chapter one

1 Introducing Istio service mesh

 

This chapter covers

  • Service communication has many challenges (reliability, control, security, observability)
  • How a service mesh can help solve service-communication challenges
  • What Istio is, and how it helps solve microservices challenges
  • How a service mesh compares to previous generations of technology

Software is the lifeblood of today’s companies. As we move to a more digital world, consumers will expect convenience, service, and quality when interacting with these companies and software will be used to deliver these experiences. Customers don’t conform nicely to structure, processes, or pre-defined boxes. Customer’s demands and needs are fluid, dynamic and unpredictable. For this reason, our companies and software systems will need to have these same characteristics. For some companies (e.g., startups), building software systems that are agile and able to respond to unpredictability will be the difference between survival or not. For others (e.g., existing companies), the inability to use software as a differentiator will mean slower growth, decay, and eventual disruption.

1.1 Optimize to go faster, safely

1.1.1 Microservices and APIs to build large systems

1.1.2 Containers

1.1.3 Continuous integration and Continuous Delivery

1.2 Challenges of going faster

1.2.1 Our cloud infrastructure is not reliable

1.2.2 Making service interaction resilient

1.2.3 Understanding what’s happening in real time

1.3 Solving these challenges with application libraries

1.3.1 Drawbacks to application-specific libraries

1.4 Pushing these concerns to the infrastructure

1.4.1 Don’t we already have this in our container platforms?

1.4.2 The application-aware service proxy

1.4.3 Meet Envoy proxy

1.5 What’s a service mesh?

1.6 Introducing Istio service mesh

1.6.1 How service mesh relates to Enterprise Service Bus

1.6.2 How service mesh relates to API gateway

1.6.3 Can I use Istio for non-microservices deployments?

1.7 Summary