SUSE Cloud Application Platform has been designated a Certified Cloud Foundry distribution by the Cloud Foundry Foundation.
The newly-certified platform brings the advanced productivity of the Cloud Foundry model to Kubernetes, which is rapidly becoming the de facto standard for modern container infrastructure.
One of two certified Cloud Foundry software offerings, SUSE Cloud Application Platform is built with SUSE Linux Enterprise and backed directly by SUSE, and it is the only distribution delivered via 100 percent open source software. It lets organisations leverage their investment in Kubernetes infrastructure and expertise to ease Cloud Foundry implementation and fast-track DevOps and modern application delivery initiatives.
SUSE is also releasing functional enhancements to SUSE Cloud Application Platform, including support for public cloud Kubernetes infrastructure that will speed customer time to value on public clouds and new backup/restore capabilities to help users protect or migrate their Cloud Foundry environment.
“Bridging open source communities, SUSE is bringing together the best of Cloud Foundry and Kubernetes technologies to create compelling new value for our customers,” says Thomas Di Giacomo, SUSE chief technology officer. “SUSE’s continuing leadership as a provider of software-defined infrastructure and application delivery solutions is reflected in the innovation contained in SUSE Cloud Application Platform.
“Our Cloud Foundry certification signifies the importance to SUSE of interoperability across Cloud Foundry platforms and our commitment to upstream Cloud Foundry development.”
One of SUSE’s application delivery solutions, SUSE Cloud Application Platform is used by software development and operations teams to streamline lifecycle management of traditional and new cloud native applications.
Unlike other Cloud Foundry offerings, SUSE Cloud Application Platform packages SUSE Cloud Foundry as a containerised distribution, managed by Kubernetes. This simplifies SUSE Cloud Foundry deployment and management, dramatically reduces its memory footprint, and makes the platform more accessible to existing Kubernetes users.
The new Cloud Foundry certification complements existing Kubernetes certification of SUSE Cloud Application Platform. It provides customers with verified protection against Cloud Foundry vendor lock-in and assurance that the platform will remain current with Cloud Foundry advancements.
Abby Kearns, executive director of the Cloud Foundry Foundation, says: “SUSE continues to push our community to think and move in new and exciting directions. The recently certified SUSE Cloud Application Platform expands the Cloud Foundry ecosystem, creating more choice for enterprises.”
The latest enhancements to SUSE Cloud Application Platform include support for Microsoft Azure Container Service (AKS) and new backup/restore capabilities. Leveraging Kubernetes services provided by Azure Container Service, enterprises can save time setting up public cloud deployment of SUSE Cloud Application Platform. Support for more public cloud providers will follow.
Customers can use new backup/restore capabilities to simplify recovery of the SUSE Cloud Foundry environment, including applications. They can also use them to migrate from one Cloud Foundry instance to another, moving between private and public cloud instances, for example, or between different Cloud Foundry distributions.
“Microsoft and SUSE are aligned in making container technology easier to use for an enhanced enterprise developer experience,” says Gabe Monroy, lead program manager for containers at Microsoft. “The approach SUSE has taken with Cloud Application Platform combines the acclaimed developer experience of Cloud Foundry with the industry-leading operational experience of Azure’s managed Kubernetes service. This gives Azure customers a seamless way to deploy and manage Cloud Foundry alongside native Kubernetes applications, all running on top of the same AKS cluster.”