Architecting a Hybrid Cloud Infrastructure using Google Anthos

Atsky recently undertook a complex project for a valued client, aimed at designing and deploying a robust hybrid cloud infrastructure. The project utilized the innovative capabilities of Google Anthos and Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) Multi-Cluster Architecture.

Kubernetes Under the Hood:

Anthos, Google's hybrid and multi-cloud application platform, is built upon the foundations of Kubernetes. It is an extension of Google’s commitment to Kubernetes and open source, and it helps businesses modernize their existing applications, build new ones, and run them anywhere.

At the heart of Anthos is the ability to manage Kubernetes deployments across various cloud and on-premises environments, bringing consistency to the infrastructure layer. Kubernetes, under the hood of Anthos, orchestrates and automates the containerized workloads and services. It streamlines the process of managing complex environments and workloads, delivering improved speed, scalability, and reliability.

Moreover, Kubernetes plays a pivotal role in Anthos by providing a standardized API surface. This allows developers to focus on writing application logic, safe in the knowledge that their apps will work unmodified in any environment that Kubernetes supports. This results in an efficient, versatile infrastructure capable of handling a variety of workloads, from cloud-native applications to VM-based workloads and more.

In our project, Kubernetes was the cornerstone of implementing Anthos, both in Google Cloud and over the bare metal edge clusters. It brought the power of container orchestration and service management, enabling us to create a highly resilient and efficient hybrid cloud infrastructure for our client.

Anthos On-Prem: Exploring Bare Metal and VMware Options

Google's Anthos provides versatile on-premises deployment options, giving businesses the flexibility to choose between bare metal and VMware as their preferred infrastructure.

Bare Metal is an ideal choice for organizations looking to leverage the raw performance and control of their existing hardware while benefiting from Anthos's hybrid capabilities. Anthos on Bare Metal allows Kubernetes to run directly on physical servers without a hypervisor layer, leading to improved performance, reduced complexity, and potentially lower costs. It offers two operating modes: standalone for individual deployments and multi-cluster for higher availability and centralized administration.

On the other hand, VMware serves as a robust and widely adopted virtualization platform. For businesses already using VMware for their data centers, Anthos on VMware allows them to extend their existing investments into the cloud. Anthos leverages the VMware vSphere environment to orchestrate and manage Kubernetes clusters, providing a familiar environment while adding the advantage of Anthos's multi-cloud capabilities.

In the project, Atsky analyzed both options considering the client's specific needs, operational constraints, and future growth plans. This nuanced approach enabled us to create a tailored solution that ensured the client could extract maximum value from their hybrid cloud infrastructure while also setting them up for long-term success.

Anthos Bare Metal: A Comprehensive Product Overview

Anthos Bare Metal is an innovative offering from Google Cloud that brings the benefits of Google's hybrid and multi-cloud platform directly to on-premises, edge, and other network infrastructure locations. It allows businesses to run Kubernetes clusters on physical servers, bypassing the need for a separate virtualization layer, thereby offering increased operational efficiency and control.

This product is designed to meet the needs of organizations that require the raw performance of their hardware, have stringent data residency requirements, or operate in edge locations where network bandwidth is a consideration. With Anthos Bare Metal, businesses can build and manage modern hybrid applications on their existing hardware, making it a cost-effective solution.

Anthos Bare Metal offers two modes of operation.

~ Standalone mode, where each cluster operates individually, ideal for edge locations

~ Multi-cluster mode, where you have a centralized admin cluster managing multiple user clusters. This offers flexibility and control, allowing organizations to tailor their deployment to their specific needs. Anthos Bare Metal presents two multi-cluster operational modes, allowing businesses to tailor their hybrid cloud infrastructure to their specific requirements and workflows: the Canonical mode and the Hybrid mode.

Canonical Mode: In the Canonical mode, Anthos Bare Metal allows the setup of a separate admin cluster for each user cluster. The admin cluster is responsible for managing the lifecycle of its associated user cluster and other administrative tasks such as upgrades and configurations. This mode offers high fault isolation, as each user cluster has its dedicated admin cluster, reducing the risk of widespread impact due to potential issues. It also offers simplified scalability as new admin-user cluster pairs can be easily added as needed. However, this mode can increase operational overhead, as each admin cluster requires its management, monitoring, and maintenance.

Hybrid Mode: The Hybrid mode in Anthos Bare Metal is designed for more efficient resource usage and easier administration. In this mode, a single admin cluster manages multiple user clusters. It centralizes administrative tasks, offering a streamlined way to manage several user clusters. It also optimizes resource usage, as the overhead of running several admin clusters is reduced. However, it does introduce a single point of failure - if the admin cluster fails, it could impact all associated user clusters. Therefore, the hybrid mode is best suited for scenarios where centralized management is preferred and the risk of a single point of failure can be effectively mitigated.

These two modes give businesses the flexibility to choose a setup that best aligns with their operational needs, scalability requirements, risk management strategies, and resource availability. In the project executed by Atsky, the specific multi-cluster mode was selected based on a thorough understanding of the client's infrastructure and business needs.

With its seamless integration into the Google Cloud ecosystem, Anthos Bare Metal allows for consistent, unified management across all deployments, providing the same Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) experience whether it's in the cloud, on-premises, or at the edge. This is coupled with robust security, with integrated features like encryption, automated patching, and private connectivity options, ensuring the safety and integrity of your applications.

Implementation:

Our proposed solution begins with architecting a centralized control plane in Google Cloud using Anthos, GKE, and other necessary Google Cloud services. The control plane will manage the lifecycle of the Kubernetes clusters, policy and configuration rollout, service mesh, and continuous delivery pipelines.

Following this, we will set up user clusters in the edge cloud over bare metal. The user clusters will be managed by the centralized control plane, thereby providing the benefits of on-premises deployment like low latency, while still being controlled from the cloud for global scale, analytics, and machine learning capabilities.

In the implementation phase, we covered:

1. Deployment of Anthos on Google Cloud and creation of a centralized control plane.

2. Configuration of Anthos Service Mesh and Anthos Config Management.

3. Deployment of GKE multi-cluster architecture in Google Cloud.

4. Setup of user clusters in edge cloud over bare metal.

5. Integration of edge cloud user clusters with the centralized control plane.

Evaluation:

To evaluate hybrid cloud infrastructure, we will perform various tests to ensure the system's reliability, scalability, and performance. The assessment will also consider factors such as ease of management, resource optimization, service continuity, and security.

Conclusion:

This project aims to present a reliable, scalable, and highly efficient model of a hybrid cloud infrastructure by architecting a system using Anthos and GKE multi-cluster architecture, with a centralized control plane in Google Cloud and user clusters setup in an edge cloud over bare metal. It showcases the robust capabilities of Google's Anthos in managing deployments across multiple environments while harnessing the power of edge computing for lower latency and increased performance.

This project will serve as a valuable guide for enterprises seeking to optimize their IT infrastructure by leveraging the benefits of hybrid cloud, providing insights into the deployment, management, and potential challenges associated with such an architectural setup.