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DC/OS vs Kubernetes: What are the differences?

Introduction

DC/OS (Distributed Cloud Operating System) and Kubernetes are both popular container orchestration platforms used to manage and deploy applications at scale. While both platforms share similarities in their ability to automate container operations, there are key differences that set them apart.

  1. Architecture: DC/OS is built on a distributed system architecture, providing a unified platform for deploying and managing services across multiple nodes in a cluster. Kubernetes, on the other hand, follows a master-worker architecture, where the master node manages the cluster and assigns tasks to worker nodes. This architectural difference can impact the scalability and fault tolerance capabilities of each platform.

  2. Ecosystem: DC/OS offers an integrated ecosystem of services, including a package manager for simplified software installation and a rich set of built-in tools. Kubernetes, on the other hand, focuses on providing a flexible platform with a wide range of plugins and extensions that can be integrated into the ecosystem. The choice between the two platforms depends on the specific requirements and preferences of the users.

  3. Networking: DC/OS uses its own proprietary network overlay technology called Virtual Network System (VNS), which allows for seamless communication between containerized applications. Kubernetes, on the other hand, relies on software-defined networking (SDN) solutions like Calico or Flannel to provide network connectivity between containers. The choice of networking solution can impact the performance and security of container communication.

  4. Community support: Kubernetes has a large and active community of contributors and users, which has led to a significant growth in its ecosystem and availability of resources. DC/OS, although also supported by a community, may have a smaller user base and a more limited set of resources compared to Kubernetes. Consideration should be given to the availability of support and resources when choosing between the two platforms.

  5. Application focus: DC/OS is designed to support a wide range of applications, including both stateless and stateful workloads, and provides features like persistent storage and multi-tenancy. Kubernetes, on the other hand, is primarily focused on stateless applications and provides features like auto-scaling and self-healing for application deployment. The application focus of each platform should align with the specific needs of the workload being deployed.

In summary, DC/OS and Kubernetes are both powerful container orchestration platforms with different architectural approaches, ecosystem offerings, networking options, community support, and application focuses. The choice between the two depends on factors such as desired architecture, available resources, networking requirements, and the nature of the applications being deployed.

Decisions about DC/OS and Kubernetes
Simon Reymann
Senior Fullstack Developer at QUANTUSflow Software GmbH · | 30 upvotes · 11.6M views

Our whole DevOps stack consists of the following tools:

  • GitHub (incl. GitHub Pages/Markdown for Documentation, GettingStarted and HowTo's) for collaborative review and code management tool
  • Respectively Git as revision control system
  • SourceTree as Git GUI
  • Visual Studio Code as IDE
  • CircleCI for continuous integration (automatize development process)
  • Prettier / TSLint / ESLint as code linter
  • SonarQube as quality gate
  • Docker as container management (incl. Docker Compose for multi-container application management)
  • VirtualBox for operating system simulation tests
  • Kubernetes as cluster management for docker containers
  • Heroku for deploying in test environments
  • nginx as web server (preferably used as facade server in production environment)
  • SSLMate (using OpenSSL) for certificate management
  • Amazon EC2 (incl. Amazon S3) for deploying in stage (production-like) and production environments
  • PostgreSQL as preferred database system
  • Redis 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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Pros of DC/OS
Pros of Kubernetes
  • 5
    Easy to setup a HA cluster
  • 3
    Open source
  • 2
    Has templates to install via AWS and Azure
  • 1
    Easy Setup
  • 1
    Easy to get services running and operate them
  • 166
    Leading docker container management solution
  • 129
    Simple and powerful
  • 107
    Open source
  • 76
    Backed by google
  • 58
    The right abstractions
  • 25
    Scale services
  • 20
    Replication controller
  • 11
    Permission managment
  • 9
    Supports autoscaling
  • 8
    Simple
  • 8
    Cheap
  • 6
    Self-healing
  • 5
    Open, powerful, stable
  • 5
    Reliable
  • 5
    No cloud platform lock-in
  • 5
    Promotes modern/good infrascture practice
  • 4
    Scalable
  • 4
    Quick cloud setup
  • 3
    Custom and extensibility
  • 3
    Captain of Container Ship
  • 3
    Cloud Agnostic
  • 3
    Backed by Red Hat
  • 3
    Runs on azure
  • 3
    A self healing environment with rich metadata
  • 2
    Everything of CaaS
  • 2
    Gke
  • 2
    Golang
  • 2
    Easy setup
  • 2
    Expandable
  • 2
    Sfg

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Cons of DC/OS
Cons of Kubernetes
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    • 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
    • 1
      Additional vendor lock-in (Docker)
    • 1
      More moving parts to secure
    • 1
      Additional Technology Overhead

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    - No public GitHub repository available -

    What is DC/OS?

    Unlike traditional operating systems, DC/OS spans multiple machines within a network, aggregating their resources to maximize utilization by distributed applications.

    What is Kubernetes?

    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.

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    What companies use DC/OS?
    What companies use Kubernetes?
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    What are some alternatives to DC/OS and Kubernetes?
    Apache Mesos
    Apache Mesos is a cluster manager that simplifies the complexity of running applications on a shared pool of servers.
    Docker
    The Docker Platform is the industry-leading container platform for continuous, high-velocity innovation, enabling organizations to seamlessly build and share any application — from legacy to what comes next — and securely run them anywhere
    OpenStack
    OpenStack is a cloud operating system that controls large pools of compute, storage, and networking resources throughout a datacenter, all managed through a dashboard that gives administrators control while empowering their users to provision resources through a web interface.
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    Marathon is an Apache Mesos framework for container orchestration. Marathon provides a REST API for starting, stopping, and scaling applications. Marathon is written in Scala and can run in highly-available mode by running multiple copies. The state of running tasks gets stored in the Mesos state abstraction.
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    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.
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