Kubernetes has now become the de facto standard for deploying containerized applications at scale in private, public and hybrid cloud environments. However, some of users who get started to use Kubernetes may feel slightly difficult since the Kubernetes has many complicated components that need to be installed and deployed, such as storage and network part. Typically, Kubernetes offers some open source solutions or projects as the storage and network service solutions. But it is not easy to install, maintain and operate multiple components in some way. For the users, the learning curve and the barriers are too high to get started quickly.
KubeSphere runs Kubernetes as the platform kernel service but offers much more functionalities, such as CI/CD pipeline, cluster autoscale, operation & troubleshooting, microservice governance, logging and resource monitoring, etc in the GUI console. In other words, Kubernetes is a great open source project, while KubeSphere is a very specialized enterprise-grade product that comes in many value-added functionalities, aiming to alleviate users' pain points in complex business scenarios, and focuses on providing users with better and more professional user experience.
Most importantly, KubeSphere provides the best solutions for both storage and networking. For example, not only supports open source storage such as Ceph RBD and GlusterFS, but also offers the high-performance cloud storage solutions that are powered by QingCloud such as QingCloud Block Storage and QingStor NeonSAN as the persistent storage. With the integration of the QingCloud CSI and NeonSan CSI plugins, it can provide more stable and secure storage for enterprise applications and data. As for the networking, it supports Calico and Flannel such open source networking projects as the industry's cloud networking solution, and will support QingCloud SDN CNI with VPC and subnet enabled for end user soon.
Why KubeSphere？
KubeSphere provides large-scale container orchestration and various management abilities to the enterprise, helping application development teams and IT operations teams from developing to deploying cloud-native applications with speed and consistency that supports enterprise digital transformation.
Enterprise-ready Functionalities
High Availability
High Resource Utilization
Extensible Resource Isolation
Advantages
Flexible and Stable Storage
Support multiple storage classes as persistent storage service, inregrates CSI plugins and other storage clients.
Support open source storage such as Ceph RBD, Glusterfs, NFS, etc.
Ability to use QingCloud Block Storage and NeonSAN to provide high performance storage services.
Scalability and Reliability
Ability to add new nodes to existing cluster, support on-demand cluster expansion.
Support for Horizontal Pod Autoscaler to ensure high availability and reliability of applications.
Multi-dimensional Monitoring
Multi-dimensional monitoring with full coverage each layer, including cluster, node, workspace, namespace, workload, Pod, container.
Provide comprehensive, multi-dimensional, fine-grained and flexible monitoring API.
Rich monitoring metrics, visual and concise metrics on UI; provide real-time metrics, trends, ranking, and support to search for any selected time range, etc.
Multi-tenant Management
Provide a multi-level and fine-grained access control system, including clusters, workspaces, projects and DevOps levels.
Role-based access control, allowing admin to dynamically configure authorization and authentication policies.
Support AD/LDAP, support account synchronization through different systems (e.g. gitlab, jenkins), ability to connect with the enterprise's account system.
Security
API security, API Gateway and authentication system to ensure API security.
Network security, based on Kubernetes NetworkPolicy to implement internal network isolation.
Operating system security, based on Kubernetes namespace to implement resource isolation.
Empower DevOps Team
Out-of-the-box DevOps, without any complicated Jenkins plugin configuration.
Ability to deploy applications to Kubernetes, provide a flexible, clean and customizable build environment.
Provide Jenkinsfile in & out of SCM (Source Code Management), reduce learning curve of Jenkinsfile and improve operation efficiency.
Easy-to-use UI
User-friendly UI and wizard-style user experience, reduce the learning cost of Kubernetes.
One-click cluster installation and one-stop application deployment/O&M are supported.
Embrace Kubernetes, keep its native storage concepts and functions into UI, much easier and more friendly for Kubernetes users.
Extensible Design
In addition to provide resource management based on Kubernetes, users can also use KubeSphere integrated modules such as image registry, application template, monitoring and logging, as well as integrating self-built services
Not only support Calico and Flannel such open source networking solutions, but also allow users to use high-performance commercial network, such as QingCloud SDN if users have higher performance requirements for network.