What is Kubernetes (K8S)?

What is Kubernetes (K8S)?

April 27, 2020 / Eternal Team

In this blog, we will explain to you about Kubernetes. But before we move on to this topic let us first know the difference between container vs container orchestration.

Going by the official definition “container image is a lightweight, standalone, executable package of software that includes everything needed to run an application: code, runtime, system tools, system libraries and settings.”

and “container orchestration is the automatic process of managing or scheduling the work of individual containers for applications based on microservices within multiple clusters.”

Other Container orchestration are

• Red Hat OpenShift
• Amazon ECS
• Nomad
• OpenStack
• Rancher

But in this blog we will see about Kubernetes and Docker Swarm Containerization or container orchestration Platforms.

kubernetes is developed by Google platform and the main purpose is to manage a containerized application in various types of physical, virtual and cloud environments. Google Kubernetes is a highly flexible container tool to deliver even complex applications, consistently. Applications run on clusters of hundreds to thousands of individual servers.

Kubernetes is the Linux kernel which is used for distributed systems. It helps you to abstract the underlying hardware of the nodes(servers) and offers a consistent interface for applications that consume the shared pool of resources.

Some of the platform features which Kubernetes offers are:

1. Container grouping using pod
2. Self-healing
3. Auto-scalability
4. DNS management
5. Load balancing

Important basics of kubernetes

Cluster: It is a collection of hosts (servers) that helps you to aggregate their available resources. That includes ram, CPU, ram, disk.

Master: The master is a collection of components which make up the control panel of Kubernetes. These components are used for all cluster decisions.

Node: It is a single host which is capable of running on a physical or virtual machine. A node should run both kube-proxy, minikube, and kubelet which are considered as a part of the cluster.

Namespace: It is a logical cluster or environment. It is a widely used method which is used for scoping access or dividing a cluster.

See the below Architecture diagram of K8S

If you want to more in details for each componentes please refer to below link

https://phoenixnap.com/kb/understanding-kubernetes-architecture-diagrams

Now let’s see what is difference between Docker Swarm vs Kubernetes

Summary

• Container helps an organization to perform maintenance and update without interrupting services
• Kubernetes is an example of a container management system developed in the Google platform.
• The biggest advantage of using Kubernetes is that it can run on-premises OpenStack, public clouds Google, , AWS, etc.
• Docker swarm does not allow auto-scaling while Kubernetes allows auto-scaling.
• The biggest drawback of Kubenetes is that it’s dashboard not very useful and effective