Kubernetes at Canonical… during the v1.30 era
Kubernetes v1.30 was recently released, and as expected, MicroK8s was one of the first distributions to bring the latest and greatest Kubernetes to your doorstep. To install it, simply run:
snap install microk8s --classic --channel=1.30 Interestingly, MicroK8s is not the only Kubernetes distribution from Canonical. Charmed Kubernetes is the older brother of MicroK8s, while Canonical Kubernetes is the latest addition to the Kubernetes distribution family.
You might be wondering why Canonical offers three different Kubernetes distributions. Well, there are actually dozens of CNCF-certified Kubernetes distributions available, each with its own unique strengths and weaknesses. So, let me explain why Canonical creates and maintains three of them.
Charmed Kubernetes is the first distribution from Canonical, with roots dating back to even before the 1.5 Kubernetes release. It’s designed for mid to large enterprise deployments and integrates well with other Canonical products (MaaS, OpenStack, etc.).
Next up is MicroK8s, which may be called “micro” but don’t let that fool you. Is called micro because it requires zero maintenance. It is ideal for edge use cases or small to mid-sized clusters. This makes it a popular choice among developers too.
The latest and under-development Kubernetes distribution from Canonical is called simply “Canonical K8s”. This distribution combines the best of both worlds — the ease of use and maintenance-free nature of MicroK8s, along with the enterprise-level features and integration of Charmed Kubernetes. It can be deployed as a snap and uses either Juju or ClusterAPI (CAPI) for its lifecycle management.
That’s not all
Canonical is heavily investing in Kubernetes and has a number of products you may or may not have heard of. Let me name a few:
- Ubuntu! Guess where most K8s distributions run on? Yes!
- Ubuntu base layer for your docker containers.
- Kubernetes worker nodes for public clouds, see for example EKS.
- Tools for building OCI images, ROCKs
- Tooling for optimizing container images
- Charmed Kubeflow
- Containerized Database deployments
At first glance, it may seem like a collection of unrelated elements, but upon closer inspection, you’ll discover that Canonical is one of the few companies capable of providing a complete software stack for infrastructure. From the kernel to the host (MaaS/MicroCloud), virtualization layer (OpenStack/LXD), Kubernetes distribution, and containerized workloads, everything can be sourced and supported by Canonical. This comprehensive approach is particularly appealing to those wary of the fragmentation present in open-source software.
The future…
… is going to be great. If you want to be part of it come join us.
