Istio is a service mesh platform specifically designed for Kubernetes. It connects, secures, and manages microservices in containerized environments. It simplifies application deployment, monitoring, and scalability, handling tasks like traffic management, load balancing, and policy enforcement at the service mesh layer. Istio injects a sidecar proxy like Envoy alongside each service instance, enabling communication between services and providing features like request routing, telemetry collection, and access control. With a focus on consistent policy enforcement and robust observability, Istio ensures reliability and security in microservices architecture. As an open-source project, it allows users to customize the service mesh, making it a popular choice in the cloud-native ecosystem. In essence, Istio is fundamental for modern cloud-native application development, especially for Kubernetes environments.
Service mesh technology is a networking layer that facilitates communication between services in a distributed system. It simplifies the task of managing the underlying network infrastructure, allowing developers to focus on building and deploying applications without worrying about the complexities of network management. Service mesh also provides advanced security features such as traffic monitoring and encryption, ensuring the system is resilient and safeguarded against malicious attacks.
Here are some reasons to use tools in the service mesh category: