presents Living in a post- container world Serverless Architecture Magazine 2019 All you need to know about serverless architecture, technology and implementation in 8 articles written by top notch expert April 8 – 10, 2019 The Hague, Neth erlands @ServerlessCon # ServerlessCon www.serverless-architecture.io Presented by: Organizer: Contents Serverless Platforms & Technology Serverless computing – What is the future for Dev and Ops teams? 3 Don‘t make yourself irrelevant by ignoring serverless Living in a post-container world 6 Serverless vs. containers Serverless adoption 8 Reap the benefits Cloud-native Architecture Monitoring serverless computing 11 We need to think differently about apps, containers, and infrastructure Containers or serverless: Which is better? 13 A head to head battle Docker, Kubernetes & Co Companies should run serverless on Kubernetes 16 An unspoken truth of serverless What exactly is Knative? 20 An introduction with Evan Anderson from Google Cloud Services & Backend as a Service Highly optimized APIs 23 Integrating GraphQL in serverless architecture www.serverless-architecture.io @ServerlessCon # ServerlessCon 2 WHITEPAPER Serverless Platforms & Technology Don‘t make yourself irrelevant by ignoring serverless Serverless compu- ting – What is the future for Dev and Ops teams? Assuming you’ve been paying attention for the last 15 years or so, serverless is just the latest movement in the ongoing Ops switch from tactics to strategy. In this ar- ticle, Dominic Wellington talks about the real danger to Ops from serverless, the potential downsides of serverless computing and more. by Dominic Wellington same way they had always managed their physical com- pute infrastructure. Of course, this was to miss the point Serverless computing, much like the other variations of both virtualisation and cloud computing almost com- on the theme of cloud computing which it inherits pletely, but it did not fail immediately. The problems from, boils down to “it’s someone else’s computer.” only became apparent over time, when the predicted In the case of serverless, it’s a little bit more complica- improvements in capacity and utilisation rates from vir- ted than that. This is where the last vestiges of super- tualising mysteriously failed to materialise. Even worse, ficial familiarity with traditional models of IT finally a significant proportion of available capacity was consu- fall away, forcing anyone who is still treating cloud med in running zombie VMs which nobody was able to computing as just more of the same old thing to con- explain or justify, but everyone was afraid to shut down front the truth. in case they turned out to be important. People can and indeed still do treat an AMI much like The reason this happened is that – surprise! – Ops is a VM, which in turn they managed in more or less the hard. The idea of serverless computing is to get rid of the www.serverless-architecture.io @ServerlessCon # ServerlessCon 3 WHITEPAPER Serverless Platforms & Technology day-to-day transactional Ops tasks, letting Dev roll out pendency, and when the developer pulled all of their code much faster, and leaving the infrastructure mostly modules, including left-pad, utter chaos ensued. to manage itself. Instead of trying to “do the DevOps” by having an army of Ops Morlocks toiling away behind How is serverless relevant to Ops? the scenes to support the Dev Eloi, with serverless there So much for the Dev side of serverless – but I’m an Ops is no wizard behind the curtain. It really is automated guy at heart; I used to be a sysadmin, and even though machinery back there, and this frees up developers to get I’ve drifted a long way from the light with my strate- on with building whatever they are building. gic architectural role at Moogsoft, I still mostly think The reason this happened is that – surprise! – Ops that way, and I spend a lot of my time with Ops peo- is hard. The idea of serverless computing is to get rid ple. Here’s the thing: many Ops people miss the point of the day-to-day transactional Ops tasks, letting Dev of serverless because the consumption model of the ap- roll out code much faster, and leaving the infrastructure plications is the same, and they run on top of familiar mostly to manage itself. Instead of trying to “do the infrastructure – so what’s the point, exactly? Sure, the DevOps” by having an army of Ops Morlocks toiling developers are all very excited, but how is it relevant to away behind the scenes to support the Dev Eloi, with Ops? serverless there is no wizard behind the curtain. It really Some Ops types even feel threatened: “My job is loo- is automated machinery back there, and this frees up king after the servers, and now you’re talking of getting developers to get on with building whatever they are rid of them!” This is the same category error that comes building. from forklifting physical servers first into VMware and Dev teams have mostly taken to the change with en- then into the cloud without changing anything in your thusiasm. Anything that takes friction out of the de- thinking. If you define your job as putting your hands to ployment process is good, and if it does not require the keyboard any time someone wants to get anything developers to pick up a metaphorical pager, so much done involving IT – which these days means pretty much the better. That’s not to say that there are no problems everything – then yes, that job is going away. Serverless with serverless, of course; no chance of that, in this may or may not be the final nail in the coffin, but the lid fallen world we live in. After all, if cloud is somebody is already firmly on. else’s computer, serverless means that your code is now Assuming you’ve been paying attention for the last dependent on someone else’s code, running on someo- 15 years or so, serverless is just the latest movement ne else’s computer. This sort of thing is great when it in the ongoing Ops switch from tactics to strategy. works, but this assumption of unreliable remote services Instead of getting actively involved in delivering each has not yet been fully internalised. and every request, Ops defines the capabilities and For an example of the sorts of dependencies which parameters of available infrastructure and then hands are being introduced, look no further than the left-pad over both delivery and day-to-day running to auto- debacle in 2016 [1]. In case you have managed to erase mation. the relevant memories, left-pad was an 11-line module This may sound like NoOps, but rather than kick in NPM which implemented basic string padding. For that particular ant hill, I’d rather go back to the old whatever reason, tons of projects included this as a de- distinction between operators (basically, tape jockeys) and actual system administrators [2]. If you’re getting involved in day-to-day stuff, you’re not sysadminning right. A proper sysadmin is taking a nap, feet propped up on a decommissioned server, secure in the knowledge Session: Serverless vs. Organizations: that everything is working just fine – because otherwise, How Serverless forces us to *un*learn something would have told them already. Soenke Ruempler Microsoft’s own pitch for serverless [3] is this: “Serverless” is fundamentally changing “What if you could spend all your time building and the way how software gets developed, deploying great apps, and none of your time managing shipped, and operated. For many organi- servers?” This doesn’t mean servers aren’t being mana- zations these change are going to be- ged, just that they aren’t managed by hand. No deve- come a major challenge. Entire disciplines and lopers or users are aware of or concerned with details teams might get obsolete or change substantially of infrastructure, which is as it should be. Utility com- within organizations. What will change with ser- puting means that compute infrastructure is about as verless? What are typical signs of resistance against the change? How can we prepare our org interesting as the electrical grid to outsiders. Sure, it’s and people for unlearning old patterns and beha- vital and we’d all have a bad day if it broke, but unless viors that don’t work anymore in a serverless maintaining it is your actual job, you just plug in and world? How can organizational *un*learning get don’t give it a second thought – and the people main- institutionalized in companies? Let’s have a look taining it certainly aren’t spending their days driving from a knowledge management perspective. around the countryside, wiring transformers by hand just because. www.serverless-architecture.io @ServerlessCon # ServerlessCon 4 WHITEPAPER Serverless Platforms & Technology So far, so good – but what are the potential Just because they don’t have to reinstall operating downsides of serverless computing? systems doesn’t mean the Ops team is idle, though. First of all, because it’s so antithetical to how (some) Sysadmins can only take those restorative naps if they Ops teams view themselves and their place in the world, know for sure that nothing bad is happening to the sys- there’s a good chance that it’s happening as part of that tems under their care. This once meant that there were growing proportion of IT spending that is happening monitoring agents running on servers, and that failu- outside the IT budget. Yes, it’s that infamous shadow re conditions had been carefully defined up front: IF IT [4] once again. I spend a lot of time with Ops teams, this_happens AND that_happens THEN wake_up_sys- and if you ask them about serverless, often they scoff admin.