“An ear to the ground” evokes someone who knows what is coming next; someone who is prepared because of their attention to detail, keen observation and thorough analysis. Today’s organizations are collections of people and locations connected via communications and insights that are generated by data — and the software that processes it.
No matter your type of organization, you need to be ready for what’s next; a market trend that indicates shifting demand, an inventory feed that alerts a supply shortage, a new way for people to interact that requires innovative engagement models. Thanks to recent developments in data and software applications, we all can keep an “ear to the ground” – if we have the right strategies to harness them.
Application architectures–and the processes to develop, deliver and maintain them–are changing. At the same time, millions of devices are generating data across millions of locations, demanding that processing be pushed to the edge. Organizations are responding to these fundamental shifts by attempting to transform their IT foundation. The early winners are those who can harness the power of modern applications across public, private and the edge to increase innovation and efficiency.
One way companies are doing that is by building applications as microservices, and that has spurred the use of containers, which enable software to run reliably in different computing environments. The downside is that as the number of containers increases, they become almost impossible to manage using conventional methods.
That’s where Kubernetes comes in, automating much of the container management. It is self-healing and declarative so that your setup can be version controlled and easily replicated. It automates deployments and rollbacks and can restart containers that fail or have stalled. Additionally, Kubernetes scales your services up or down based on utilization. Scale up fast for Cyber Monday shopping or scale down during natural dips in business.
With new, modern applications you find “platforms” entering the picture. Platforms encapsulate cloud-native patterns and enable you to automate the full stack — from a unified Kubernetes runtime across clouds to simplified operations to a consistent developer experience — regardless of where your applications are running.
Dell Technologies and VMware have a pragmatic approach that can help organizations evolve their existing infrastructure and processes to be ready for what’s next. We’ve detailed this approach in a new whitepaper entitled An Ear to the Ground.