Istio
Istio is an open source service mesh that provides traffic management, observability, policy enforcement and security for microservices. It manages network traffic between microservices without requiring code changes.
traffic-management
observability
policy-enforcement
security
microservices
Istio: Open Source Service Mesh
Istio is an open source service mesh that provides traffic management, observability, policy enforcement and security for microservices. It manages network traffic between microservices without requiring code changes.
What is Istio?
Istio is an open source service mesh that layers transparently onto existing distributed applications. It manages and secures microservice communications without requiring code changes. Key capabilities include:
- Traffic management - Control flow of traffic and API calls between services. Perform load balancing, failovers, A/B tests, canary rollouts, etc.
- Observability - Gain understanding of what is happening within and between services. Track trace data, monitor metrics, and access logs.
- Policy enforcement - Apply organizational policy to services. Enforce quotas, rate limits, access controls, etc.
- Security - Protect services with authentication, authorization, encryption, etc. without changes to application code.
Istio provides these benefits transparently, without requiring service code changes. It is platform independent and works across cloud and on-premise environments. This makes it well-suited for microservices applications built with technologies like Kubernetes, Envoy proxy, containers and more.
Istio Features
Features
- Traffic management and load balancing
- Service-to-service authentication and encryption
- Observability with metrics, logs and tracing
- Policy enforcement for access control, rate limiting and quotas
- Platform-independent deployment model
Pricing
- Open Source
Pros
Improves reliability and stability of microservices
Adds security features without code changes
Provides insights into traffic flow between services
Enables progressive rollout and canary deployments
Works across cloud providers and on-premise datacenters
Cons
Complexity and learning curve
Performance overhead
Requires changes to infrastructure and deployment model
Immature product with rapid release cycles
Limited ecosystem compared to alternatives
Official Links
The Best Istio Alternatives
Top Ai Tools & Services and Service Mesh and other similar apps like Istio
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