What’s new with Kubernetes 1.14
Kubernetes is a versatile open-source program for managing containerized services and workloads. This portable and extensible platform facilitates automation and declarative configuration that are backed by Google’s decade-long experience in running production workloads at scale. Unlike other open-source platforms for managing containerized services, Kubernetes offers superior services, combined with best-of-breed ideas and best industry standards and practices.
Recently, the cloud-native release team announced the first update release in 2019– Kubernetes 1.14. And this release brought many goodies to Kubernetes users! Guided by a theme of extensibility and support for more workloads, this latest Kubernetes release is expected to bring in more availability and security.
With 10 features graduating to stable versions, 12 new beta introductions, and 7 brand-new features, this update release features more stable enhancements and features than any other release before.
What is Kubernetes?
This release will enhance customization, expand the ecosystem, and increase the overall stability of the platform. Here is a sneak peek view of the new features and enhancements contained in the newly released Kubernetes 1.14.
Support Windows Server Worker Nodes
The windows nodes support in Kubernetes has graduated from beta to a more stable version. This means that users will now be in a position to experiment with a more versatile platform for windows containers. This update also allows for a vast, more robust, and more stable ecosystem for windows applications due to its ability to support windows nodes and scheduling windows containers.
But what does this mean for enterprises with considerable investments in Linux-based and Windows-based applications? Well, the production level support for windows nodes means that such enterprises will not need separate systems to manage their workloads. This means that customers can now mix and match both windows and Linux machines within the same cluster.
Enterprises can now build robust cloud-native applications that use both .NET runtime frameworks alongside more contemporary platforms such as Go. Obviously, this will lead to increased operational deployment efficiencies, the type of operating system notwithstanding. Linux's users also have an added advantage since the improved service types, pods, metrics, and workload controllers will seamlessly match the capabilities offered by Linux containers.
Notable Kubectl Updates and Enhancements
There are several significant Kubectl Updates, such as:
- Kustomize integration: Through the -k flag command and kustomize sub-command, users can now enjoy kustomize’ resource Config authoring capabilities using Kubernetes native concepts.
- New Kubectl logo and docs: The updates feature a brand new kubectl documentation that has been rewritten ground-up to allow users to manage their resources better.
- Kubectl plugin has graduated to stable: This allows developers to publish their own sub-commands in the form of custom standalone binaries.
Persistent local volumes GA
This will ensure that locally attached storage blocks are now available as a persistent volume source. This will not only amp performance but also lower the cost of running systems and databases, both offline and on the cloud.
PID limiting moved to Beta
For Linux users, process IDs (PIDs) are an integral resource to their host systems. This pod priority and preemption update means that administrators can now provide seamless pod-to-pod PID isolation by limiting the numbers or process IDS through the beta feature. This mitigates the risk of a single pod monopoly on all other available PIDs.
Similarly, administrators will now have the ability to isolate node-to-pod by reversing the number of allocatable PIDs. This is an alpha feature that the community hopes to move to beta in the next release.
Additional security for containers
The runAsGroup and RuntimeClass projects have been graduated to beta status in the newly released Kubernetes 1.14. A more stable RuntimeClass means that cluster administrators will now be able to define and configure robust container runtime configs.
On the other hand, the graduated runAsGroup feature allows enterprises to run non-zero gid containers, hence improving the level of security by limiting how each container interacts with the rest of the Kubernetes services and infrastructure.
What’s Next? Hardening Kubernetes In Future Releases
Kubernetes is an open-source program that is managed and written by thousands of contributors spread across the globe. These new features and updates to this community-backed open-source platform present a fantastic demonstration of the power of collaborative efforts in open-source software development.
These updates and features in Kubernetes 1.14 have also reduced the number of unsupported use cases and have set a precedent for future growth. A significantly hardened and stabilized Kubernetes platform will provide enterprises – especially those in the financial, telco, and retail spaces – with a robust multi-cloud, flexible, secure and a highly available platform for cloud-native workloads.
What version of Kubernetes are you running? Do you intend to go to the latest version? Please let me know on Twitter, and thanks for reading!