Building a massively-multiplayer online RPG became a very different, very competitive business after Blizzard’s World of Warcraft took the industry by storm in the mid-2000s.

BioWare was one of the few companies to debut a competiting MMORPG and keep it online, launching its own Star Wars: The Old Republic in 2011 and keeping it going (while navigating the transition to free-to-play) through to the present day.

At GDC 2012, MMO veterans and BioWare Austin leads Richard Vogel and Dallas Dickinson discussed how Star Wars: The Old Republic positioned itself to break into the World of Warcraft-dominated MMO market. Throughout the talk, the pair explained in-depth the various strategies the team used to prepare the game for a strong debut.

The whole thing was fascinating, so if you missed it back then (or just want to refresh yoursef) you should know that Vogel and Dickinson’s talk is now freely available on the official GDC YouTube channel!

In addition to this presentation, the GDC Vault and its accompanying YouTube channel offers numerous other free videos, audio recordings, and slides from many of the recent Game Developers Conference events, and the service offers even more members-only content for GDC Vault subscribers.

Those who purchased All Access passes to recent events like GDC or VRDC already have full access to GDC Vault, and interested parties can apply for the individual subscription via a GDC Vault subscription page. Group subscriptions are also available: game-related schools and development studios who sign up for GDC Vault Studio Subscriptions can receive access for their entire office or company by contacting staff via the GDC Vault group subscription page. Finally, current subscribers with access issues can contact GDC Vault technical support.

Gamasutra and GDC are sibling organizations under parent UBM Americas.

Starting at 2:00 p.m. PDT today, members of the Xbox One Preview Alpha, Beta, Delta and Omega Rings will begin receiving the latest 1810 Xbox One system update (181004-2027). Read on for more about the fixes and known issues in the latest 1810 system update.

Fixes:

Game Pass Twist

• Fixes to the Game Pass twist to ensure install dialog boxes are accurately shown for all titles.

My Games and Apps

• Additional fixes to navigation issues in My Games and Apps that caused some users not able to select certain tiles in their collection and erratic behavior trying to select filters.

Known Issues:

Avatars

• It can take up to 10 seconds to view an Avatar on the profile screen after creating a new Avatar.

My Games & Apps

• We are aware that some users are experiencing crashing of a game or the Youtube app when you are either launching or resuming the Youtube app.
• If you are in the Youtube app and then Resume to a Game the app/game and console may hang or crash.
• We are aware that some users are experiencing challenges navigating the Ready to Install Filter options in My Games and Apps. Some users are unable to select the filter options at all and we are investigating.

Power

• We are tracking an issue in which the console is fully powering off when it is placed into Instant On mode.

Profile Color

• Sometimes users may encounter the incorrect Profile color when powering on the console.

The Switch is arguably Nintendo’s most premium-feeling handheld console ever released, with its smart and sleek design making earlier systems feel a little clunkier (and more able to take a battering) as a result. Thanks to this, as well as the fact that it comes with a whole range of extras that you wouldn’t usually need for a handheld (extra controllers, cables, the dock, etc.), it’s also the console most in need of some extra protection and storage space when out and about.

Whereas your 3DS can likely slide right into your pocket, protected by its own flip design, the Switch is too big to simply carry around and has a large, beautiful display just waiting to be scratched up by the keys and other bits and bobs inside your bag of choice. Luckily, tomtoc has released a new range of cases for the console that appear to suit every need and, even more luckily, they just so happen to be pretty great.

Each case is waterproof, made of strong, sturdy material (which tomtoc tells us has passed the latest military standard drop test), and has its own advantages and disadvantages over the other options. We’ve gathered our thoughts on each design below.

The Slim

The smallest of the bunch, and the best for quick trips or your daily commute, is the slim variant (which comes in black, red, grey, or camouflage colourings). Even with your Switch inside, the width of this case only measures in at around 4cm, easily slotting into your backpack for that extra layer of protection. Actually, this is where we found this case to be most useful; it only holds your Switch (with Joy-Con attached) and eight games, with no room for any extras, but it does serve as excellent protection when you just need to slot the console into a bag of some sort and avoid any scratches.

The case actually moulds around the design of the Switch, with the Joy-Con triggers sitting inside small indents on the bottom of the case and the control sticks and face buttons being protected by the raised parts seen on the front. This is a fantastic feature; applying pressure to these raised points has no impact on the Joy-Con’s delicate control sticks, and some of our official Nintendo-branded cases fail to offer that same level of protection. Having said that, we wish the part of the case sitting on top of the screen had a similarly robust design – pressing hard on the middle of the case, or dropping something heavy on it, does seem to press onto the Switch’s screen just a tad.

Speaking of Nintendo’s official releases, this small case from tomtoc retails at a considerably cheaper price point while actually giving you a greater amount of protection. A small pouch is included with the case, too, and while we didn’t feel was completely necessary, it does provide a nice way of carrying some small extra bits like an AC adaptor.

The Frequent Traveller

This one sees a significant step up in features, but a much smaller jump in price. This medium-range case holds your Switch (with Joy-Con attached), 18 game cards (six of which are hidden away), and has space for a Joy-Con grip and your AC adaptor, too. It features the same indents on the bottom of the case for your Joy-Con’s ZL/ZR buttons for a snug fit, and a centrefold rests on top of your screen. The same raised sections also appear on the front of the case, but these are purely aesthetic as the case is considerably wider this time around, and there’s a small handle on the top to help you carry it around.

The big selling point of this one, though, is that it doubles up as a way to play your console in tabletop mode. The centrefold we just mentioned has two straps on either side, which strap your Switch’s tablet section down nicely; the weight of the console keeps the folded material rigid – as long as you don’t wobble the case around too much as you play.

We wouldn’t recommend playing this outdoors under the sun for too long, for fear of the console burning up the fabric behind it, but the Switch’s fans are allowed to breathe at the top of the system and we haven’t experienced any overheating issues while playing inside. The best part about this is the fact that you can still charge your console while playing in tabletop mode – again doing something which Nintendo hasn’t allowed with its own kickstand.

The Professional Storage Case

Easily our favourite of the bunch, but also naturally the most expensive, is the professional storage option. This one features a large, suitcase-like section on the bottom with a chunk of foam padding nestling inside; almost everything you could possibly need fits in here thanks to the perfectly cut shapes. You can carry your Switch, two extra Joy-Con on your Joy-Con grip, your dock, the AC adaptor, a Pro Controller, and four wrist straps in this section, and there’s another mesh-type pocket on the opposite side for the HDMI cable, Pro Controller charging cables, game cases, and more.

In between the two sections is a flap of material which can hold 32 game cards – which should be more than enough to hold of your favourite titles – although you could theoretically throw more in that back pocket, too. Every item fits into its designated spot securely and neatly, with no wiggle room being given for things to slip out during travels, and you can even attach a shoulder strap if you prefer to carry it that way.

To test out its practicality, we took this case out on a weekend trip to see some loved ones and play lots of games in the process. Having everything neatly tucked away was perfect; previous trips had seen the dock, cables, and extra controllers simply thrown into a plastic bag for travels – constantly scaring us with thoughts of scratches or damage – but this almost fixed the issue completely. We still had to find somewhere to put extra Pro Controllers, but the case was more than enough to transport everything else securely.

The idea behind this one is for professional gamers who might attend championships or other events, and while we’re sure it would be great for that, too, we’d actually recommend this for anyone who finds themselves taking their entire Switch setup to friends or family homes. It’s a little more on the pricey side compared to the other options, but it’s absolutely worth it.

If you’re interested in buying any of the cases shown above, you can find the designs on Amazon UK for £13.99, £18.99 and £37.99 respectively, or Amazon US for $16.99, $19.99, and $42.99.

Thanks to tomtoc for supplying the cases featured in this review.

We wanted to give you a heads up about some exciting language options coming to Steam.

Starting today, we are adding two new languages (Vietnamese and Latin American Spanish) to the list of 26 languages officially supported by Steam. This means the Steam desktop client, the Steam store, and the Steam Community, are all translated to make it easier for Vietnamese or Latin American Spanish speakers to interact with Steam, find games, and chat with friends. It also means that game developers can now provide translations of their game in those languages through Steam.

Why Vietnamese?

Vietnamese is the sole national language of the country Vietnam, but is also widely used in other countries, including the United States, Australia, and France. There are over 75 million Vietnamese speakers worldwide. In November of 2017, we added Steam support for the national currency of Vietnam, the Vietnamese Dong, along with a number of payment methods that make it easier for players in Vietnam to make purchases on Steam. While supporting payments methods and currencies is important for making Steam accessible to global audiences, we realized our mistake in not also supporting the national language too so that players can more easily find their way around Steam and be able to get games in their native language, when available.

Why Latin American Spanish?

In the past, Steam has only supported a single definition of Spanish-language. But our customers and game developers have been reminding us of the stylistic differences among Spanish spoken in different locales, and requested that Steam support that difference. As a result, we now have a definition of both Castilian (European) Spanish and Latin American (LatAm) Spanish, translating the Steam desktop client, store, and community into both variants of Spanish.

As a practical example, this is how we already treat Portuguese and Brazilian Portuguese, where customers can choose one, the other, or both for their language preferences, and game developers can indicate whichever variants their game supports.

Changing Your Language Preferences in Steam

Whether your native language is Vietnamese, Castilian Spanish, or any of the 26 other languages supported by Steam, you can specify your language preferences in the Steam desktop client by clicking “Steam>settings>interface”.

Additionally, you can specify more than one language within the Steam store to help you find more games available in languages you may speak. For example, you may want to run Steam in Vietnamese, but you also speak English and want to make sure you can find games that are available with English language audio. You can visit your store preferences to select multiple languages for games that you wish to discover in the Steam store.

FAQ for Game Developers

Language support can be pretty important for the enjoyment of games. If you are making a game on Steam, here are some questions we thought you might have and some answers. Of course if you have additional question, please let us know through the Steamworks contact form.

Q: What do I need to do if my game already supports Spanish?
A: If you want to add another language support option, you can provide Spanish support in both Castilian and Latin American varieties. If you don’t plan to add additional support, that’s OK: Steam will assume that your existing Spanish language content is Castilian and automatically provide that content to customers that have indicated either Castilian or Latin American Spanish. If your existing translation is actually Latin American Spanish, you can update your definition within Steamworks by visiting your app landing page and clicking “Edit Steamworks Settings” and selecting “Depots” from the “SteamPipe” drop-down.

For more information on translating your game into different languages, and a list of supported languages, please see https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/store/localization

Q: What if my game doesn’t support Spanish at all?
A: That’s okay, and you don’t need to make any changes. But just so you know: nearly 2 million of our 45 million daily active users view the store in Spanish, and platform revenue in Latin America increased 35% over the previous year… so now might be a good time to consider adding support!

Q: What’s the difference, anyway? Why does this matter?
A: There are some substantial differences in vocabulary and colloquial choices between these two varieties of Spanish. By supporting the difference on the Steam store and UI, we can make it more welcoming and easy to use. By supporting the difference in your game, you can provide the best possible experience to any customers who want to play your game in Spanish. Historically, customer improvements to localization and regional support have helped grow the overall pie of platform opportunity for developers, and we think this will be one more improvement for people who play and make PC games.

Q: Do I get any benefit if my game supports additional languages on Steam?
A: Definitely! In addition to making your game more accessible to more customers, language preference is one of the things the store takes into account when making recommendations. That means a customer is more likely to see your game in the store if it supports the language preferences the customer selected. For example, Vietnamese is the fifth most spoken language in the United States, at around 1.5 million speakers.

Q: Where can I learn more about adding language support?
A: We’re so glad you asked! The documentation here provides a rundown on localization, and some best practices and advice. https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/store/localization

Today, we’re excited to launch the all new Surface Pro 6 and Surface Laptop 2 in markets around the world. We’ve seen great momentum already for these products and I can’t wait for our fans to experience them.

When we started on this journey with Surface, we gave people the ability to choose a device that would adapt to their lives and help them accomplish more. As the way we work and live has changed around the world Surface and Microsoft have also evolved. We’ve grown to deliver a full, integrated portfolio of products to help you do more, dream more and achieve more.

We’re a team of passionate product makers, putting our hearts into creating devices, software, apps and features to push you forward. Helping to maximize the ingenuity of our customers, so they can do and create amazing things.

We’re inspired by the artists, scientists, engineers and poets that help to shape our future. Their passion drives us and ultimately leads us to craft the next generation of devices.

Our products, a symphony of technology between Windows, Surface, Office and AI, are designed to amplify your ideas, get you into your flow and let you build what’s in your mind and heart. Like an instrument, our products, our technology fades to the background so you can focus on your craft.

But what does that mean and how does it help you?

When someone asks me that, asks why we would want beautiful devices to fade into the background, I tell them about my daughter Sophia and her piano. How when she plays there is a moment – a moment when she forgets the piano, the pedals under her feet, the bench she sits on, the sheets in front of her – and in this moment of inspiration, of greatness, she’s in her flow. It’s just her and the music. In order for that moment to happen, for her to forget about everything else, the piano must be perfectly tuned, the bench the right height, the music sheets at eye level.

For our customers, Surface, Windows, Office, and the experience they create together is the instrument. An instrument we’ve tuned perfectly to fade to the background, so you don’t have to think about all the little things, you can just get in your flow and capture those moments of greatness, of focus, of inspiration, to make the most of your time.

Get in your flow anytime, anywhere with Surface Pro 6

The first Quad-Core Processor in a Surface Pro comes to life on Surface Pro 6 – an instrument of versatility, portability and power, coming in a gorgeous, all new matte black finish.

We wanted this product to be the device you can bring with you anywhere since you never know when or where your moments of inspiration will strike.

While the refined exterior may look familiar, this is a new generation of Surface Pro, we’ve redesigned the architecture inside the device to deliver astounding power with the 8^th Generation Quad-Core Intel Processor, all while still offering up to 13.5 hours of battery life.

Providing what you need to transition between work life, home life and everything in between no matter where you are. Built with Windows and Office it can handle the powerful desktop apps you need, without compromising the thin and light form factor you love.

Surface Laptop 2 – beauty and power to make the most of your ideas

The blend of beauty and incredible performance on Surface Laptop 2 keeps everything you love about the first-generation form factor with so much more built in to keep you productive and inspired.

With an all new 8th generation Quad-Core processor, Surface Laptop 2 is 85 percent more powerful than Surface Laptop.

Even with all that power Surface Laptop 2 has an incredible 14.5 hours of all-day battery life, incredible display quality, beautiful design and easy portability. The Alcantara® material covering the keyboard draws you in, a perfect tone-on-tone balance with the gorgeous colors. Every detail on this product has been thought through, from the depth of the new matte black finish to the redesign of the thermal system to keep the quiet elegance of the device.

Matte black isn’t the only new finish highlighting the incredible design of Surface Laptop 2. On Monday in Beijing, we also introduced an all new blush finish as an exclusive for the Chinese market.

You bring our products to life

Nothing inspires the team more than seeing the amazing things our customers do with our products. Surface Pro 6 and Surface Laptop 2 are available in markets around the world today, and I truly believe that when you have your hands on them, when you experience them for yourself, you will understand what it means to have technology fade to the background, so you can focus on what’s important to you and save time for what really matters.

Availability details:

Available today in Australia, Austria, Canada, China, Germany, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and United States.

Updated October 16, 2018 6:36 am

In Part 1 of our series, we got our local Kubernetes cluster up and running with Docker, Minikube, and kubectl. We set up an image repository, and tried building, pushing, and deploying a container image with code changes we made to the Hello-Kenzan app. It’s now time to automate this process.

In Part 2, we’ll set up continuous delivery for our application by running Jenkins in a pod in Kubernetes. We’ll create a pipeline using a Jenkins 2.0 Pipeline script that automates building our Hello-Kenzan image, pushing it to the registry, and deploying it in Kubernetes. That’s right: we are going to deploy pods from a registry pod using a Jenkins pod. While this may sound like a bit of deployment alchemy, once the infrastructure and application components are all running on Kubernetes, it makes the management of these pieces easy since they’re all under one ecosystem.

With Part 2, we’re laying the last bit of infrastructure we need so that we can run our Kr8sswordz Puzzle in Part 3.

Read all the articles in the series:

 

This tutorial only runs locally in Minikube and will not work on the cloud. You’ll need a computer running an up-to-date version of Linux or macOS. Optimally, it should have 16 GB of RAM. Minimally, it should have 8 GB of RAM. For best performance, reboot your computer and keep the number of running apps to a minimum.

Creating and Building a Pipeline in Jenkins

Before you begin, you’ll want to make sure you’ve run through the steps in Part 1, in which we set up our image repository running in a pod (to do so quickly, you can run the npm part1 automated script detailed below).

If you previously stopped Minikube, you’ll need to start it up again. Enter the following terminal command, and wait for the cluster to start:

minikube start

You can check the cluster status and view all the pods that are running.

kubectl cluster-info kubectl get pods --all-namespaces

Make sure that the registry pod has a Status of Running.

We are ready to build out our Jenkins infrastructure.

Remember, you don’t actually have to type the commands below—just press Enter at each step and the script will enter the command for you!

1. First, let’s build the Jenkins image we’ll use in our Kubernetes cluster.

docker build -t 127.0.0.1:30400/jenkins:latest   -f applications/jenkins/Dockerfile applications/jenkins

2. Once again we’ll need to set up the Socat Registry proxy container to push images, so let’s build it. Feel free to skip this step in case the socat-registry image already exists from Part 1 (to check, run docker images).

docker build -t socat-registry -f applications/socat/Dockerfile applications/socat

3. Run the proxy container from the image.

docker stop socat-registry; docker rm socat-registry;   docker run -d -e "REG_IP=`minikube ip`" -e "REG_PORT=30400"   --name socat-registry -p 30400:5000 socat-registry

This step will fail if local port 30400 is currently in use by another process. You can check if there’s any process currently using this port by running the command lsof -i :30400

4. With our proxy container up and running, we can now push our Jenkins image to the local repository.

docker push 127.0.0.1:30400/jenkins:latest

You can see the newly pushed Jenkins image in the registry UI using the following command.

minikube service registry-ui

5. The proxy’s work is done, so you can go ahead and stop it.

docker stop socat-registry

6. Deploy Jenkins, which we’ll use to create our automated CI/CD pipeline. It will take the pod a minute or two to roll out.

kubectl apply -f manifests/jenkins.yaml; kubectl rollout status deployment/jenkins

Inspect all the pods that are running. You’ll see a pod for Jenkins now.

kubectl get pods

Jenkins as a CD tool needs special rights in order to interact with the Kubernetes cluster, so we’ve setup RBAC (Role Based Access Control) authorization for it inside the jenkins.yaml deployment manifest. RBAC consists of a Role, a ServiceAccount and a Binding object that binds the two together. Here’s how we configured Jenkins with these resources: Role: For simplicity we leveraged the pre-existing ClusterRole “cluster-admin” which by default has unlimited access to the cluster. (In a real life scenario you might want to narrow down Jenkins’ access rights by creating a new role with the least privileged PolicyRule.) ServiceAccount: We created a new ServiceAccount named “Jenkins”. The property “automountServiceAccountToken” has been set to true; this will automatically mount the authentication resources needed for a kubeconfig context to be setup on the pod (i.e. Cluster info, User represented by a token and a Namespace). RoleBinding: We created a ClusterRoleBinding that binds together the “Jenkins” serviceAccount to the “cluster-admin” ClusterRole. Lastly, we tell our Jenkins deployment to run as the Jenkins ServiceAccount.

Notice our Jenkins deployment has an initContainer. This is a container that will run to completion before the main container is deployed on our pod. The job of this init container is to create a kubeconfig file based on the provided context and to share it with the main Jenkins container through an “emptyDir” volume.

7. Open the Jenkins UI in a web browser.

minikube service jenkins

8. Display the Jenkins admin password with the following command, and right-click to copy it.

kubectl exec -it `kubectl get pods --selector=app=jenkins  --output=jsonpath={.items..metadata.name}` cat  /var/jenkins_home/secrets/initialAdminPassword

9. Switch back to the Jenkins UI. Paste the Jenkins admin password in the box and click Continue. Click Install suggested plugins. Plugins have actually been pre-downloaded during the Jenkins image build, so this step should finish fairly quickly.

One of the plugins being installed is Kubernetes Continuous Deploy, which allows Jenkins to directly interact with the Kubernetes cluster rather than through kubectl commands. This plugin was pre-downloaded with the Jenkins image build.

10. Create an admin user and credentials, and click Save and Continue. (Make sure to remember these credentials as you will need them for repeated logins.)

11. On the Instance Configuration page, click Save and Finish. On the next page, click Restart (if it appears to hang for some time on restarting, you may have to refresh the browser window). Login to Jenkins.

12. Before we create a pipeline, we first need to provision the Kubernetes Continuous Deploy plugin with a kubeconfig file that will allow access to our Kubernetes cluster. In Jenkins on the left, click on Credentials, select the Jenkins store, then Global credentials (unrestricted), and Add Credentials on the left menu

13. The following values must be entered precisely as indicated:

• Kind: Kubernetes configuration (kubeconfig)

• ID: kenzan_kubeconfig

• Kubeconfig: From a file on the Jenkins master

• File: /var/jenkins_home/.kube/config

Finally click Ok.

13. We now want to create a new pipeline for use with our Hello-Kenzan app. Back on Jenkins Home, on the left, click New Item.

Enter the item name as Hello-Kenzan Pipeline, select Pipeline, and click OK.

14. Under the Pipeline section at the bottom, change the Definition to be Pipeline script from SCM.

15. Change the SCM to Git. Change the Repository URL to be the URL of your forked Git repository, such as https://github.com/[GIT USERNAME]/kubernetes-ci-cd.

Note for the Script Path, we are using a Jenkinsfile located in the root of our project on our Github repo. This defines the build, push and deploy steps for our hello-kenzan application.

Click Save. On the left, click Build Now to run the new pipeline. You should see it run through the build, push, and deploy steps in a few seconds.

16. After all pipeline stages are colored green as complete, view the Hello-Kenzan application.

minikube service hello-kenzan

You might notice that you’re not seeing the uncommitted change you previously made to index.html in Part 1. That’s because Jenkins wasn’t using your local code. Instead, Jenkins pulled the code from your forked repo on GitHub, used that code to build the image, push it, and then deploy it.

Pushing Code Changes Through the Pipeline

Now let’s see some Continuous Integration in action! try changing the index.html in our Hello-Kenzan app, then building again to verify that the Jenkins build process works.

a. Open applications/hello-kenzan/index.html in a text editor.

nano applications/hello-kenzan/index.html

b. Add the following html at the end of the file (or any other html you like). (Tip: You can right-click in nano and choose Paste.)

<p style="font-family:sans-serif">For more from Kenzan, check out our <a href="http://kenzan.io">website</a>.</p>

c. Press Ctrl+X to close the file, type Y to confirm the filename, and press Enter to write the changes to the file.

d. Commit the changed file to your Git repo (you may need to enter your GitHub credentials):

git commit -am "Added message to index.html" git push

In the Jenkins UI, click Build Now to run the build again.

18. View the updated Hello-Kenzan application. You should see the message you added to index.html. (If you don’t, hold down Shift and refresh your browser to force it to reload.)

minikube service hello-kenzan

And that’s it! You’ve successfully used your pipeline to automatically pull the latest code from your Git repository, build and push a container image to your cluster, and then deploy it in a pod. And you did it all with one click—that’s the power of a CI/CD pipeline.

If you’re done working in Minikube for now, you can go ahead and stop the cluster by entering the following command:

minikube stop

a. curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_7.x | sudo -E bash - b. sudo apt-get install -y nodejs

a. cd ~/kubernetes-ci-cd b. npm install

npm run part1 (or part2, part3, part4 of the blog series)

Up Next

In Parts 3 and 4, we will deploy our Kr8sswordz Puzzle app through a Jenkins CI/CD pipeline. We will demonstrate its use of caching with etcd, as well as scaling the app up with multiple puzzle service instances so that we can try running a load test. All of this will be shown in the UI of the app itself so that we can visualize these pieces in action.

Curious to learn more about Kubernetes? Enroll in Introduction to Kubernetes, a FREE training course from The Linux Foundation, hosted on edX.org.

This article was revised and updated by David Zuluaga, a front end developer at Kenzan. He was born and raised in Colombia, where he studied his BE in Systems Engineering. After moving to the United States, he studied received his master’s degree in computer science at Maharishi University of Management. David has been working at Kenzan for four years, dynamically moving throughout a wide range of areas of technology, from front-end and back-end development to platform and cloud computing. David’s also helped design and deliver training sessions on Microservices for multiple client teams.

Comparing Spinnaker and Kubernetes in this way is somewhat unfair to both projects. The scale, scope, and magnitude of these technologies are different, but parallels can still be drawn.

Just like Kubernetes, Spinnaker is a technology that is battle tested, with Netflix using Spinnaker internally for continuous delivery. Like Kubernetes, Spinnaker is backed by some of the biggest names in the industry, which helps breed confidence among users. Most importantly, though, both projects are open source, designed to build a diverse and inclusive ecosystem around them.

Frankenstein’s Monster

Continuous Delivery (CD) is a solved problem, but it has been a bit of a Frankenstein’s monster, with companies trying to build their own creations by stitching parts together, along with Jenkins. “We tried to build a lot of custom continuous delivery tooling, but they all fell short of our expectation,” said Brandon Leach, Sr. Manager of Platform Engineering at Lookout.

“We were using Jenkins along with tools like Rundeck, but both had their own set of problems. While Rundeck didn’t have a first-class deployment tool, Jenkins was becoming a nightmare and we ended up moving to Gitlabs,” said Gard Voigt Rimestad of Schibsted, a major Norwegian media group.

Netflix created a more elegant way for continuous delivery called Asgard, open sourced in 2012, which was designed to run Netflix’s own workload on AWS. Many companies were using Asgard, including Schibsted, and it was gaining momentum. But it was tied closely to the kind of workload Netflix was running with AWS. Bigger companies who liked Asgard forked it to run their own workloads. IBM forked it twice to make it work with Docker containers.

IBM’s forking of Asgard was an eye-opening experience for Netflix. At that point, Netflix had started looking into containerized workloads, and IBM showed how it could be done with Asgard.

Google was also planning to fork Asgard to make it work on Google Compute Engine. By that time, Netflix had started working on the successor to Asgard, called Spinnaker. “Before Google could fork the project, we managed to convince Google to collaborate on Spinnaker instead of forking Asgard. Pivotal also joined in,” said Andy Glover, shepherd of Spinnaker and Director of Delivery Engineering at Netflix. The rest is history.

Continuous popularity

There are many factors at play that contribute to the popularity and adoption of Spinnaker. First and foremost, it’s a proven technology that’s been used at Netflix. It instills confidence in users. “Spinnaker is the way Netflix deploys its services. They do things at the scale we don’t do in AWS. That was compelling,” said Leach.

The second factor is the powerful community around Spinnaker that includes heavyweights like Microsoft, Google, and Netflix. “These companies have engineers on their staff that are dedicated to working on Spinnaker,” added Leach.

Governance

In October 2018, the Spinnaker community organized its first official Spinnaker Summit in Seattle. During the Summit, the community announced the governance structure for the project.

“Initially, there will be a steering committee and a technical oversight committee. At the moment Google and Netflix are steering the governance body, but we would like to see more diversity,” said Steven Kim, Google’s Software Engineering Manager who leads the Google team that works on Spinnaker.  The broader community is organized around a set of special interest groups (SIGs) that enable users to focus on particular areas of interest.

“There are users who have deployed Spinnaker in their environment, but they are often intimidated by two big players like Google and Netflix. The governance structure will enable everyone to be able to have a voice in the community,” said Kim.

At the moment, the project is being run by Google and Netflix, but eventually, it may be donated to an organization that has a better infrastructure for managing such projects. “It could be the OpenStack Foundation, CNCF, or the Apache Foundation,” said Boris Renski, Co-founder and CMO of Mirantis.

I met with more than a dozen users at the Summit, and they were extremely bullish about Spinnaker. Companies are already using it in a way even Netflix didn’t envision. Since continuous delivery is at the heart of multi-cloud strategy, Spinnaker is slowly but steadily starting to beat at the heart of many companies.

Spinnaker might not become as big as Kubernetes, due to its scope, but it’s certainly becoming as important. Spinnaker has made some bold promises, and I am sure it will continue to deliver on them.