Glossary
This page gives a quick reference to various object types and concepts within the Palette platform.
App Mode
A mode optimized for a simpler and streamlined developer experience that allows you to focus on the building, maintenance, testing, deployment, and monitoring of your applications. App Mode removes the need to worry about the infrastructure management of a Kubernetes cluster and results in a PaaS-like experience, enabling you to focus on deploying App Profiles, Apps, and Palette Virtual Clusters.
App Profile
App Profiles are templates created with preconfigured services required for Palette Virtual Clusters deployment. The App Profile allow creators to integrate various services or tiers, required to run an application, such as cache, databases, and more into a single deliverable. App Profiles provide a way to drive consistency across virtual clusters. You can create as many profiles as required, with multiple tiers serving different functionalities per use case.
Air-Gapped
Palette on-prem installation supports Air-Gapped, a security measure in which its management platform is installed on VMware environments with no direct or indirect connectivity to any other devices or networks of the outside world. This feature provides airtight security to the platform without the risk of compromise or disaster. In addition, it ensures the total isolation of a given system from other networks, especially those that are not secure.
Attach Manifests
For integrations and add-ons orchestrated via Palette Packs or Charts, at times it is required to provide additional Kubernetes resources to complete the installation. Resources like additional secrets or Custom Resource Definitions may need to be installed for the integration or add-on to function correctly. Attach Manifests are additional raw manifests attached to a cluster profile layer built using a Palette Pack or a Chart. Multiple Attach Manifests can be added to a layer in a cluster profile.
Bring Your Own Operating System (BYO-OS)
A feature in Palette that allows you to bring your own operating system and use it with your Kubernetes clusters. With the BYO-OS pack, you can reference your own OS images, configure the necessary drivers, and customize the OS to meet your specific requirements. BYO-OS gives you greater flexibility, control, and customization options when it comes to managing your Kubernetes clusters. It is especially useful for enterprises and organizations with strict requirements around security, compliance, or specific hardware configurations.
Chart Repositories
Chart Repositories are web servers, either public or private, that host Helm Charts. By default, Palette includes several popular chart registries such as Bitnami. As an administrator, you can add additional public or private chart repositories to leverage charts from those sources. This feature provides greater flexibility in managing and deploying applications, allowing you to access and use Helm Charts from various sources in your Palette environment
Cloud Account
Cloud Accounts are where access credentials are stored for public and private clouds. It is used by the system to provide new cluster infrastructure and cluster resources. Cloud account information is treated as sensitive data and fully encrypted using the tenant's unique encryption key.
Cluster Mode
Cluster Mode enables you to create, deploy, and manage Kubernetes clusters and applications. In Cluster Mode, you can deploy Kubernetes clusters to public cloud providers, on-prem data centers, and on the edge.
Cluster Definition
A Cluster Definition contains one or more cluster profiles, including profile variables used in those profiles.
Cluster Profile
A Cluster Profile is a declarative model of a Kubernetes infrastructure stack. A Kubernetes infrastructure stack is broken into multiple layers, from core layers like base OS, Kubernetes, storage, network, to additional add-on layers such as load balancer, ingress controller, logging, monitoring, security, etc. For each layer, Palette provides multiple out-of-the-box options and versions. The cluster profile is essentially a configuration of end-to-end Kubernetes stacks and settings that you create based on your needs, which you can reuse every time you need to deploy a cluster matching that configuration. For example, let us say for AI/ML you need a cluster with a base OS with an NVIDIA driver installed and Kubeflow installed in the cluster, but for a production cluster, you need a different stack with Logging (EFK), Monitoring (Prometheus), Security (Twistlock) pre-installed. For more information, check out Cluster Profiles.
Cluster Profile Variable
Cluster Profile Variables enable you to create placeholders for parameters in profile layer configurations, which you can then populate for individual clusters during deployment. Meaning you can use a single cluster profile to deploy multiple clusters with unique requirements for security, networking, resource allocation, and so on.
Edge Appliances
Palette supports several kinds of appliances for the Edge deployment. These appliances can be registered with the Palette Management Console and used for provisioning a Virtualized or a Native OS (Native Edge Deployment). The following is the list of all the Palette supported Edge appliance types:
Appliance Type | Environment |
---|---|
Native Edge Deployment | Bare Metal Machines or Virtual Appliances |
Bare Metal Machine | Virtualized |
KVM-based virtual machines | Virtualized |
Note: Palette Edge Manager & TUI would be embedded in P6OS.