Cloud technology has ushered in a new era for businesses, laymen, and developers behind all the applications. Cloud-native technology is essentially about speed and agility, which have become necessities for business systems. Of course, the heart of it all is the cloud infrastructure. Three of the most prominent cloud service providers include Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud Platform, and Microsoft Azure.
Cloud-native development is clearly the next big thing in DevOps, for reasons that stand out when you consider the many benefits this approach offers. But if you don’t exactly know what it is, let’s take a minute to discuss it in detail.
Cloud-native is the latest approach to creating and running software on cloud infrastructure. It combines the flexibility, speed, and resilience of cloud computing with elements that offer dynamism and scalability.
That’s a pretty basic and simple definition. Here’s how the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) defines it:
“Cloud-native technologies empower organizations to build and run scalable applications in modern, dynamic environments such as public, private, and hybrid clouds. Containers, service meshes, microservices, immutable infrastructure, and declarative APIs exemplify this approach.
These techniques enable loosely coupled systems that are resilient, manageable, and observable. Combined with robust automation, they allow engineers to make high-impact changes frequently and predictably with minimal toil.”
This approach was pioneered by some of the world’s most trailblazing digital companies. Netflix, Ub r, and Spotify are among those that have fully embraced the power of the cloud. A wide range of companies follow suit, taking on cloud-native development for current and future applications.
Cloud-native technology uses technologies like containers, microservices, serverless computing, and automation to achieve the growth today’s businesses need.
There are some key advantages to using a cloud-native development model rather than traditional software development models that typically run on-premises data centers.
The most recent OWASP Top 10 web security risks list includes Software and Data Integrity Failures at number eight. This is a new entrant that is directly related to updates. There’s no room for faulty assumptions about software updates.
Traditional development models use the waterfall methodology for updating applications once or twice a year. On the other hand, cloud-native applications are open to as many updates as necessary because of the added flexibility. That also allows developers to deliver new features to end-users faster than before.
Physical servers take up space, use energy, and require money to run. Even when applications are not in high-demand mode, all those resources are being expended. Cloud-native applications benefit significantly from the flexibility of the cloud by using only what is needed and adjusting for demand.
This also brings scalability into the picture, as cloud-native applications can scale when needed without any complex provisioning processes. Businesses pay only for what they use in terms of computing and space usage, which has been the biggest benefit of the cloud anyway.
Cloud-native development is all about modern web-centric languages that are adaptable and easy to deploy. Developers can create dynamic applications that run seamlessly on different platforms using HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Java, Go, Node.js, Python, PHP, .NET, and Ruby.
Believe it or not, the automation makes cloud-native an ideal developer approach. Implementation is not a responsibility for developers, as automation handles most of that; software engineers can move from one challenge to another without worrying too much about deployment. Most development techniques use declarative code, allowing developers to move on to more pressing issues like security.
Stateless applications do not save data for each session. This model makes it easier to scale on different servers and consequently uses fewer resources. More importantly, it frees DevOps teams from getting locked in with a specific vendor because the applications can easily move among cloud servers and data centers.
The cloud-native approach helps address the scalability issues of traditional software development models, including the agile group (SCRUM, KANBAN, and Extreme Programming).
The most traditional software development lifecycle (SDLC) models include the waterfall and iterative/incremental models.
The former is very rigid in approach, with each stage having its deliverables. There’s too much focus on the documentation, which is not as feasible for today’s dynamic web and mobile applications.
More importantly, the application needs cannot be re-evaluated if the team is currently in development mode. Also, changes cannot be seen until they have been deployed.
This model is dated and not at all feasible for modern applications.
The iterative model is more modular, but still does not come near the modularity offered by the cloud-native DevOps development process. Development can go in parallel, which speeds up the process slightly, but it’s still a sequential development model that makes development a painstakingly long endeavor.
These traditional software development models are also highly dependent on physical servers or, in other words, on-premises architecture.
Scalability is a nightmare because scaling applications requires multiple phases every time. The cloud has resolved that for good.
Agile software development models became the norm in the 2000s. Seventy percent of companies still use them for software and web application development. They are a major improvement over traditional SDLC models.
While agile models use N-Tie application architecture and virtual servers, there are still many challenges with scalability. They are not as plan-driven as traditional software development models, but they are not as adaptive as cloud-native models either.
For instance, Sprints in the Scrum model can take two to four weeks, but with serverless functions of cloud-native application development, the DevOps team is more productive.
Here’s how developers can create code as a function or service (FaaS), which is evoked only when needed. This allows them to focus on improving those functions without being concerned with provisions, availability, security, or patching.
This is just one example of how cloud-native techniques in application development are a considerable improvement over present development models, even those currently hailed as the gold standard.
It’s simple, really. Cloud-native applications can scale seamlessly, more so than applications developed with agile models. That’s because cloud-native applications are broken into smaller elements (microservices) that can be managed and produced independently.
Of course, these services are interlinked. However, they are not co-dependent, allowing developers to work much faster and businesses to use fewer resources with their applications.
As you can guess, there’s a serious need to incorporate modern development techniques such as containers and microservices. Cloud-native architecture basically enables applications that are meant to live on the cloud. With businesses rapidly moving to the cloud, it’s high time they incorporated cloud into their development models.
Cloud-native architecture is surprisingly cost-effective and self-reliant, which is the ultimate goal for many tech companies. Similarly, it offers better flexibility and scalability than legacy systems and architectures, which no longer suffice for rapidly changing consumer demands.
Plus, there’s no reliance on physical servers, which increases redundancy and uptime. For developers, that’s just as important as for users who rely on the applications they build.
Microservices and serverless functions can support DevOps teams by arranging applications into different, independent segments that are easy to update, patch, and scale. These microservices can also communicate with one another through APIs.
In addition, functions are event-driven, impacting performance and the cost behind the performance. When a function is called only when needed, it uses resources only when needed. For large enterprises, this can mean significant savings without compromising the integrity of their web or mobile applications.
Cloud-native services are already on the rise, with big players like Microsoft and Oracle offering them. For businesses and developers, the path forward is following the CNCF trail map, which can help businesses build and deploy truly modern cloud-native applications.
It’s the first step in staying competitive in the field, whether you’re a business considering cloud-native applications or a DevOps member adopting this new wave of software development techniques and models. It’s only a matter of time before cloud-native application development becomes the new norm with its standardized model.
Cloud-native applications for web and mobile will drive the future of software development with their easy scalability, interoperability, and upgradability.
Taking inspiration from a ‘divide and conquer’ strategy, cloud-native at its core is just about turning big applications and software into smaller, independent, often event-driven services and functions.
When we talk about cloud-native applications, it’s important to also discuss security. Security can never be compromised for agility or speed, so DevOps teams need cloud code security.
Kiuwan provides hybrid code security solutions with its key products, Software Composition Analysis (SCA) and Code Security (SAST). Empowered by these application security tools, developers can adopt modern development practices while ensuring their software applications do not have exploitable vulnerabilities.
