Microservice architectures have become the de facto standard for cloud native applications, and organizations are continuing to adopt, grow, and harness the Kubernetes platform for their applications’ needs. Along with the rapid volume of Kubernetes adoption comes the operational complexity to maintain and secure the vast amounts of application endpoints in these cloud native environments.
Since our initial announcement of Open Service Mesh (OSM) as an open-source community-led project back in August 2020, and later being accepted to the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) as a sandbox project in September 2020, the core principles that inspired the project continue to ring true. Those core principles were to develop a cloud native service mesh that is simple to understand and contribute to; effortless to install, maintain, and operate; painless to troubleshoot; and finally keep OSM easy to configure via the Service Mesh Interface (SMI) specification. We are thankful to the community and all the individuals, contributors, and maintainers for their hard work in keeping the core principles at the forefront of the project.
In our efforts to provide a simplified service mesh experience for securing your cloud native application communications and endpoints, today we are excited to announce the public preview of the Open Service Mesh (OSM) Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) add-on. Azure customers will benefit now by being able to experience first-class Azure support on a fully integrated cloud native application stack provided with AKS.
OSM is being developed as an open-source project with the CNCF, and as the project continues to mature, those enhancements will continue to inform the OSM AKS add-on. This working model with the open-source community not only allows us to rapidly develop features, but also allows us to work closely with the community in prioritizing the experiences and functionality expected by end users. We look forward to your experiences with the OSM AKS add-on.
If you are ready to get started with the public preview of the OSM AKS add-on, please visit our documentation at https://docs.microsoft.com/azure/aks/servicemesh-osm-about , which will provide more information about how to get started with the add-on for your AKS environment. We look forward to hearing about your experiences with the OSM AKS add-on.