In 2019, Google introduced Anthos to help customers modernize legacy applications with Kubernetes, a system for automating containerized application deployment, open-sourced by Google. Google Cloud Anthos is a hybrid, cloud-agnostic container environment that enables enterprises to use container clusters instead of cloud virtual machines (VMs) to bridge gaps between legacy software and cloud hardware. Anthos enables you to run Kubernetes clusters anywhere, in both cloud and on-premises environments.

Advantages of containers and Kubernetes

To understand the innovative solution of Google Cloud Anthos it is good to look at the advantages of containers and Kubernetes. Containers are similar to VMs, but a container is an isolated environment with application code and libraries, where the operating system is virtualized from the underlying platform. With containers, developers can create predictable environments that logically separate functions and services. There are several advantages of containers. Specific software dependencies are handled per container. CPU, memory, storage and network resources are virtualized at the level of the operating system so that containers are logically separated from each other. Container is safe and always up to date because the operating system is virtualized from the underlying platform. Containers guarantee continuous development, integration, and deployment, also environmental consistency across development, testing, and production because it runs the same on a laptop as it does in the cloud.

Kubernetes is a container platform that provides you with a framework to run distributed systems resiliently on-premises, in the cloud or as a hybrid/multicloud solution. With Kubernetes, services can be automatically rolled out, rolled back and scaled up or down according to the needs of the moment. Containers are monitored continuously and restarted if necessary.

Google Anthos - a multicloud application platform

Google Anthos is a set of managed services that take the container service to a higher level. Anthos is a managed application platform that extends Google Cloud services and engineering practices to your environments so you can modernize apps faster and establish operational consistency across them.

Anthos focuses on multi-cloud container orchestration, automating policies and modernizing security. Anthos runs on both bare-metal servers and existing virtualized infrastructures, enabling you to administer Kubernetes clusters both on-premises or in the cloud. It provides a simplified application stack that is easy to use and does not require a costly hypervisor layer. Anthos configuration manager enforces enterprise-level policies across multi-cloud deployments, ensuring constant compliance and security enforcement. Anthos enables integrating security throughout an application’s develop-build-run cycle. Creates a defense-in-depth security model that employs a broad selection of security controls, consistently across all environments.

Anthos has several key components:

• Google Kubernetes Engine deploys, manages and scales containers across multiple compute engineers pooled into a cluster. Anthos clusters manage Kubernetes clusters residing outside Google Cloud Platform (on-prem, or at other cloud providers) from a single pane of glass.
• Anthos Service Mesh simplifies service delivery, from traffic management, observability and mesh telemetry to securing communications between services across private and public clouds.
• Anthos Config Management allows uniformly consistent containers configurations across multiple clouds.
• Traffic Director adds multi-region load balancing, health checking and demand-based autoscaling.
• Google Cloud Platform's monitoring, management and debugging service, and Migrate for Anthos that automates the migration of legacy virtualized workloads to Google Kubernetes Engine containers.

Companies can leverage a wide range of useful services offered by Google Anthos such as cluster management, service management, serverless support, operations management, common security and compliance rules, and configuration and policy management. Softline has huge experience in Google solutions including Google Cloud Anthos. Our experts help you to analyze your company’s current IT solutions and find and implement the best set of IT solutions. Contact us and ask for consultancy.