Tag Archives: cloud

Driving etcd Stability and Kubernetes Success


Introduction: The Critical Role of etcd in Cloud-Native Infrastructure

Imagine a cloud-native world without Kubernetes. It's hard, right? But have you ever considered the unsung hero that makes Kubernetes tick? Enter etcd, the distributed key-value store that serves as the central nervous system for Kubernetes. Etcd's ability to consistently store and replicate critical cluster state data is essential for maintaining the health and harmony of distributed systems.


etcd: The Backbone of Kubernetes

Think of Kubernetes as a magnificent vertebrate animal, capable of complex movements and adaptations. In this analogy, etcd is the animal's backbone – a strong, flexible structure that supports the entire system. Just as a backbone protects the spinal cord (which carries vital information), etcd safeguards the critical data that defines the Kubernetes environment. And just as a backbone connects to every other part of the body, etcd facilitates communication and coordination between all the components of Kubernetes, allowing it to move, adapt, and thrive in the dynamic world of distributed systems.

ALT TEXT
Credit: Original image xkcd.com/2347, alterations by Josh Berkus.

Google's Deep-Rooted Commitment to Open Source

Google has a long history of contributing to open source projects, and our commitment to etcd is no exception. As the initiator of Kubernetes, Google understands the critical role that etcd plays in its success. Google engineers consistently invest in etcd to enhance its functionality and reliability, driven by their extensive use of etcd for their own internal systems.


Google's Collaborative Impact on etcd Reliability

Google engineers have actively contributed to the stability and resilience of etcd, working alongside the wider community to address challenges and improve the project. Here are some key areas where their impact has been felt:

Post-Release Support: Following the release of etcd v3.5.0, Google engineers quickly identified and addressed several critical issues, demonstrating their commitment to maintaining a stable and production-ready etcd for Kubernetes and other systems.

Data Consistency: Early Detection and Swift Action: Google engineers led efforts to identify and resolve data inconsistency issues in etcd, advocating for public awareness and mitigation strategies. Drawing from their Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) expertise, they fostered a culture of "blameless postmortems" within the etcd community—a practice where the focus is on learning from incidents rather than assigning blame. Their detailed postmortem of the v3.5 data inconsistency issue and a co-presented KubeCon talk served to share these valuable lessons with the broader cloud-native community.

Refocusing on Stability and Testing: The v3.5 incident highlighted the need for more comprehensive testing and documentation. Google engineers took action on multiple fronts:

  • Improving Documentation: They contributed to creating "The Implicit Kubernetes-ETCD Contract," which formalizes the interactions between the two systems, guiding development and troubleshooting.
  • Prioritizing Stability and Testing: They developed the "etcd Robustness Tests," a rigorous framework simulating extreme scenarios to proactively identify inconsistency and correctness issues.

These contributions have fostered a collaborative environment where the entire community can learn from incidents and work together to improve etcd's stability and resilience. The etcd Robustness Tests have been particularly impactful, not only reproducing all the data inconsistencies found in v3.5 but also uncovering other bugs introduced in that version. Furthermore, they've found previously unnoticed bugs that existed in earlier etcd versions, some dating back to the original v3 implementation. These results demonstrate the effectiveness of the robustness tests and highlight how they've made etcd the most reliable it has ever been in the history of the project.


etcd Robustness Tests: Making etcd the Most Reliable It's Ever Been

The "etcd Robustness Tests," inspired by the Jepsen methodology, subject etcd to rigorous simulations of network partitions, node failures, and other real-world disruptions. This ensures etcd's data consistency and correctness even under extreme conditions. These tests have proven remarkably effective, identifying and addressing a variety of issues:

For deeper insights into ensuring etcd's data consistency, Marek Siarkowicz's talk, "On the Hunt for Etcd Data Inconsistencies," offers valuable information about distributed systems testing and the innovative approaches used to build these tests. To foster transparency and collaboration, the etcd community holds bi-weekly meetings to discuss test results, open to engineers, researchers, and other interested parties.


The Kubernetes-etcd Contract: A Partnership Forged in Rigorous Testing

To solidify the Kubernetes-etcd partnership, Google engineers formally defined the implicit contract between the two systems. This shared understanding guided development and troubleshooting, leading to improved testing strategies and ensuring etcd meets Kubernetes' demanding requirements.

When subtle issues were discovered in how Kubernetes utilized etcd watch, the value of this formal contract became clear. These issues could lead to missed events under specific conditions, potentially impacting Kubernetes' operation. In response, Google engineers are actively working to integrate the contract directly into the etcd Robustness Tests to proactively identify and prevent such compatibility issues.


Conclusion: Google's Continued Commitment to etcd and the Cloud-Native Community

Google's ongoing investment in etcd underscores their commitment to the stability and success of the cloud-native ecosystem. Their contributions, along with the wider community's efforts, have made etcd a more reliable and performant foundation for Kubernetes and other critical systems. As the ecosystem evolves, etcd remains a critical linchpin, empowering organizations to build and deploy distributed applications with confidence. We encourage all etcd and Kubernetes contributors to continue their active participation and contribute to the project's ongoing success.

By Marek Siarkowicz – GKE etcd

Home APIs: Enabling all developers to build for the home

Posted by Matt Van Der Staay – Engineering Director, Google Home


This blog was originally posted on Google for Developers.

As the saying goes, “home is where the heart is.” It’s where we spend the most time; it’s your space to be comfortable, where you can truly relax, connect and make memories. Our homes have gotten more helpful with connected products, such as a smart door lock or Nest thermostat. Despite this momentum, it's still too hard to develop for the home.

We are changing all of that. Building on the foundation of Matter, we've re-envisioned Google Home as a platform for developers - all developers, not just those that build smart home devices. Google Home is the destination to create innovative experiences for the home.

Today, we’re announcing the Home APIs and Home runtime. With the Home APIs, app developers can access over 600M devices, Google’s hubs and Matter infrastructure, and an automation engine powered by Google intelligence - all available on both Android and iOS. Here are five things to know:

1. Any developer can now build an experience that works with Google Home.

The home offers a unique opportunity for developers to create seamless and deeper relationships with users, but developing for the smart home is harder than it needs to be. Building for the smart home means integrations with many device makers, operating hubs and Matter fabrics, and operating automations engines driven by intelligent signals.

Whether you build an app specifically for smart home devices or build apps that have nothing to do with the smart home – like a fitness app or delivery app - the Home APIs will let you create app experiences that offer your customers delightful and differentiated experiences on both Android and iOS.

2. Access 600 million connected devices from your app

The new Device and Structure APIs let you access over 600M devices with a single integration. Control and manage the devices already connected to Google Home, such as Matter light bulbs or the Nest Learning Thermostat, whether at home, or on the go. You can build a complex app to manage any aspect of a smart home, or simply integrate with a smart device to solve pain points - like turning on the lights automatically before the food delivery driver arrives.

The Home APIs have been designed with privacy and security in mind, leveraging industry standard best practices. Users are always in control and need to explicitly grant access to their structure and smart home devices before an app can access it. And they can easily revoke access at any time from the Google Home app. To ensure quality experiences, developers who adopt the Home APIs must pass certification before launching their app.

The Device and Structure APIs
The Device and Structure APIs provide all of the foundational building blocks to create a smart home experience.

The new Commissioning API lets you setup Matter devices in your app or the Home app or directly with Fast Pair on Android, without the need to create a new Matter fabric, saving you time and resources.

The Commissioning API
The Commissioning API provides all of the customer experience to set up a Matter device.

3. Automate with Google’s unique intelligence about the home

As people add more devices to their home, it becomes challenging to make them all work in unison. Over the past year, we have added new signals and allowed those with advanced skills to script their home using generative AI. With the new Automation API, you can create and manage home automations in your app, using Google Home’s new automation engine and intelligent signals.

Automations can be triggered by device signals from the home such as occupancy events from motion sensors, mode changes from appliances, or media events from a smart TV. For example, Yale is using the Automation API to turn on the foyer lights when the front door is unlocked at night. Automations can also use Google’s intelligence signals like home and away, which fuses together signals from devices across the home to create a more accurate presence detection.

The Automations API
The Automations API provides all of the tools for creating and managing automations.

4. Expanding hubs for Google Home to the TV

A hub for Google Home is a device that enables remote access and local control of their Matter devices across Wifi and Thread. The Home APIs use the network of hubs for Google Home to control Matter devices whether the user is in the home or away.

Later this year, we’re upgrading our hubs and introducing the Home runtime, so other devices, including Chromecast with Google TV, select panel TVs with Google TV running Android 14, or higher and eligible LG brand TVs will also become hubs for Google Home.

Home APIs make controlling lights and switches locally over a hub feel snappy. We are adopting these APIs in the Google Home app, and our early tests show device control operating up to three times faster than before. Developers using the Home APIs can see faster and more responsive local control in their apps as well.

5. Delightful new experiences from a diverse set of apps

We are working with a broad range of brands across lighting, security, automotive, energy, and entertainment to build seamless smart home experiences that help get more usefulness from the smart home.

Partners from every major smart home category are building on the Home APIs.
Partners from every major smart home category are building on the Home APIs.

Here are how some of our first partners are using the Home APIs:

ADT’s new Trusted Neighbor will revolutionize the universal practice of “giving a trusted neighbor a key to your home,” enabling users to easily grant secure and temporary access to their homes for neighbors, friends or helpers.

ADT Trusted Neighbor Program

LG will enable millions of TVs to be hubs for Google Home, allowing seamless control of devices from any app built using Home APIs. You will also be able to use the ThinQ mobile app or the Home Hub on the LG TV to control devices.

Home APIs on LG TVs for Google Home

Eve Systems will bring their experience to Android for the first time and build helpful automations like lowering the blinds when the temperature drops at night.

Eve Systems using Home APIs

Google Pixel is bridging the digital and physical worlds so that bedtime mode can not only dim your screen, but can also automatically dim your bedroom lights, lower the shades and lock the front door.

Google Pixel using Home APIs

And this is just the beginning. With the Home APIs, a workout app could keep you cool while you are burning calories by turning on the fan before you begin working out. Or a vacation rental app could make sure that the lights are on and the temperature is just right when a guest arrives. With the Home APIs, now anyone can bridge digital experiences and physical devices.


Sign Up to Build with the Home APIs

Do you have a great idea or feature that you'd like to build into your app with the Home APIs? Tell us about it and join the waitlist for access to the Home APIs or Home runtime. We will expand access on a rolling basis and the first apps built on the Home APIs will come to the Play Store and App Store starting this fall. Learn more about what’s included in the Home APIs from our I/O session on the Google Home Developer Center.

Get ready for Google I/O: Program lineup revealed

Posted by Timothy Jordan – Director, Developer Relations and Open Source

Developers, get ready! Google I/O is just around the corner, kicking off live from Mountain View with the Google keynote on Tuesday, May 14 at 10 am PT, followed by the Developer keynote at 1:30 pm PT.

But the learning doesn’t stop there. Mark your calendars for May 16 at 8 am PT when we’ll be releasing over 150 technical deep dives, demos, codelabs, and more on-demand. If you register online, you can start building your 'My I/O' agenda today.

Here's a sneak peek at some of the exciting highlights from the I/O program preview:

Unlocking the power of AI: The Gemini era unlocks a new frontier for developers. We'll showcase the newest features in the Gemini API, Google AI Studio, and Gemma. Discover cutting-edge pre-trained models from Kaggle, and delve into Google's open-source libraries like Keras and JAX.

Android: A developer's playground: Get the latest updates on everything Android! We'll cover groundbreaking advancements in generative AI, the highly anticipated Android 15, innovative form factors, and the latest tools and libraries in the Jetpack and Compose ecosystem. Plus, discover how to optimize performance and streamline your development workflow.

Building beautiful and functional web experiences: We’ll cover Baseline updates, a revolutionary tool that empowers developers with a clear understanding of web features and API interoperability. With Baseline, you'll have access to real-time information on popular developer resource sites like MDN, Can I Use, and web.dev.

The future of ChromeOS: Get a glimpse into the exciting future of ChromeOS. We'll discuss the developer-centric investments we're making in distribution, app capabilities, and operating system integrations. Discover how our partners are shaping the future of Chromebooks and delivering world-class user experiences.

This is just a taste of what's in store at Google I/O. Stay tuned for more updates, and get ready to be a part of the future.

Don't forget to mark your calendars and register for Google I/O today!

Get ready for Google I/O: Program lineup revealed


Developers, get ready! Google I/O is just around the corner, kicking off live from Mountain View with the Google keynote on Tuesday, May 14 at 10 am PT, followed by the Developer keynote at 1:30 pm PT.

But the learning doesn’t stop there. Mark your calendars for May 16 at 8 am PT when we’ll be releasing over 150 technical deep dives, demos, codelabs, and more on-demand. If you register online, you can start building your 'My I/O' agenda today.

Here's a sneak peek at some of the exciting highlights from the I/O program preview:

Unlocking the power of AI: The Gemini era unlocks a new frontier for developers. We'll showcase the newest features in the Gemini API, Google AI Studio, and Gemma. Discover cutting-edge pre-trained models from Kaggle, and delve into Google's open-source libraries like Keras and JAX.

Android: A developer's playground: Get the latest updates on everything Android! We'll cover groundbreaking advancements in generative AI, the highly anticipated Android 15, innovative form factors, and the latest tools and libraries in the Jetpack and Compose ecosystem. Plus, discover how to optimize performance and streamline your development workflow.

Building beautiful and functional web experiences: We’ll cover Baseline updates, a revolutionary tool that empowers developers with a clear understanding of web features and API interoperability. With Baseline, you'll have access to real-time information on popular developer resource sites like MDN, Can I Use, and web.dev.

The future of ChromeOS: Get a glimpse into the exciting future of ChromeOS. We'll discuss the developer-centric investments we're making in distribution, app capabilities, and operating system integrations. Discover how our partners are shaping the future of Chromebooks and delivering world-class user experiences.

This is just a taste of what's in store at Google I/O. Stay tuned for more updates, and get ready to be a part of the future.

Don't forget to mark your calendars and register for Google I/O today!

Posted by Timothy Jordan – Director, Developer Relations and Open Source

Build with Google AI video series, Season 2: more AI patterns

Posted by Joe Fernandez – Google AI Developer Relations

We are off to another exciting year in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and it's time to build more applications with Google AI technology! The Build with Google AI video series is for developers looking to build helpful and practical applications with AI. We focus on useful code projects you can implement and extend in an afternoon to bring the power of artificial intelligence into your workflow or organization. Our first season received over 100,000 views in six weeks! We are glad to see that so many of you liked the series, and we are excited to bring you even more Google AI application projects.

Today, we are launching Season 2 of the Build with Google AI series, featuring projects built with Google's Gemini API technology. The launch of Gemini and the Gemini API has brought developers even more advanced AI capabilities, including advanced reasoning, content generation, information synthesis, and image interpretation. Our goal with this season is to help you put those capabilities to work for you and your organizations.


AI app patterns

The Build with Google AI series features practical application code projects created for you to use and customize. However, we know that you are the best judge of what you or your organization needs to solve day-to-day problems and get work done. That's why each application we feature in this series is also meant to be used as an AI pattern. You can extend the applications immediately to solve problems and provide value for your business, and these applications show you a general coding pattern for getting value out of AI technology.

For this second season of this series, we show how you can leverage Google's Gemini AI model capabilities for applications. Here's what's coming up:

  • AI Slides Reviewer with Google Workspace (3/20) - Image interpretation is one of the Gemini model's biggest new features. We show you how to make practical use of it with a presentation review app for Google Slides that you can customize with your organization's guidelines and recommendations. 
  • AI Flutter Code Agent with Gemini API (3/27) - Code generation was the most popular episode from last season, so we are digging deeper into this topic. Build a code generation extension to write Flutter code and explore user interface designs and looks with just a few words of description.
  • AI Data Agent with Google Cloud (4/3) - Why write code to extract data when you can just ask for it? Build a web application that uses Gemini API's Function Calling feature to translate questions into code calls and data into plain language answers.

Season 1 upgraded to Gemini API: We've upgraded Season 1 tutorials and code projects to use the Gemini API so you can take advantage of the latest in generative AI technology from Google. Check them out!


Learn from the developers

Just like last season, we'll go back to the studio to talk with coders who built these projects so they can share what they learned along the way. How do you make the Gemini model review an entire presentation? What's the most effective way to generate code with AI? How do you get a database to answer questions with the Gemini API? Get insights into coding with AI to jump start your own development project.


New home for AI developer content

Developers interested in Google's AI offerings now have a new home at ai.google.dev. There you'll find a wealth of resources for building with AI from Google, including the Build with Google AI tutorials. Stay tuned for much more content through the rest of the year.

We are excited to bring you the second season of Build with Google AI – check out Season 2 right now! Use those video comments to let us know what you think and tell us what you'd like to see in future episodes.

Keep learning! Keep building!

Tune in for Google I/O on May 14

Posted by Jeanine Banks – VP & General Manager, Developer X, and Head of Developer Relations

Google I/O is arriving this year on May 14th and you’re invited to join us online! I/O offers something for everyone, whether you are developing a new application, modernizing an existing one, or transforming it into a business.

The Gemini era unlocks new possibilities for developers to build creative and productive AI-enabled applications. I/O is where you’ll hear how you can get from idea to production AI applications faster. We’re excited to share what’s new for mobile, web, and multiplatform development, and how to scale your applications in the cloud. You will be able to dive deeper into topics that interest you with over 100 sessions, workshops, codelabs, and demos.

Visit the Google I/O site and register to stay informed about I/O and other related events coming soon. The livestreamed keynotes start May 14 at 10am PT, so mark your calendar.

If you haven’t already, go try out our newest Google I/O puzzle and head to @googlefordevs on Instagram if you need a hint.

Google Cloud Next ’24 session library is now available

Posted by Max Saltonstall – Developer Relations Engineer

Google Cloud Next 2024 is coming soon, and our session library is live!

Next ‘24 covers a ton of ground, so choose your adventure. There's something on the menu for everyone, not just AI.

Developer-focused

Developers, this is your time. We have got a huge collection of edutainment for you in store for Next, including:

  • Thousands of Googlers on-site to connect and chat
  • Demos you can play with, try out, poke and see inside of (rather than just watching)
  • Talks from Champion Innovators about how they put cloud to use
  • Gathering spots for classes, interest groups, trainings and hanging out

This year we have more than double the number of advanced technical sessions, and recommendations for startups, small and medium businesses, and sustainability for all. Data scientists and data engineers can shard themselves out into 60+ big data sessions, including going to the cutting edge with BigQuery multi-modal data.


Artificial intelligence

If you want to build your own AI model, LLM or chatbot we've got sessions for that, covering ways to use Vertex AI to spin up your own large-language models on cloud, to search your multimedia library and to maintain equity in your data used for training.


Diversity, equity, and inclusion

Equity and inclusion go way past AI, and we’re really excited to have talks this year addressing allyship for your Muslim colleagues, growing inclusion in your org, and dialogues for change.

A cupped hand with a lock floating in a bed of clouds above it against a nebulous blue background. A faint ray of sunshine is shining through from the top left corner.

Security and data privacy

Don't forget security (really, who does?). Whether you are tackling security at the infrastructure, platform, machine or workload level, we've got sessions for you. Even if you're on multiple clouds, with multiple teams, you still need to get insight into the security and compliance of it all.

Speaking of all these fun chips, what about the salsa? We've got supply chain security with talks on SLSA and GUAC, plus numerous options for serverless workload security and ML data privacy.


Come join us

So, still on the fence?

Come for the magnificent shows in Vegas.

Come for the chance to sit down with expert developers and engineers.

Come for the amazing technical talks and tutorials.

Or just come for the spectacle. We've got it all at Google Cloud Next ‘24.

Check out sessions and secure your spot for three days of learning, community-building, and cloud tech with experts and peers at Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Las Vegas, April 9–11.

How recommerce startup Beni uses AI to help you shop secondhand

Posted by Lillian Chen – Global Brand and Content Marketing Manager, Google Accelerator Programs

Sarah Pinner’s passion to reduce waste began as a child when she would reach over and turn off her sibling’s water when they were brushing their teeth. This passion has fueled her throughout her career, from joining zero-waste grocery startup Imperfect Foods to co-founding Beni, an AI-powered browser extension that aggregates and recommends resale options while users shop their favorite brands. Together with her co-founder and Beni CTO Celine Lightfoot, Sarah built Beni to make online apparel resale accessible to everyday shoppers in order to accelerate the circular economy and reduce the burden of fashion on the planet.

Sarah explains how the platform helps connect shoppers to secondhand clothing: “Let’s say you’re looking at a Nike shoe. While on the Nike site, Beni pulls resale listings for that same shoe from over 40 marketplaces like Poshmark or Ebay or TheRealReal. Users can simply buy the resale version instead of new to save money and purchase more sustainably. On average, Beni users save about 55% from the new item, and it’s also a lot more sustainable to buy the item secondhand.”

Beni was one of the first companies in the recommerce platform software space, and the competitive landscape is growing. “The more recommerce platforms the better, but Beni is ahead in terms of our partnerships and access to data as well as the ability to search across data,” says Sarah.


How Beni Uses AI

AI helps Beni to ingest all data feeds from their 40+ partnerships into Beni’s database so they can surface the most relevant resale items to the shopper. For example, when Beni receives eBay’s feed for a product search, there may be 100,000 different sizes. The team has trained the Beni model to normalize sizing data. That’s one piece of their categorization.

“When we first started Beni, the intention wasn’t to start a company. It was to solve a problem, and AI has been a great tool to be able to do that,” says Sarah.


Participating in Google for Startups Accelerator: Circular Economy

Beni’s product was built using Google technology, is hosted on Google Cloud and utilizes Vision API Product Search, Vertex AI, BigQuery, and the Chrome web store.

When they heard about the Google for Startups Accelerator: Circular Economy program, it seemed like the perfect fit. “Having been in the circular economy space, and being a software business already using a plethora of Google products, and having a Google Chrome extension - getting plugged into the Google world gave us great insights about very niche questions that are very hard to find online,” says Sarah.

As an affiliate business in resale, Beni’s revenue per transaction is low—a challenge for a business model that requires scale. The Beni team worked one-on-one with Google mentors to best use Google tools in a cost-effective way. Keeping search results relevant is a core piece of the zero-waste model. “Being plugged in and being able to work through ways to improve that relevancy and that reliability with the people in Google who know how to build Google Chrome extensions, know how to use the AI tools on the backend, and deeply understand Search is super helpful.” The Google for Startups Accelerator: Circular Economy program also educated the team in how to selectively use AI tools such as Google’s Vision API Product Search versus building their own tech in-house.

“Having direct access to people at Google was really key for our development and sophisticated use of Google tools. And being a part of a cohort of other circular economy businesses was phenomenal for building connections in the same space,” says Sarah.

Google for Startups Accelerator support extended beyond tech. A program highlight for Sarah was a UX writing deep dive specifically for sustainability. “It showed us all this amazing, tangible research that Google has done about what is actually effective in terms of communicating around sustainability to drive behavior change,” said Sarah. “You can’t shame people into doing things. The way in which you communicate is really important in terms of if people will actually make a change or be receptive.”

Additionally, the new connections made with other circular economy startups and experts in their space was a huge benefit of participating in Google for Startups Accelerator. Mentorship, in particular, provided product-changing value. Google technical mentors shared advice that had a huge impact on the decision for Beni to move from utilizing Vision API Product Search to their own reverse image search. “Our mentors guided us to shift a core part of our technology. It was a big decision and was one of the biggest pieces of mentorship that helped drive us forward. This was a prime example of how the Google for Startups Accelerator program is truly here to support us in building the best products,” says Sarah.


What’s next for Beni

Beni’s mission is straightforward ‐ they’re easing the burden for shoppers to find and buy items second hand so that they can bring new people into resale and make resale the new norm.

Additionally, Beni is continuing to be built into a search platform, searching across second hand clothing. Beni offers their Chrome extension on desktop and mobile, and they will have a searchable interface. In addition to building out the platform further, Beni is looking at how they can support other e-commerce platforms and integrate resale into their offerings.

Learn about how to get involved in Google accelerator programs here.

Kubernetes 1.29 is available in the Regular channel of GKE

Kubernetes 1.29 is now available in the GKE Regular Channel since January 26th, and was available in the Rapid Channel January 11th, less than 30 days after the OSS release! For more information about the content of Kubernetes 1.29, read the Kubernetes 1.29 Release Notes.

New Features

Using CEL for Validating Admission Policy

Validating admission policies offer a declarative, in-process alternative to validating admission webhooks.

Validating admission policies use the Common Expression Language (CEL) to declare the validation rules of a policy. Validation admission policies are highly configurable, enabling policy authors to define policies that can be parameterized and scoped to resources as needed by cluster administrators. [source]

Validating Admission Policy graduates to beta in 1.29. We are especially excited about the work that Googlers Cici Huang, Joe Betz, and Jiahui Feng have led in this release to get to the beta milestone. As we move toward v1, we are actively working to ensure scalability and would appreciate any end-user feedback. [public doc here for those interested]

The beta of ValidatingAdmissionPolicy feature can be opted into by enabling the beta APIs.

InitContainers as a Sidecar

InitContainers can now be configured as sidecar containers and kept running alongside normal containers in a Pod. This is only supported by nodes running version 1.29 or later, so ensure all nodes in a cluster are at version 1.29 or later before using this feature in Pods. The feature was long awaited. This is evident by the fact that Istio has already widely tested it and the Istio community working hard to make sure that the enablement of it can be done early with minimal disruption for the clusters with older nodes. You can participate in the discussion here.

A big driver to deliver the feature is the growing number of AI/ML workloads which are often represented by Pods running to completion. Thos Pods need infrastructure sidecars - Istio and GCSFuse are examples of it, and Google recognizes this trend.

Implementation of sidecar containers is and continues to be the community effort. We are proud to highlight that Googler Sergey Kanzhelev is driving it via the Sidecar working group, and it was a great effort of many other Googlers to make sure this KEP landed so fast. John Howard made sure the early versions of implementation were tested with Istio, Wojciech Tyczyński made sure the safe rollout vie production readiness review, Tim Hockin spent many hours in API review of the feature, and Clayton Coleman gave advice and helped with code reviews.

New APIs

API Priority and Fairness/Flow Control

We are super excited to share that API Priority and Fairness graduated to Stable V1 / GA in 1.29! Controlling the behavior of the Kubernetes API server in an overload situation is a key task for cluster administrators, and this is what APF addresses. This ambitious project was initiated by Googler and founding API Machinery SIG lead Daniel Smith, and expanded to become a community-wide effort. Special thanks to Googler Wojciech Tyczyński and API Machinery members Mike Spreitzer from IBM and Abu Kashem from RedHat, for landing this critical feature in Kubernetes 1.29 (more details in the Kubernetes publication). In Google GKE we tested and utilized it early. In fact, any version above 1.26.4 is setting higher kubelet QPS values trusting the API server to handle it gracefully.

Deprecations and Removals

  • The previously deprecated v1beta2 Priority and Fairness APIs are no longer served in 1.29, so update usage to v1beta3 before upgrading to 1.29.
  • With the API Priority and Fairness graduation to v1, the v1beta3 Priority and Fairness APIs are newly deprecated in 1.29, and will no longer be served in 1.32.
  • In the Node API, take a look at the changes to the status.kubeProxyVersion field, which will not be populated starting in v1.33. The field is currently populated with the kubelet version, not the kube-proxy version, and might not accurately reflect the kube-proxy version in use. For more information, see KEP-4004.
  • 1.29 removed support for the insecure SHA1 algorithm. To prevent impact on your clusters, you must replace incompatible certificates of webhook servers and extension API servers before upgrading your clusters to version 1.29.
    • GKE will not auto-upgrade clusters with webhook backends using incompatible certificates to 1.29 until you replace the certificates or until version 1.28 reaches end of life. For more information refer to the official GKE documentation.
  • The Ceph CephFS (kubernetes.io/cephfs) and RBD (kubernetes.io/rbd) volume plugins are deprecated since 1.28 and will be removed in a future release

Shoutout to the Production Readiness Review (PRR) team

For each new Kubernetes Release, there is a dedicated sub group of SIG Architecture, composed of very senior contributors in the Kubernetes Community, that regularly conducts Production Readiness reviews for each new release, going through each feature.

  • OSS Production Readiness Reviews (PRR) reduce toil for all the different Cloud Providers, by shifting the effort onto OSS developers.
  • OSS Production Readiness Reviews surface production safety, observability, and scalability issues with OSS features at design time, when it is still possible to affect the outcomes.
  • By ensuring feature gates, solid enable → disable → enable testing, and attention to upgrade and rollout considerations, OSS Production Readiness Reviews enable rapid mitigation of failures in new features.

As part of this group, we want to thank Googlers John Belamaric and Wojciech Tyczyński for doing this remarkable, heavy lifting on non shiny, and often invisible work. Additionally, we’d like to congratulate Googler Joe Betz who recently graduated as a new PRR reviewer, after shadowing during all 2023 the process.

By Jordan Liggitt, Jago Macleod, Sergey Kanzhelev, and Federico Bongiovanni – Google Kubernetes Kernel team

Carbon Limit’s concrete technology is saving the environment using AI

Posted by Lillian Chen – Global Brand and Content Marketing Manager, Google Accelerator Programs

Located in Boca Raton, Carbon Limit aims to decarbonize the industry and take part in saving, protecting, and healing the environment. Cofounder Tim Sperry explains that for him and his cofounders Oro Padron, and Christina Stavridi, the mission is personal. “I’ve lost family members [to polluted air]. Oro has his own story, Christina has her own story, and our other core team member Angel just had kids. All of us have our own connection to our mission. And with that, we've developed a really strong company culture,” he says.

Today, Carbon Limit is evolving to create sustainable solutions for the built environment. Their flagship product, CaptureCrete, is an additive that gives concrete the ability to capture and store CO2 directly from the air.

Carbon Limit’s initial prototype — a portable shipping container fitted with solar panels, filtered media, and intake fans — was a direct air capture system. With a business model that was dependent on tax credits and carbon credits, the team decided to pivot. “We took our original technology, which was always meant to capture CO2 to store in concrete as a permanent storage solution to CO2 in the air, and turned that into concrete technology,” explains Tim. “We’re lowering the carbon footprint of concrete projects and problems, and providing the ability to generate valuable carbon credits. It actually pays to use our technology: you’re quantifiably lowering the carbon footprint and improving the environment, and you can make money from these carbon credits.”


How Carbon Limit uses AI

Combating climate change is a race against time, as cofounder and CMO Oro explains: “We are in an industry that moves at a pace that when technology catches up, sometimes it’s too late.”

“We have found that AI actually is not eliminating, it is creating—it is letting our own people discover things about themselves and possibilities that they didn’t know about,” says Oro. “We embrace AI because we are embracing the future, and we strive to be pioneers.”

Artificial intelligence also allows for transparency in a space that can become congested by unreliable data. “We’re developing tools, specifically the digital MRV, which stands for measurement, reporting, and verification of carbon credits,” says Tim. “There is bad press that there’s a lot of fake or unverified carbon credits being sold, generated, or created.” AI gives real-time, real-world data, exposure, and quantification of the carbon credits. Carbon Limit is generating carbon credits with hard tech, bringing trust into tech.


How Carbon Limit uses Google technology

Carbon Limit is a team of developers, programmers, and data scientists working across multiple operating systems, so they needed a centralized system for collaborating. “Google Workspace has allowed us to build our own CRMs with Google Sheets and Google Docs, which we’ve found to be the easiest way to onboard quickly. Google has been an amazing tool for us to communicate internally.” Christina adds, “We have a small but diverse team with ages that vary. Not every single team member is used to using the same tools, so the way Oro has onboarded the team and utilized these tools in a customizable way where they’re easily adoptable and used by every single team member to optimize our work has been super beneficial.”

Additionally, the Carbon Limit team uses Google data for training their CO2-related data, and Google Colab to train their models. “We have some models that were made in Python, but utilizing Google Cloud has helped us predict models faster,” says Oro.


Participating in Google for Startups Accelerator: Climate Change

Before Carbon Limit started the Google for Startups Accelerator: Climate Change program, the Carbon Limit team considered integrating artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) into their process but wanted to ensure that they were making the right decision. With Google mentorship and support, they went full force with AI and ML algorithms. “Accelerator: Climate Change helped us realize exactly what we needed to do,” says Oro.

Participating in the program also gave Carbon Limit access to resources that helped enhance their SEO. “We learned how to increment our backlinks and how to improve performance, which has been extremely helpful to put us on the map. Our whole backbone has been built thanks to Google Workspace,” says Oro.

“The Google for Startups Accelerator program gave us valuable resources and guidance on what we can do, how we can do it, and what not to do” says Tim. “The mentorship and learning from people who developed the technology, use the technology, and work with it every day was invaluable for us.” Christina adds, “The mentors also helped us refine our pitch when communicating our solution on different platforms. That was very useful to understand how to speak to different customers and investors.”

The program also led to a new client for Carbon Limit: Google. “That was critical because with Google as an early adopter, that helped us build a significant amount of credibility and validation,” Tim tells us.


What’s next for Carbon Limit

Looking ahead, Carbon Limit will be launching a new technology that can be used in data centers to mitigate electricity as well as reduce and remove CO2 pollution.

“We went from a carbon capture solution to sustainable solutions because we wanted to go even bigger,” says Tim. “We want to inspire others to do what we’re doing and help create more awareness and a more environmentally friendly world.”

Tim shares, “I love what I do. I love to be able to invent something that didn’t exist. But more importantly, it helps protect my family, my loved ones, future generations, and the environment. And I get to do it with this amazing group of people at Carbon Limit.”

Learn about how to get involved in Google accelerator programs here.