Google App Engine vs Kubernetes

Overview

Google App Engine

Stacks10.5K

Followers8.1K

Votes611

Kubernetes

Stacks61.2K

Followers52.8K

Votes685

Google App Engine vs Kubernetes: What are the differences?

Introduction

This Markdown code provides a comparison between Google App Engine (GAE) and Kubernetes, highlighting their key differences.

Deployment and Scaling: In Google App Engine (GAE), the deployment and scaling of applications are handled automatically by Google, with the platform managing the underlying infrastructure and resources. On the other hand, Kubernetes allows more granular control over deployment and scaling, giving users the flexibility to define and manage these aspects themselves.
Container Orchestration: While both GAE and Kubernetes support running applications in containers, their approaches to container orchestration differ. GAE provides a fully managed environment where developers only need to focus on their application code, while Kubernetes offers a container orchestration platform that allows for more advanced operations and control, such as automatic scaling and managing container lifecycle.
Flexibility and Customization: Google App Engine abstracts away much of the infrastructure and configuration details, offering a more opinionated and simplified experience. Kubernetes, on the other hand, gives users full control and flexibility over their infrastructure and application stack, enabling customization and the use of various tools and technologies.
Multi-Cloud and Hybrid Deployments: Kubernetes is designed to work across multiple cloud providers and even on-premises environments, allowing for hybrid and multi-cloud deployments. Google App Engine, on the other hand, is tightly integrated with Google Cloud Platform and is optimized for running applications specifically on Google's infrastructure.
Resource Utilization and Efficiency: Kubernetes provides extensive features to optimize resource utilization, including resource allocation, scheduling, and auto-scaling based on metrics like CPU and memory usage. While Google App Engine also handles scaling automatically, Kubernetes offers more advanced resource management capabilities, enabling fine-tuning and optimization for specific application requirements.
Monitoring and Debugging: Kubernetes offers a range of built-in monitoring and debugging features, including logging, health checks, and metric collection. Google App Engine also provides monitoring capabilities, but Kubernetes exposes more advanced functionalities and integrations with various monitoring tools and frameworks.

In summary, Google App Engine is a fully managed platform that simplifies deployment and scalability, granting less control but ease of use, while Kubernetes offers more flexibility and control over deployment, scaling, and infrastructure, enabling sophisticated container orchestration and multi-cloud support.

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Advice on Google App Engine, Kubernetes

Simon

Senior Fullstack Developer at QUANTUSflow Software GmbH

Apr 27, 2020

Decidedon

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Markdown

Our whole DevOps stack consists of the following tools:

@{GitHub}|tool:27| (incl. @{GitHub Pages}|tool:683|/@{Markdown}|tool:1147| for Documentation, GettingStarted and HowTo's) for collaborative review and code management tool
Respectively @{Git}|tool:1046| as revision control system
@{SourceTree}|tool:1599| as @{Git}|tool:1046| GUI
@{Visual Studio Code}|tool:4202| as IDE
@{CircleCI}|tool:190| for continuous integration (automatize development process)
@{Prettier}|tool:7035| / @{TSLint}|tool:5561| / @{ESLint}|tool:3337| as code linter
@{SonarQube}|tool:2638| as quality gate
@{Docker}|tool:586| as container management (incl. @{Docker Compose}|tool:3136| for multi-container application management)
@{VirtualBox}|tool:774| for operating system simulation tests
@{Kubernetes}|tool:1885| as cluster management for docker containers
@{Heroku}|tool:133| for deploying in test environments
@{nginx}|tool:1052| as web server (preferably used as facade server in production environment)
@{SSLMate}|tool:2752| (using @{OpenSSL}|tool:3091|) for certificate management
@{Amazon EC2}|tool:18| (incl. @{Amazon S3}|tool:25|) for deploying in stage (production-like) and production environments
@{PostgreSQL}|tool:1028| as preferred database system
@{Redis}|tool:1031| as preferred in-memory database/store (great for caching)

The main reason we have chosen Kubernetes over Docker Swarm is related to the following artifacts:

Key features: Easy and flexible installation, Clear dashboard, Great scaling operations, Monitoring is an integral part, Great load balancing concepts, Monitors the condition and ensures compensation in the event of failure.
Applications: An application can be deployed using a combination of pods, deployments, and services (or micro-services).
Functionality: Kubernetes as a complex installation and setup process, but it not as limited as Docker Swarm.
Monitoring: It supports multiple versions of logging and monitoring when the services are deployed within the cluster (Elasticsearch/Kibana (ELK), Heapster/Grafana, Sysdig cloud integration).
Scalability: All-in-one framework for distributed systems.
Other Benefits: Kubernetes is backed by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF), huge community among container orchestration tools, it is an open source and modular tool that works with any OS.

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Detailed Comparison

Google App Engine	Kubernetes
Google has a reputation for highly reliable, high performance infrastructure. With App Engine you can take advantage of the 10 years of knowledge Google has in running massively scalable, performance driven systems. App Engine applications are easy to build, easy to maintain, and easy to scale as your traffic and data storage needs grow.	Kubernetes is an open source orchestration system for Docker containers. It handles scheduling onto nodes in a compute cluster and actively manages workloads to ensure that their state matches the users declared intentions.
Zero to sixty: Scale your app automatically without worrying about managing machines.;Supercharged APIs: Supercharge your app with services such as Task Queue, XMPP, and Cloud SQL, all powered by the same infrastructure that powers the Google services you use every day.;You're in control: Manage your application with a simple, web-based dashboard allowing you to customize your app's performance.	Lightweight, simple and accessible;Built for a multi-cloud world, public, private or hybrid;Highly modular, designed so that all of its components are easily swappable
Statistics
Stacks 10.5K	Stacks 61.2K
Followers 8.1K	Followers 52.8K
Votes 611	Votes 685
Pros & Cons
Pros 145 Easy to deploy 106 Auto scaling 80 Good free plan 62 Easy management 56 Scalability	Pros 166 Leading docker container management solution 130 Simple and powerful 108 Open source 76 Backed by google 58 The right abstractions Cons 16 Steep learning curve 15 Poor workflow for development 8 Orchestrates only infrastructure 4 High resource requirements for on-prem clusters 2 Too heavy for simple systems
Integrations
Red Hat Codeready Workspaces Twilio Twilio SendGrid	Vagrant Docker Rackspace Cloud Servers Microsoft Azure Google Compute Engine Ansible Google Kubernetes Engine

What are some alternatives to Google App Engine, Kubernetes?

Heroku

Heroku is a cloud application platform – a new way of building and deploying web apps. Heroku lets app developers spend 100% of their time on their application code, not managing servers, deployment, ongoing operations, or scaling.

Clever Cloud

Clever Cloud is a polyglot cloud application platform. The service helps developers to build applications with many languages and services, with auto-scaling features and a true pay-as-you-go pricing model.

Rancher

Rancher is an open source container management platform that includes full distributions of Kubernetes, Apache Mesos and Docker Swarm, and makes it simple to operate container clusters on any cloud or infrastructure platform.

Red Hat OpenShift

OpenShift is Red Hat's Cloud Computing Platform as a Service (PaaS) offering. OpenShift is an application platform in the cloud where application developers and teams can build, test, deploy, and run their applications.

Docker Compose

With Compose, you define a multi-container application in a single file, then spin your application up in a single command which does everything that needs to be done to get it running.

Docker Swarm

Swarm serves the standard Docker API, so any tool which already communicates with a Docker daemon can use Swarm to transparently scale to multiple hosts: Dokku, Compose, Krane, Deis, DockerUI, Shipyard, Drone, Jenkins... and, of course, the Docker client itself.

AWS Elastic Beanstalk

Once you upload your application, Elastic Beanstalk automatically handles the deployment details of capacity provisioning, load balancing, auto-scaling, and application health monitoring.

Tutum

Tutum lets developers easily manage and run lightweight, portable, self-sufficient containers from any application. AWS-like control, Heroku-like ease. The same container that a developer builds and tests on a laptop can run at scale in Tutum.

Render

Render is a unified platform to build and run all your apps and websites with free SSL, a global CDN, private networks and auto deploys from Git.

Portainer

It is a universal container management tool. It works with Kubernetes, Docker, Docker Swarm and Azure ACI. It allows you to manage containers without needing to know platform-specific code.

Related Comparisons

Google App Engine vs Kubernetes: What are the differences?

Introduction

This Markdown code provides a comparison between Google App Engine (GAE) and Kubernetes, highlighting their key differences.

Deployment and Scaling: In Google App Engine (GAE), the deployment and scaling of applications are handled automatically by Google, with the platform managing the underlying infrastructure and resources. On the other hand, Kubernetes allows more granular control over deployment and scaling, giving users the flexibility to define and manage these aspects themselves.
Container Orchestration: While both GAE and Kubernetes support running applications in containers, their approaches to container orchestration differ. GAE provides a fully managed environment where developers only need to focus on their application code, while Kubernetes offers a container orchestration platform that allows for more advanced operations and control, such as automatic scaling and managing container lifecycle.
Flexibility and Customization: Google App Engine abstracts away much of the infrastructure and configuration details, offering a more opinionated and simplified experience. Kubernetes, on the other hand, gives users full control and flexibility over their infrastructure and application stack, enabling customization and the use of various tools and technologies.
Multi-Cloud and Hybrid Deployments: Kubernetes is designed to work across multiple cloud providers and even on-premises environments, allowing for hybrid and multi-cloud deployments. Google App Engine, on the other hand, is tightly integrated with Google Cloud Platform and is optimized for running applications specifically on Google's infrastructure.
Resource Utilization and Efficiency: Kubernetes provides extensive features to optimize resource utilization, including resource allocation, scheduling, and auto-scaling based on metrics like CPU and memory usage. While Google App Engine also handles scaling automatically, Kubernetes offers more advanced resource management capabilities, enabling fine-tuning and optimization for specific application requirements.
Monitoring and Debugging: Kubernetes offers a range of built-in monitoring and debugging features, including logging, health checks, and metric collection. Google App Engine also provides monitoring capabilities, but Kubernetes exposes more advanced functionalities and integrations with various monitoring tools and frameworks.

Google App Engine vs Kubernetes

Overview

Google App Engine vs Kubernetes: What are the differences?