This was originally published on the Amalgam Insights website.

We are in the midst of another change up in the IT world. Every 15 to 20 years there is a radical rethink of the platforms that applications are built upon. During the course of the history of IT we have moved from batch-oriented, pipelined systems (predominantly written in COBOL) to client-server and n-Tier systems that are the standards of today. These platforms were developed in the last century and designed for last century applications. After years of putting shims into systems to accommodate the scale and diversity of modern applications, IT has just begun to deploy new platforms based on containers and Kubernetes. These new platforms promise greater resiliency and scalability, as well as greater responsiveness to the business.

As is often the case with new technology, Kubernetes and container platforms began as a decidedly DIY affair. Over time, however, software vendors have begun to craft curated platform experiences for sale. The DIY platform is a customized experience but difficult and expensive to engineer; the vendor curated platform is much easier but has more constraints. These are typical tradeoffs seen in any emerging platform environment. Curation reduces risk and degree of difficulty but at the expense of choice. DIY has ultimate choice but requires additional personnel costs, not only to build but to support and maintain the platform. These are the two paths open to IT shops looking to Kubernetes and containers to solve the problems of their 21^st century applications.

Canonical, however, is creating a third path to new platforms. At the Canonical Analyst Day (September 12, 2019) in New York City, Canonical CEO Mark Shuttleworth articulated a different vision for Kubernetes platforms than is typically expressed by vendors. Based on their Juju and Charms toolset, Canonical hopes to offer the benefits of the curated experience and the flexibility of the DIY. With Charms, Canonical hopes to encapsulate best practices and integrations, in effect curating the parts. Instead of combining these into a set platform, they are offering Juju as a way to combine these parts, Lego like, into a custom platform. Charms describes what the software should be; Juju says where the software should go. At the component level, Charms knows how to configure, provision, and deploy a piece of software while Juju knows the existing infrastructure and where a Charmed component can and should go.

So, why a third path? The most obvious benefit is flexibility. Most platform plays assume that you will want what they have already tested and integrated. Simplicity is the byword since complexity is harder to do and support. If the platform vendor has integrated Istio and Envoy for the service mesh, that is what is supported. If IT’s platform engineers believe Linkerd makes more sense, they now have the responsibility for figuring out how to integrate it and manage its deployment. It’s a simple trade off – the cost of engineering versus the constraints of pre-determined components. While this works for a lot of applications, there are plenty where deviation from the platform is called for. The third path that Canonical is envisioning changes that dynamic. It provides the advantages of DIY with the advantages of the curated platform. This is not to say that DIY or curated platforms are wrong. For many companies, one or the other works for them. Not all IT environments, however, can go in the two common directions. They lack the resources to build their own platforms from scratch but need more flexibility than a standard platform can give them. They need purpose-built platforms at standardized pricing. This is where the third path becomes valuable.

It’s not at all unexpected that Canonical would take a path that diverges from the pack. This has been their modus operandi since the very beginning. The Charm-Juju experience is just another example of Canonical refusing to accept the status quo and, instead, looking for a way to forge a different trail through the woods of IT.