The 3 Best Tools for Kubernetes Cluster Management

Kubernetes has become the new norm for container orchestration. Enterprises going cloud-native consider Kubernetes as one of the important elements contributing to the success of implementing a cloud-first strategy. Kubernetes is a system that helps with the deployment, scaling and management of containerized applications. 

But with its benefits, K8s management brings in profound challenges for software teams, planning to adopt Kubernetes architecture. Here are 3 tools to manage a Kubernetes cluster. So, let’s take a look at some of the popular Kubernetes management tools, here in this blog.

kOps (shortened form of Kubernetes Operations) is a set of tools that helps users create, upgrade and manage production-grade Kubernetes clusters. This open-source project automates clusters in AWS & GCE and also supports cloud-native features and automatic updates.

kOps is considered to be one of the best tools for deploying small production-grade clusters. It is built on a state-sync model that provides dry-runs and automatic idempotency. Some of the incredible features of this Kubernetes tool include,

- It helps in automating the provisioning of highly available Kubernetes clusters and supports zero-config managed cluster add-ons.
- Its additional features include command line autocompletion, YAML manifest-based API configuration, and dry-run modes for creating manifests. 
- It allows adding of containers, as hooks, and files to nodes through a cluster manifest file.
- It provides support for add-ons, upgrading from kube-up, and the ability to generate Terraform configurations.

Next on the list of Kubernetes management tools is Kubespray. Kubespray is an automation tool that can help automate the provisioning of Kubernetes with Ansible, an open-source IT automation engine. It enables quicker, more flexible and hassle-free deployment of Kubernetes clusters allowing customization of the implementation process. 

Kubespray can be defined as a combination of Kubernetes and Ansible. It operates on bare metal and most cloud services. Moreover, it supports popular Linux distributions, such as Ubuntu, CentOS, Debian, Fedora, OpenSUSE, and Flatcar. Kubespray is one of the most popular ways to automate a Kubernetes cluster. Its extraordinary features include,

Kubespray is one of the most effective options for organizations that run a hybrid environment with more than one public cloud on their premises.

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BuildPiper is an end-to-end Kubernetes & Microservices Application Delivery Platform that eases the task of the DevOps team as it frees them from the task of keeping a check on the implementation details of Kubernetes components and making sure that the cluster is healthy, secure, and up to date.

Here are some of the other out-of-the-box functionalities of this Kubernetes tool,

Namespace/ Ingress Management
Easy creation of Ingress, Namespaces, Config Maps, Secrets. This can easily be done through a Guided UI or by uploading the Manifest file via Gitops.

Security Tools
Easy and production-grade setup of supporting tools for security such as Hashicorp Vault, Consul, Sonar, Istio, Nginx from a single, centralized console. 

Monitoring & Log Management Tools
Hassle-free and enterprise-grade setup of Monitoring tools such as Prometheus, Grafana, Alert Manager and Log Management tools such as ElasticSearch, Fluentd, and Kibana.

360-degree Cluster Observability
Easy and seamless configuration, maintenance and management of K8s cluster with deep insights and 360-degree observability.

Cost Optimization with Spot Instances
Allowing DevOps teams to use spot instances for running containerized workloads.

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