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3 Kubernetes Features You Absolutely Must Use

If it seems like application development is becoming more and more complex by the year, that’s because it definitely is.

Packaging applications as containers alleviated some of the complexity that came with the demand for accessing services virtually, but modern datacenters are hosting unprecedented numbers of apps, and modern apps are built upon numerous containers. Using Kubernetes to manage all of these containers is becoming a necessity for many organizations, so IT leaders who understand the best Kubernetes features are already one step ahead.

Key Takeaways:

Automated lifecycle management is a feature that helps apps perform their best from inception to retirement.
Load balancing is essential for using all servers to their fullest potential, and enabling it as a feature of Kubernetes removes the extra burden from IT teams.
Desired state declaration is another feature that removes the burden from teams and administrators by allowing the system to reconfigure applications to the declared state on the fly.Defining the Layers of Cloud Computing

Defining Kubernetes and Its Features

Kubernetes is an open-source container orchestration platform that provides a framework for managing containerized applications. Containerization is an ingenious method of packaging software in such a way that it may run virtually. Still, the sheer volume of containers in use in any given datacenter calls for a solution such as Kubernetes that can automate the deployment, scaling, and minute-to-minute management of those containers.

Many Kubernetes features further simplify container orchestration across multiple nodes and optimize resource utilization. Automatic scaling, self-healing, and native support for DevSecOps are all examples of inherent features that organizations can practically benefit from upon installation of Kubernetes.

However, some features of Kubernetes are easy to overlook and may require informed input and configuration from an admin. These must-use features include:

Automated lifecycle management
Load balancing
Desired state declaration

Kubernetes is designed for extensibility, and by leveraging the most notable must-use features of the platform, organizations can mount, manage, and fully capitalize on the storage system of their choice.

Automated Lifecycle Management

Application lifecycle management refers to the maintenance and upkeep of an app from the moment of its creation until it is permanently retired. As a Kubernetes feature, automated lifecycle management plays a crucial role in ensuring that containerized apps are able to perform optimally at every stage of life.

For example, Kubernetes can automate the deployment of the application itself, as well as the deployment of updates as they become available. At the same time, admins always retain control of the process and have the option of pausing automation, continuing deployment, or rolling back to a previous version.

That being said, Kubernetes can also automate rollbacks when it becomes necessary for application health. The Kubernetes system regularly rolls out changes to containerized apps or their configurations, monitoring relevant metrics every step of the way. If something goes wrong, or if an automated rollout kills all instances of an app, Kubernetes will immediately roll back to a functional version.

Auto-scaling is another facet of automated lifecycle management. This Kubernetes feature monitors usage patterns and will scale containers and their resources up or down based on that observed usage, thereby reducing costs for maintaining unused resources while also ensuring that resources are always available when needed.

Load Balancing

Load balancing is the process of distributing network traffic across multiple servers to bring about lower wait times for the user and more efficient processing for the system itself. If an IT monitoring team notices unacceptable response times or an uneven workload distribution, a better load-balancing solution is a must.

Kubernetes has a number of tools in place for autonomously balancing loads both internally and externally. There is not a one-size-fits-all approach to load balancing; the process differs greatly based on the amount of traffic, the nature of the application, the amount of servers in a datacenter, as well as their capabilities, and other factors. Kubernetes comes equipped to address a wide range of diverse needs.

Load balancing as a Kubernetes feature uses sophisticated service discovery technology to automatically recognize unfamiliar services without the need to manually configure the application to accommodate them. Kubernetes gives Pods unique IP addresses, and a consistent DNS name for a set of Pods, and can load-balance across them.

Load balancing always had the potential to be a pain point in traditional datacenters. As Matt Ferrari, CTO at ClearData, points out in an article for Forbes, though, “Gone are the worries about traditional load balancing, as the clouds have an army of services that can replicate across regions.” Kubernetes and its associated features number among those game-changing services.

Desired State Declaration

Another capability of Kubernetes is the possibility of running as a declarative model. With desired state declaration, admins define what they need from an application or what state it should default to, and Kubernetes runs in the background to maintain that state.

Desired state declaration can act as a sort of disaster recovery measure built into Kubernetes. When failures occur, Kubernetes works to restore the application to the declared state.

Similarly, admins can generate user-defined health checks that Kubernetes will then run automatically at regular intervals to monitor the well-being of containers that make up an application. The system kills off any containers that fail to respond to these checks and makes them indivisible to standard users until they are ready to provide quality service again.

This is an example of self-healing as another key Kubernetes feature. Automatic restarts, placements, replication, and scaling all lend to resiliency and occur within the parameters of the admin’s desired Kubernetes state.

Deploy on a Platform That Empowers All Kubernetes Features

Containerized applications are an inevitable part of the cloud-native IT landscape where today’s development takes place. Containers solve many problems by enabling virtualization, but add layers of complexity that only Kubernetes can address. The right cloud platform will make it easy to utilize all the best features of Kubernetes natively on any cloud or any data location in a hybrid cloud environment.

Nutanix Kubernetes Engine accomplishes this by providing a complete end-to-end Kubernetes solution with push-button simplicity of deployment, all without requiring any level of vendor lock-in. This is a fast, reliable path to hybrid cloud Kubernetes, where customers’ preferred cloud-native services and Kubernetes management capabilities are easily extended to their own datacenters.

Containerization is synonymous with the idea of modern applications, so it stands to reason that Kubernetes is becoming synonymous with the idea of managing those applications. When an organization masters the use of the best Kubernetes features, development and deployment become processes that present significantly fewer challenges in a DevOps setting.

Learn more about why Kubernetes-powered DevOps is good for business as well as how to implement Kubernetes-as-a-Service.

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