Skip to content

Why k0rdent?#

k0rdent was developed to provide for the needs of platform engineers and the developers that they serve, as well as the application workloads that they support.

Applications and Workloads#

Workloads evolve and grow, often faster then the infrastructure needed to support them. Infrastructure is almost always the lagging factor in getting new or existing applications into the hands of users and scaling them to meet user expectations. This challenge has grown exponentially with the rise of AI and ML workloads. Specifically:

  • Workload complexity is increasing
  • Modern workloads depend on specialized infrastructure
  • Developers have high expectations of time to value

Platform Engineering#

Modern infrastructure systems are increasingly complex, and administrators need to manage that complexity while still responding quickly to developers' needs efficiently as possible. This has led to development of internal developer platforms (IDP) and platform engineering. These environments provide the frameworks and tools for increasing developer productivity when developing, deploying, and managing applications and services, enabling developers to focus on their specific tasks or goals and not the underlying complexities. Overall:

  • Developer platforms increase developer productivity
  • Platform engineers need to implement and grow the platforms
  • Infrastructure needs to support the required complexity

Modern Infrastructure Systems#

The increasingly distributed nature of modern infrastructure systems and the demands of modern workloads is leading to increasing complexity. Solutions need to solve a diverse set of challenges and provide consistency, repeatability, and prevention of lock-in, all without increasing the burden on operators. Modern platform engineers and operators are increasingly time constrained with the vast number of challenges they need to overcome, including security and compliance, cost management, resilience, and scale to name but a few. Keep in mind that:

  • Distributed deployments are the new normal
  • Infrastructure management is not just a technical problem
  • Operators need to focus on building value chains

Open Source#

The open source ecosystem, and especially Kubernetes, is mature and offers an increasing number of tools that solve real problems. The open source ecosystem, if leveraged correctly, also supports building unique architectures to support a business' needs while helping to avoid lock-in and architectural dead ends. All of these tools need to be selected, deployed, and lifecycle-managed in a way that is repeatable and traceable. Open source:

  • Prevents lock-in and supports architectural self determination
  • Solutions allow for solving of problems in unique ways
  • Can help solve the problem of managing the complexity of modern infrastructure