Technology is constantly changing, and businesses that fail to adapt risk being left behind. One of the most transformative shifts in the past decade has been the rise of containerization, a technology that promises increased agility, scalability and efficiency.

But what exactly are containers, and how has the technology been positioned to revolutionize the digital landscape?

Google’s Spencer Bischof and Gari Singh discuss GKE and modern containerization.

“Traditionally in the past, we’d have things like large servers; then it matured, and we started virtualizing those machines because no one has all the space to have one single server,” said Spencer Bischof (pictured, left), product manager of GKE at Google LLC. “A couple of folks at Google, Red Hat and others said, ‘What happens if we made something smaller, compact and we could stuff thousands of these containers, mini servers into a virtual environment?’ That’s what a container is.”

Bischof and Gari Singh (right), product manager of Google Cloud at Google, spoke with theCUBE’s Savannah Peterson for the “Google Cloud: Passport to Containers” interview series, during an exclusive broadcast on theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio. They discussed GKE and the evolution of containers into crucial platforms for developing, deploying and managing applications in a seamless, secure and performant manner. (* Disclosure below.)

Today’s use cases for containers span app development and deployment

The evolution of containers has largely followed that of computing itself. Traditionally, applications were deployed on large, physical servers. Today, containers are lightweight, self-contained packages that include everything an application needs to run, including code, runtime, system tools, system libraries and settings. This means that a containerized application can run consistently across different environments, from development to production, without the compatibility issues that often arise with traditional deployments.

“If you start thinking about source containers from that development perspective, you can package up your entire app and all its dependencies independent of the host operating system,” Singh said. “Containers have been around for a long time, but Docker popularized them by making them a lot easier to use. I think it started out on the development side and then moved on to the deployment side.”

On the development side, containers simplify managing dependencies, ensuring that applications run consistently regardless of the underlying infrastructure. For example, developers can package their applications with specific versions of programming languages and libraries, eliminating conflicts and streamlining the development process.

Beyond development, containers excel at deploying stateless applications, such as web servers and APIs. Their lightweight nature and scalability make them ideal for running multiple instances of an application, allowing businesses to easily handle fluctuating workloads. While initial adoption focused on these simpler cases, the technology has evolved to support complex workloads, including machine learning and stateful applications, Singh added.

“The easiest one is stateless applications,” he said. “You package up any web application, a web server, Nginx, a Go application … you just want to package it up; it’s lightweight, and you want to run multiple of them that can scale up and down. I think those are the easiest use cases to start with. But, obviously, we have everything from running ML workloads today to stateful apps.”

Navigating the often complex containerization journey

While the benefits of containerization are clear, the adoption journey can be complex. Google Kubernetes Engine simplifies the orchestration and management of containers. Google Cloud offers a comprehensive suite of tools, including Cloud Build for building containers and Cloud Run for serverless deployments, to support businesses throughout their container journey.

“If you just want to get started with Kubernetes, something that’s based on Kubernetes, go start there,” Bischof said. “Now, you’re not necessarily sure how you want to spin up a GKE cluster — we have complete walkthroughs and guides. Just follow the best practice built in using something like Autopilot. You don’t need to worry about understanding how the networking works, because of the complexity of the systems and the complexity of the storage.”

While there is a learning curve, especially with Kubernetes, the goal is to simplify the process and break down the journey into manageable steps. By focusing on core principles and providing clear guidance, Google Cloud aims to demystify containerization and make it accessible to a wider audience. Sanity Inc., for example, has leveraged GKE to streamline structured content delivery to the digital services and products that developers and content creators rely on.

“You’re orchestrating all of that, and we’re handling all that for you,” Singh said. “You want three zones — here’s where your node pools are. Or you could have built it all yourself. I think if you start to explain to people these building block pieces of how what you would’ve traditionally done can map into this world, I think there’d be a better mutual understanding and people might be less scared and apprehensive.”

Listen to Singh discuss the past, present and future of GKE.

Here’s the complete video interview, part of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE Research’s coverage of the “Google Cloud: Passport to Containers” interview series: 

(* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for the “Google Cloud: Passport to Containers” series. Neither Google Cloud, the sponsor of theCUBE’s event coverage, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE