What is Kubernetes? Kubernetes which is also referred to as k8. k8 is an open-source container orchestration platform that automates deployment, scaling, and management of the containerized application. k8 was developed by Google and it is now currently maintained by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF).
k8 is currently the de facto standard for container orchestration and it is widely adopted in the industry. Kubernetes provides a platform-agnostic framework that allows developers to run containers on different cloud providers or on-premise infrastructure.
k8 architecture is based on a master-slave model, where the master node manages the overall state of the cluster and the slave nodes (also known as worker nodes) run the application workloads.
The four major Kubernetes providers are Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (Amazon EKS), Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE), Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), and DigitalOcean Kubernetes (DOKS).
We also need to ensure we are not spending above our budget while running the k8 environment. Although using cloud providers gives us the flexibility of putting nodes offline and autoscaling groups ensures we don't have nodes online if not in use. However, tools like kubecost can help us to create visibility in our Kubernetes cluster.
What is Kubecost? Kubecost is a platform that provides cost optimization and visibility in Kubernetes clusters. Kubecost can be used in Kubernetes cluster for the following:
Cost Management: It assists to identify the cost of running the Kubernetes cluster, including the cost of infrastructure resources and other services running in the cluster.
Resource Allocation: Kubecost can help us to identify which resources in the cluster are being overutilized or underutilized.
it can also be used in capacity planning which includes forecasting resource needs for your Kubernetes cluster based on historical usage patterns.
You can also use kubecost as an addon while using EKS. For more information https://aws-ia.github.io/terraform-aws-eks-blueprints/v4.12.1/add-ons/kubecost/ and https://docs.aws.amazon.com/eks/latest/userguide/cost-monitoring.html
For more general information on kubecost. kindly follow this link https://www.kubecost.com/