Why cloud computing trends suggest a bright future for OpenStack

In a way, OpenStack resembles the iPod: a technology that was once very popular, but its heyday seems to be over.

Not like the iPod, however, OpenStack has not been discontinued. On the contrary, OpenStack is alive and well as an open source project – and arguably, it has a particularly bright future at the moment, given the trends in cloud computing that can encourage many More organizations consider building private clouds using OpenStack.

Related: OpenStack Foundation changes name to Open Infrastructure Foundation

Keep reading for the state of OpenStack and what might happen in the future venerable open source private cloud platform.

What is OpenStack?

For the uninitiated, OpenStack is an open source infrastructure platform designed for building private clouds. OpenStack allows organizations to combine physical servers into virtual pools of resources that they can then use to deploy virtual machines or containers.

Released in 2010, OpenStack was once one of the biggest, latest trends in cloud computing. However, by the mid-2010s, the platform had begun to lag in popularity – or at least in public perception – as more and more attention turned to public cloud platforms. plus, like AWS and Microsoft Azure. Unlike the public cloud, OpenStack requires organizations to purchase and manage their own physical infrastructure, which is arguably the main reason why it looks less attractive than public cloud services. allowing companies to get out of the physical infrastructure game altogether.

OpenStack Today: Livelier than ever

Despite the shift in thinking about the public cloud, OpenStack is not going away. In contrast, the open source project that builds OpenStack is still roll out new releases follow a reliable schedule and receive thousands of code commits from many companies and individuals.

Besides, OpenStack is now completely based on Kubernetes, which means that Kubernetes acts as the underlying orchestration engine. That makes OpenStack container-friendly and allows the platform to host both a monolith running in a virtual machine and containerized microservice-based applications. (For the record, you can also do this with plain Kubernetes use solutions like KubeVirtbut supporting legacy apps alongside modern apps is still a more appropriate use case for Kubernetes than for modern OpenStack.)

So if you wonder if OpenStack is dead, The answer is no reverberation. By every serious measure — release frequency, active code development, corporate support, and engagement with modern technologies and models — OpenStack still performs better than ever, even today. even when relatively few people notice.

Why OpenStack adoption can increase

I’m also inclined to think that OpenStack will get some renewed interest and will probably ramp up adoption over the next few years for a number of reasons.

Multi-cloud trend

Multi-cloud architecture, which involves using multiple cloud platforms at the same time, has become mainstream. You could even argue that they are now the default approach to cloud computing, with more than 3/4 of businesses use a multi-cloud strategy.

That’s good news for OpenStack because it means that instead of committing to a single cloud – which means, in most cases, using only the public cloud – multiple organizations can consider operating a private cloud based on OpenStack alongside a public cloud environment. In this sense, the world has become more OpenStack-friendly than it was when single-cloud architectures became the norm.

The need for repatriation of the cloud

The cloud repatriation trend could also drive OpenStack adoption up. As more and more companies look to move workloads out of the public cloud and back into their own data centers, building OpenStack-based private clouds to host workloads is becoming increasingly important. repatriation would be an obvious proposition in some cases.

Easier to use for OpenStack

Adoption of OpenStack has long been complicated by the fact that the platform is complex and difficult to administer. But there are signs that that is changing. Standard recently revealed a new OpenStack productcalled Sunbeam, promises to simplify the setup and management of OpenStack.

It’s too early to say how many companies might decide to take OpenStack more seriously thanks to simplified distributions like Sunbeam. But if Canonical or other vendors try to improve OpenStack usability, one of the major traditional objections to OpenStack adoption – that it’s too hard to operate – will disappear.

Commitment to supplier support

Last but not least, it should be noted that vendors remain surprisingly committed to OpenStack even as general interest in the platform has waned. Open source software vendors Red Hat, Canonical and Mirantis, as well as major telecommunications service providers such as Ericsson and NEC, continue to support the project.

It’s a sign that while OpenStack may not be getting much attention these days, vendors continue to see a large enterprise market for it. It also makes it much easier for businesses to choose to adopt OpenStack, as they don’t need to worry as much that the ecosystem surrounding the platform will die or its main supporters might abandon the project. .

Conclusion

You may not hear much about OpenStack these days, but that’s not because there’s very little to be said about the platform. OpenStack remains very active, and recent trends in cloud computing suggest that its future may be brighter than at any point in the past decade.