Key Kubernetes Tools Enabling Agility from Local Development to the Edge

KubeCon 2022 was full of exciting announcements and new features that will make the Kubernetes experience smoother for both operators and developers. Below are the Portworx advancements I can’t wait to see in action.

Next Generation Multi-Cloud Ready Kubernetes

The latest version of Portworx Enterprise has landed, and it’s ready to simplify the deployment and management of running containers in Kubernetes across multiple clouds — even at the edge. As a developer, one of the most appealing features is the Object Store Service, which gives application developers a scale-out object service layer on top of S3 compliant object stores. Now, with Object Store Service, anywhere you go in any cloud, you can use this overlay layer to keep your APIs consistent in the application and consistently access native storage or even real arrays in your datacenter. This all means Cloud, core, access and edge can now run the same software without modification and share a common object storage API.

On the performance side of the house, there are two notable new features. PX-Fast was introduced to provide more linear performance from storage, regardless of what the backend runs on. PX-Fast allows for 1.5m IOPS per node in the cluster. By leveraging a higher density of containers per node, it helps free up one of the main bottlenecks to scaling out your compute. The other performance related release is Portworx Direct Access. When Pure Flash arrays are present, Portworx will now have direct access to these high-performance storage devices.

Managed Time Machine for Kubernetes

The new Backup-as-a-Service (BaaS) gives you the ability to complete any-to-any backup and restore for Kubernetes with zero click install ease. Currently offered via an exclusive agreement with AWS, the BaaS version of PX-Backup is available to deploy on AWS EKS, and it is able to talk to any Kubernetes cluster you configure it to use. Because you feed BaaS with AWS credentials, a bonus of this feature is that it will auto-discover your EKS clusters and offer to start backing them up.

As the saying goes, if it’s easy to do, it will get done. BaaS greatly simplifies the backup story on Kubernetes — a process that has always been tricky to manage and ensure consistency. The latest BaaS includes the PX-Backup ransomware protection features that help ensure that snapshots taken can’t be deleted inadvertently or maliciously. The only real solution to ransomware is to have a quick way to restore your data right back to where it is needed. With the help of BaaS, you can manage your backup policies centrally and even use the service to move datasets to new environments. You can also use BaaS to make sure your staging environment matches production, a great tool for increasing your confidence when releasing new versions of code. 

Fully Managed Cloud Native Data Services

Personally, I’m most excited about the new Portworx Data Services Database-as-a-Service (DBaaS) platform for Kubernetes. A developer at heart, when we develop new applications, I always want to ensure that we launch on the data version of the database as we develop against. With DBaaS, you can deploy and manage a local Postgres and Redis instance with the same tools you use to deploy into staging and production. This is a big win. It also allows for the same software to run in multiple clouds — or at the edge — with the same code working in all scenarios.

DBaaS makes it possible to deploy the same data services (such as Postgres) into any cloud with just one tool — instead of using each cloud’s tools to deploy and update. Plus, day 2 management problems are solved using DBaaS because it gives you the ability to patch and set polices centrally.

Smoothing the Path to Containers

We are moving from the decade of cloud into the decade of Kubernetes. Whether you’re an organization looking to get more utilization from your existing datacenter resources or an edge provider looking to provide cloud native tools in far-flung places and deploy apps across multiple public clouds, these new tools make Kubernetes more approachable by developers and operators alike. 

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