June 2019 Summaries

Static websites have gained popularity due to their simplicity and cost-efficiency, with modern tools like Jekyll, Hugo, and Gatsby facilitating their creation by generating static HTML files from templates and markdown pages. This text details how to set up such a site on Microsoft Azure, addressing challenges like HTTPS certificate integration, content distribution via Azure CDN, and custom domain configuration. Pulumi's code-centric approach is highlighted for its ability to streamline the management of cloud resources and integration of multiple services, including creating a storage account with static website features, deploying static files through a storage container, and configuring Azure CDN for custom domain support and HTTPS. The process involves setting DNS CNAME records and automating TLS certificate deployment to enable secure connections, demonstrating the power of using a general-purpose programming language like Pulumi for sophisticated infrastructure automation that ensures reliable and reproducible deployments.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) offers several solutions for running containers, including Elastic Container Service (ECS) with Fargate, ECS backed by EC2 instances, and Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS), each with distinct advantages and trade-offs. ECS with Fargate is suitable for those who want simplicity and automatic management of containers without handling the underlying infrastructure, while ECS backed by EC2 offers more control over the compute environment, making it ideal for organizations with advanced requirements. EKS provides a comprehensive Kubernetes experience, beneficial for organizations focused on cloud-native technologies and multi-cloud or hybrid environments, though it requires greater expertise and management. Pulumi supports these container solutions by providing infrastructure as code, simplifying deployment, and integrating with AWS services like IAM, ELB, and CloudWatch. Additionally, Amazon Elastic Container Registry (ECR) allows for efficient and secure storage of Docker container images within AWS accounts.

Pulumi has celebrated a significant first year since its launch as an open-source platform for managing multi-cloud infrastructure as code using various programming languages. During this time, Pulumi has introduced over 100 examples and tutorials, a comprehensive Kubernetes provider, and numerous enhancements across major cloud providers like AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud. The introduction of Pulumi Crosswalk for AWS, additional providers, and enhancements to their SDKs have bolstered their offerings. Pulumi has also developed Team and Enterprise SaaS editions, identity management integrations, and CI/CD support, while enhancing security and state management capabilities. The community has expanded rapidly with thousands of users and substantial open-source contributions, leading to successful implementations by companies such as Mercedes-Benz R&D North America, Tableau, and Learning Machine, which have benefited from improved collaboration, productivity, and cost efficiency. Pulumi's team expresses gratitude to its community and customers, looking forward to another year of innovation, community growth, and delivering comprehensive solutions.

Amazon Elastic Container Registry (ECR) is a fully-managed Docker container registry that facilitates the storage, management, and deployment of Docker container images, seamlessly integrating with Amazon Elastic Container Service (ECS) and Kubernetes (EKS). This integration simplifies workflows from development to production, secures access through IAM, and eliminates the need for personal container repositories. Pulumi Crosswalk for AWS enables developers to use infrastructure as code to build, publish, and pull from private ECR repositories efficiently. A practical example demonstrates the use of Pulumi to provision an ECR repository, build a custom Docker image, and deploy it to an ECS Fargate service. Lifecycle management features allow for the easy declaration of policies to manage stale images, reducing costs and ensuring that only necessary images are retained. Pulumi offers a streamlined process for maintaining Docker images in private ECR repositories, updating ECS or EKS services, and enforcing flexible policies, all through a simplified command structure.

Pulumi Crosswalk for AWS provides robust tools for gaining insights and visualizations within Pulumi applications, crucial for monitoring long-lived cloud applications. It allows developers to define and visualize metrics, create alarms, and dashboards to track the health of services, integrating these elements from the start rather than as an afterthought. This integration is demonstrated through a hackathon project involving a Slack bot designed to monitor @mentions, using AWS services like SNS and Lambda to handle messages efficiently due to Slack's time constraints. By employing Pulumi's Crosswalk APIs, developers can profile Lambda Functions, track their duration, and set up CloudWatch alarms and dashboards to monitor application performance effectively. This seamless integration ensures that applications can adapt to changes without requiring manual updates to alarms and dashboards, offering a powerful and simplified way to maintain app health and performance.

Mapbox, utilizing Pulumi's open-source JavaScript libraries and Crosswalk for AWS framework, has developed an Asset Tracking Solution for logistics businesses to manage and process data from billions of connected IoT devices and smartphones. This solution employs AWS services to create a flexible, secure, and efficient system for data ingestion and processing. Key components include a REST API for data ingestion, a Kinesis stream for data processing, and DynamoDB for high-performance data storage, enabling real-time data visualization on a map client. Pulumi's framework simplifies the architecture setup, deployment, and management of AWS services with minimal coding effort. The solution ensures that complex data from IoT devices is processed and visualized efficiently, leveraging AWS's infrastructure and Pulumi's capabilities to handle tasks such as geofencing and traffic-aware ETA calculations. The implementation process includes creating AWS resources, developing APIs for data consumption, and integrating with Mapbox maps for live data visualization, with additional support and examples available from Mapbox and Pulumi resources.

Pulumi Crosswalk for AWS is an open-source library designed to simplify the deployment and management of cloud-native applications on Amazon Web Services (AWS) by providing infrastructure-as-code components. This library facilitates the transition from development to production by leveraging AWS's existing building blocks, such as Lambda, API Gateway, ECS, Fargate, and EKS, allowing developers to adopt best practices and evolve their infrastructure as application needs change. Unlike traditional tools that focus on specific AWS services, Crosswalk offers a unified interface across the entire AWS platform, making it easier to build, scale, and maintain complex cloud solutions. It also integrates with AWS's networking, monitoring, and load balancing services, enabling comprehensive solutions for deploying containers, setting up custom Virtual Private Clouds (VPCs), and managing Kubernetes clusters. Crosswalk's ability to streamline cloud infrastructure development has garnered positive feedback from companies like Tableau and Compute Software, who have successfully utilized it to enhance their productivity and scalability. Pulumi plans to expand Crosswalk's capabilities to other cloud platforms, aiming to democratize access to cloud resources and empower developers to harness more of AWS's capabilities.

Pulumi is an open-source Infrastructure as Code tool that facilitates the integration and coexistence of infrastructure provisioned by different tools, such as CloudFormation, ARM Templates, and Terraform, within the same environment. This is particularly useful for organizations where different teams manage resources using varied tools, as Pulumi allows seamless interaction with existing infrastructure through its StackReference type. Notably, Pulumi enables the retrieval of outputs from these tools, supporting AWS CloudFormation, Azure ARM Templates, and more recently, Terraform state files, including those managed remotely via Terraform Enterprise. By using the RemoteStateReference type in the @pulumi/terraform NPM package, Pulumi programs can dynamically consume outputs from Terraform states, providing flexibility and ease of integration for teams transitioning from other IaC solutions to Pulumi. Pulumi's approach supports the co-management of infrastructure without disrupting existing setups, appealing to teams seeking to adopt it in their current environments.