How to deploy our cloud native applications on Kubernetes?



   Introduction of Kubernetes:
Kubernetes are originally developed by google and are now an open-source project managed by Cloud Native Computing Foundation.  It is compatible with a number of different container technologies including Docker, rkt and CRI-O. Kubernetes is a system for managing containerized applications across a cluster of servers. It allows running multiple copies of an application on different servers while keeping in sync with each other. This ensures that our applications are always available and can handle traffic without any downtime. 

Basics of Kubernetes: Kubernetes is a powerful tool that can help you streamline your application development process. By using Kubernetes, you can easily manage your application's dependencies and configurations. It provides features such as load balancing, service discovery, and health checking.  Also, it helps you to automate the deployment and scaling of your applications.,

     Kubernetes clusters refer to the group of machines running on Kubernetes and containers. The cluster must have a master and each cluster contains Kubernetes nodes. Nodes might be physical machines or VMs. Nodes run on Pods, the Kubernetes objects created or managed. Each pod represents a single instance of an application and consists of one or more containers. Kubernetes starts, stops, and replicates all containers in a pod as a group. 

Installation: In order to install Kubernetes, you will need the following:

 - A Linux distribution such as Ubuntu 18.04

- 2 CPU cores

- 20GB of free disk space

- At least 4GB  of RAM

To start the installation process, update your system's package list and install the dependencies required to add new repositories and keys. Next, add Google's apt repository to your system. This repository contains the packages required to install Kubernetes. Update your system's local package index and install the kubelet, kubeadm and kubectl packages. These packages are used to configure and manage Kubernetes clusters. Finally, start the kubelet service and enable it to start automatically at boot time.

Kubernetes Architecture: Kubernetes is a powerful system for managing containerized applications at scale. Its architecture consists of a master node that manages a group of worker nodes, each of which runs one or more containers. etcd is used to store Kubernetes configuration data in a distributed manner across all nodes in the cluster. It groups containers that make up an application into logical units for easy management and discovery. 

Kubernetes Master Node: The Kubernetes master node is the heart of the Kubernetes cluster. The master node is responsible for managing the cluster and maintaining its state. It provides a unified view of the cluster and exposes the API to end users and clients. The master node also schedules workloads on worker nodes and ensures that they are running as desired.

Kubernetes Worker Nodes: Worker nodes are the machines in a Kubernetes cluster that actually run the containers. They are managed by the master node and perform the work assigned to them by the master node. Each worker node runs a kubelet process which communicates with the master node and ensures that containers are running as desired. Worker nodes also run a proxy process that provides network connectivity to services running on the worker node.

ETCD Cluster: etcd is a distributed key-value store that is used by Kubernetes to store its configuration data. The data stored in etcd is replicated across all nodes in the Kubernetes cluster so that if one node fails, the data is still available from another node. ETCD is used by both master and worker nodes in the Kubernetes cluster.

Kubernetes Application Development: The first thing you need to do is set up a Kubernetes cluster. You can create cluster using AWS, Goolge Cloud, and Microsoft Azure. Once you have your cluster set up, you will need to install kubectl command line tool.

   Once you have cluster setup and kubectl installed, you need to create a configuration file called kuber-config which will be used to connect kubectl to your Kubernetes cluster. Finally, Connect kubectl to your cluster by running the following command:

     $kubectl --kubeconfig=<path_to_config_file> get nodes

This will list all the nodes in your cluster. Once you have verified that kubectl is correctly configured and able to communicate with your cluster, you are ready to start using your containerized applications.

Now, you are ready to start deploying your applications to kubernetes. The first thing you need to do is create a deployment. It is to create of identical pods that are used to provide your application with high availability.  To create the deployment, you need to create a deployment resource file. It contains information about your deployments such as the name of the deployment and the number of replicas you want to deploy etc.,


 Stateful Web Application: It is an application that maintains the state of a user's activity within an application. The stateless web application does not maintain the state of a user's activity within the application. The main benefits of the stateful applications are.

    - Improved performance for users by reducing the need to re-authenticate or re-enter data

   - The ability to scale horizontally without losing data

   - Greater security by encrypting data and storing it in a central location 

  - Easy to manage with well-defined APIs.

Kubernetes Application Deployment: Kubernetes is a powerful tool that can help you to manage your web application and ensure its availability. By using Kubernetes, you can abstract away the underlying infrastructure and focus on your application code. Also, it can automate many of the tasks that are required to maintain a stateful web application, such as storage provisioning, scaling up or down based on load, rolling out, new versions of the app, and self-healing in the event of failures. It enables you to run your applications in a cloud-native environment with all the benefits that come with it.

      To use Kubernetes, you need to containerize your application using Docker or another containerization tool. It means packaging your application code and dependencies into a single unit that can run isolated from other applications. If you are not familiar with containers, think of them as self-contained units that include everything your application needs to run such as code, libraries, dependencies, and configuration files. Once your application is containerized, you can deploy it to a Kubernetes cluster. It consists of set of nodes that are used to run your applications. These nodes are managed by control plane, which is responsible for maintaining the desired state of the cluster. You can interact with the control plane using kubectl command line tool.     

      Kubernetes also provides a rich set of APIs that can be used to automate tasks such as deployments, scaling, and operations. These APIs are exposed via the kube-apiserver and can be accessed using any programming language.

     Cloud-native is a modern application that is built using microservices, which are small, independent services that can be deployed and scaled quickly and easily. Cloud-native apps are also designed to be highly resilient, so that if one service fails the others can continue to run. To run a cloud-native app in Kubernetes, you will need to create a deployment. A deployment is a group of identical pods that are all running the same application. Pods are the basic units of deployment in Kubernetes. 

       To create a deployment, you will need to specify the number of replicas you want, as well as the image for your application. Once you have created your deployment, you are ready to deploy your applications on Kubernetes. To do this, you will use the kubectl apply command. This command will take your deployment resource file and create the resources specified in it. Once your application is deployed, Kubernetes will manage it for you. This includes tasks such as rolling out new versions of your application and scaling your application based on demand.,

Works: It works by using a control plane to manage a group of nodes or servers. The control plan consists of a number of controllers that work together to ensure that the desired state of the system is always met. For ex, if you want to deploy a new application, the control plane will ensure that the necessary containers are created on the nodes and that they are correctly configured. 

       If one of the nodes in the cluster goes down, the control plane takes care of rescheduling the affected container onto other nodes in the cluster so that the application can continue to function correctly. This ensures that your applications are always available, even in the event of hardware failure. Kubernetes also uses a number of services to provide additional functionality such as storage, networking, and monitoring. These services can be provided either by Kubernetes itself or by external providers. 

    Benefits of Integrating Kubernetes: Kubernetes automates the tasks of container management that includes built-in commands for deploying applications. It is a powerful system for managing containerized applications at scale. It provides high availability and fault tolerance so that you don't have to worry about designing your own solutions for these problems. Also, it makes it easy to automate many common tasks such as deployment and scaling so that you can focus on developing your applications rather than managing them. There are many benefits of integrating Kubernetes into your workflow like,

 - Increased Efficiency: By automating the deployment and management of containerized applications, Kubernetes can help to optimize your use of resources and improve efficiency.

  - Reduced Costs: By using Kubernetes to manage your containerized applications, you can reduce your infrastructure costs by making better use of your existing resources.

 - Improved Scalability; Kubernetes makes it easy to scale your containerized applications up or down as needed, so you can always meet the demands of your users.

 - Increased Reliability: With its built-in features for fault tolerance and self-healing, Kubernetes can help you ensure that your applications are always available when you need them.

 


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