Red Hat OpenShift Service on AWS (ROSA) is a fully-managed, turnkey application platform designed to simplify the building, deployment, and management of containerized cloud-native applications. Here’s a comprehensive overview of what ROSA does and its key features:
What ROSA Does
ROSA is a joint effort between Red Hat and AWS, providing a managed Kubernetes platform that allows enterprises to focus on delivering value to their customers by building and deploying applications, without the complexity of infrastructure management. Red Hat site reliability engineering (SRE) experts manage the underlying platform, ensuring that users can concentrate on application development and deployment.
Key Features
Seamless Integration with AWS Services
ROSA integrates seamlessly with a wide range of AWS services, including Amazon CloudWatch, AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM), Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (VPC), and other compute, database, analytics, and machine learning services. This integration accelerates the development and delivery of applications by leveraging the robust portfolio of AWS cloud services.
Fully Managed Platform
As a fully-managed service, ROSA reduces the complexity associated with building and managing application platforms. Red Hat and AWS SRE experts handle the management of the underlying infrastructure, including updates, security, and high availability, allowing developers to focus on writing quality code and deploying applications quickly.
High Availability and Resiliency
ROSA clusters can be deployed across multiple Availability Zones (AZs) to maximize availability and maintain high availability for mission-critical applications. The platform ensures that control plane and infrastructure nodes are highly available and distributed, with automated cluster operations and over-the-air platform upgrades.
Scalability and Flexibility
Users can easily scale their clusters by adding or removing compute nodes to match resource demand. ROSA supports various EC2 instance types, including memory-optimized, compute-optimized, and general-purpose instances, allowing for optimized cluster configurations based on specific needs.
Security and Compliance
ROSA employs robust security measures, including the use of AWS Security Token Service (STS) for temporary, limited-privilege credentials aligned with the principle of least privilege. Data encryption is supported through AWS Key Management Service (KMS), with the option for customers to provide their own KMS keys. Additionally, SRE cluster access is secured by multi-factor authentication (MFA).
Comprehensive Application Management
The platform includes a suite of features for container management, such as Operators, networking, load balancing, service mesh, CI/CD, firewall, monitoring, registry, authentication, and authorization capabilities. These components are tested together to ensure unified operations as a complete platform.
Global Availability and Flexibility
ROSA is available in multiple regions globally, allowing businesses to deploy and manage applications on a global scale. Customers have the flexibility to stop using ROSA at any time and move their applications to on-premise, private cloud, or other cloud providers.
Simplified Cluster Management
Clusters can be operated using the OpenShift web console, the ROSA CLI, or through Red Hat OpenShift Cluster Manager. This flexibility ensures that users can manage their clusters efficiently and effectively.
In summary, ROSA is a powerful tool for enterprises looking to leverage the benefits of hybrid cloud environments by providing a managed, scalable, and highly available platform for building and deploying containerized applications, all while integrating seamlessly with AWS services.