OpenStack and Kubernetes are being used in tandem to develop a new generation of cloud-native platforms, according to SIG-Kubernetes, an OpenStack special interest group focused on cross-community efforts with Kubernetes.
Development efforts combining OpenStack and Kubernetes can be found at AT&T, CERN, SK Telecom, and Superfluidity, which is a European Research project (Horizon 2020) trying to build the basic infrastructure blocks for 5G networks by leveraging and extending well known open source projects.
In conjunction with OpenStack Summit in Vancouver, SIG-Kubernetes published a whitepaper highlighting progress on OpenStack-Kubernetes integration efforts, including:
- The OpenStack Cloud Provider, an external cloud controller manager for running Kubernetes in an OpenStack cluster, has a permanent new home. Cloud Provider OpenStack gives Kubernetes direct access to OpenStack resources such as Nova compute instance information, Cinder block storage, and Neutron and Octavia load balancing.
- The latest release of the CNCF dashboard features OpenStack as one of the target public clouds. This CI system runs nightly test jobs against CNCF projects. It uses a cross-cloud deployment tool to build a multi-node, highly available Kubernetes cluster. It runs Kubernetes end-to-end tests against the installation and also tests other cloud-native applications like Helm and Prometheus on the OpenStack-hosted Kubernetes test cluster.
- Cinder now offers one integration point for over 80 different storage options through a single Cinder API with a choice of Flex or Container Storage Interface (CSI) drivers.
- The community has documented how to Integrate Keystone authentication and authorization with Kubernetes role-based access control (RBAC). This approach allows Kubernetes to use OpenStack Keystone as an identity server.
