Keynote: Beyond Automation: Kubernetes Success Requires a GitOps Mindset

The presentation discusses how a platform operations team was able to manage over 30 clusters and several applications in production in a highly regulated environment using the Carvel tool chain by adopting the GitOps mindset.

• The team faced challenges with complex deployment topologies and managing fine-grained access for development teams
• They adopted the GitOps mindset by keeping configuration in a central git repository, relying on Carvel's package manager cap controller to create clusters, and using continuous reconciliation to prevent configuration drift
• They bundled their applications configuration, Kubernetes manifests, and dependencies in a single immutable OCI artifact using a Carvel tool called image package
• They used Carvel's yaml wrangling tool ytt to write overlays for third-party software
• The platform operations team was able to enable the development team to provision new clusters with common software in a matter of minutes and keep these clusters upgraded

The team was able to update their applications and their clusters in Dev, test, and prod in minutes, and were able to keep these clusters upgraded multiple times a month to stay on top of CVEs and other issues.

As an industry we’ve come a long way to embrace automation. What once seemed like a scary proposition is now at the heart of a successful Kubernetes platform, and as we evolve as practitioners we’ve come to embrace GitOps to fully realize the value we can provide: value to the developer experience, security, and operations at scale across multiple environments.In this talk, VMware's Shatarupa Nandi, will discuss how we can ship high quality software securely and repeatably on Kubernetes, and still keep developer experience simple. We'll discuss how the IT industry has embraced GitOps for applications, for 3rd party software, and for Kubernetes itself. We'll talk about how this mindset gives businesses a competitive edge and helps showcase IT’s strategic value and importance.