Azure AKS Overview: Azure’s Managed Kubernetes Service
In today’s entry in our exploration of container services, we’ll look at Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS). Azure AKS manages your hosted Kubernetes environment, making it simple to deploy and manage containerized applications without container orchestration expertise, divesting much of that responsibility to Azure — much like EKS and GKE do for AWS and Google Cloud. Critical tasks like health monitoring of ongoing operations and maintenance by provisioning, upgrading, and scaling resources on demand are handled by Azure.
Azure AKS Overview
Azure AKS is, as of this writing, just over a year old, released for general availability in June 2018. With AKS, you can deploy, scale, and manage Docker containers and applications. Azure AKS gives developers greater flexibility, automation and reduced management overhead for administrators and developers. This is because it’s a managed service, which takes some of the management burden off the user.
As applications grow to span multiple containers deployed across multiple servers, operating them becomes more complex. To manage this complexity, Azure AKS provides an open source API to deploy, scale and manage Docker containers and container-based applications across a cluster of container hosts.
Use cases for AKS include:
- Easily migrating existing applications to Kubernetes
- Simplifying the deployment and management of microservices based applications
- Easily integrated DevSecOps
- IoT device deployment and management on demand
- Machine Learning model training with AKS
If AKS is free, what do you pay for?
Yes, Azure AKS is a free service since there is no charge for managing Kubernetes clusters. However, you pay for the VM instances, storage and networking resources consumed by your Kubernetes cluster. These should be managed like any other cloud resources, with attention paid to potential areas of waste.
AKS vs. ACS
Microsoft’s experience with cluster orchestration began with Azure Container Service back in 2017, which supported Kubernetes, Docker Swarm and Mesosphere’s DC/OS. It was the simplest most open and flexible way to run container applications in the cloud then, and now followed by Azure Kubernetes Services (AKS), which was made generally available in 2018.
ACS users who run on Kubernetes can possibly migrate to AKS, but migration should be planned and reviewed for it to be successful as there are many key areas in which they are different. If considering migration, check out Azure’s guide to migrating from ACS to AKS here.
Should you use Azure AKS?
Chances are, you’re locked into a cloud provider — or have a preferred cloud provider — already, so you’re likely to use the container management service offered on your provider of choice. If you’re on Azure, AKS will be the natural choice as you increase use of microservices and app portability with containers.
Further reading:
- How to Keep Costs in Check After Converting a Monolith to Microservices
- The Next Evolution of Cloud Management: Container Management
- 5 Ways to Get Started with Container Optimization for Automation and Cost Savings
Originally published at www.parkmycloud.com on June 20, 2019.
