only covers hybrid cloud, enterprise private cloud, KubernetesApp market, but also enables its own serverless services to be deployed to GKE On-Prem to enter the enterprise.

The last jigsaw puzzle of enterprise hybrid cloud architecture

Urs H ö lzle said that Kubernetes has become one of the deployment standards for enterprise infrastructure, so Google now goes a step further to use GKE On-Prem software to complete the last piece of the puzzle of enterprise hybrid cloud architecture. Google's new strategy is to bring the cloud to you. To harmonize the management tools from the enterprise internal environment (on premise) to the cloud environment, from the network to the application can be managed in the same way.

What he did not say is that in this way, with the help of GKE On-Prem software and Cloud Services Platform layout, Kubernetes has become a new application layer for enterprises, or even a new generation of application server layer. Future Kubernetes cloud native applications can be quickly deployed at this layer, arbitrarily scheduling expansion and migration, just like a new generation of general AP layer infrastructure.

Original: https://www.ithome.com.tw/news/125469

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