The unique and state of the art Apache Stratos (Incubating) architecture makes the platform as a service (PaaS) framework stand out among the rest. There are few factors that one should pay attention to, in order to understand the key advantages of the Stratos PaaS. Those include:
- Cartridge model
- Unified communication infrastructure
- Centralised logging and monitoring
- IaaS plugin capabilities
- Load balancer plugin capabilities
- Health check tooling plugin capabilities
Cartridge Model
Cartridge model makes Stratos unique among the PaaS alternatives because it allows the runtime extensibility of the PaaS framework. It is the enabler of the polyglot aspect of the PaaS container framework. The polyglot nature enables the support of multiple types of cartridges such as data cartridge, language cartridge, framework cartridges and operating system cartridges to be plugged in and managed by the PaaS framework in unified manner.
Another key advantage of Stratos cartridge model is that it enables bringing in even legacy containers and applications into cloud with ease. So, with Stratos, you can cloud enable both existing IT assets as well as the future IT assets that you plan to use or yet to acquire.
Unified Communication Infrastructure
Apache Stratos, within the architecture, has a unified communication model across components within the PaaS framework. This model enables loosely coupled component based communication architecture within the framework. This is achieved using a message broker.
The message broker use a publisher/subscriber model for unified communication, and use a standard protocol, namely JMX. This makes it easy to integrate with third parties and also guaranteed interoperability, thanks to the use of JMX.
Centralised Logging and Monitoring
Apache Stratos is equipped with a centralised monitoring and metering mechanism with a unified logging framework. It also has the provision for plugging in a third party business activity monitor (BAM). Ability to plug in BAM enables the tracking and monitoring as well as tuning the PaaS deployment based on the key performance indicators (KPI).
Metering is a key requirement in a PaaS framework, to help bill the tenants to enable the pay as you go model.
IaaS Plugin Capabilities
The use of jclouds API is the key advantage in Apache Stratos PaaS architecture in terms of supporting different infrastructure as a service (IaaS) layers. Because of this standardized API based approach, you can plug any IaaS easily.
As of now the integrated and tested IaaS list include: OpenStack all versions (including SUSE cloud), vCloud and EC2.
TO support the IaaS of your choice, it is all about integrating via the APIs.
Load Balancer Plugin Capabilities
Apache Stratos comes with a built in load balancer, and an associated set of load balancing algorithms. It also has the ability to plugin any third party load balancer using message broker model. The message broker communication model can be used to get any load balancer to integrate into the topology and auto scaling model of the PaaS framework.
Health Check Tooling Plugin Capabilities
Health check is a key requirement for any IT deployment and the key stakeholders are the DevOps. Apache Stratos has the provision to plugin any third party health checking/monitoring framework. This way the IT experts can use the familiar set of tools that they are comfortable with, to stay informed of the health of the PaaS deployment.
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