Akamai Cloud Computing vs. Kubernetes

Akamai Connected Cloud Linode would be a good service to host a content delivery network (CDN) because of its edge network but I'd prefer not to use Akamai Connected Cloud Linode for tasks that need GPU power such as Machine Learning or Artificial Intelligence (AI) because Akamai Connected Cloud Linode lacks deep GPU compute compared to AWS or Google Cloud or Microsoft Azure

Along with all the best features and support by k8s, the automatic container scheduling to worker nodes and also self-healing containers which is what I like the most. On the other side, when I was installing the k8s cluster on CentOS 8, it was quite difficult for me, but never mind it is working as we expected and it is a one-time effort. Especially, in my case, there are more than 7 application containers required to run and communicate with each other, so for us, Kubernetes is an optimal solution.

Incentivized

• Many locations of datacenter
• Wide selection of pre-installed applications in the marketplace
• Price is very affordable.
• User interface in the account panel is easy to understand.
• Fast server
• Linode provides tutorials for new users thru Youtube channel.
• Payment is per usage, not monthly.
• Responsive customer service

Incentivized

• Complex cluster management can be done with simple commands with strong authentication and authorization schemes
• Exhaustive documentation and open community smoothens the learning process
• As a user a few concepts like pod, deployment and service are sufficient to go a long way

Incentivized

• The (new) 'create custom image' function needs a bit of work before it is useable.
• New accounts have limited features until a support requested is made to turn specific ones on. It would be useful to have an account page that tells you what is disabled so unpleasant surprises are not had at the pointy end of a deadline.
• Stackscripts would be better if it more info was transferred to the script. Eg the Linode Label given, plan requested, etc. But now I am just nit-picking

• Local development, Kubernetes does tend to be a bit complicated and unnecessary in environments where all development is done locally.
• The need for add-ons, Helm is almost required when running Kubernetes. This brings a whole new tool to manage and learn before a developer can really start to use Kubernetes effectively.
• Finicy configmap schemes. Kubernetes configmaps often have environment breaking hangups. The fail safes surrounding configmaps are sadly lacking.

Incentivized

In this eight years of being Linode's customer, there hasn't been a single day we faced problem. Even the migration or maintenance activities have been planned, organised and priorly informed. Kudos to taking care of even such small metrics. Though the instances are unmanaged, the support team helps with relevant document links, or their own articles that help us to fix or solve the issues we face.

Incentivized

The Kubernetes is going to be highly likely renewed as the technologies that will be placed on top of it are long term as of planning. There shouldn't be any last minute changes in the adoption and I do not anticipate sudden change of the core underlying technology. It is just that the slow process of technology adoption that makes it hard to switch to something else.

It's pretty easy for me, but I preferred their old interface before it was called 'cloud' (not a computer science term.) The new interface looks easier but I had to ask for help for things I used to be able to find myself. If someone was new to it--without having used their old interface--it might be easier for them than it originally was for me.

Incentivized

It is an eminently usable platform. However, its popularity is overshadowed by its complexity. To properly leverage the capabilities and possibilities of Kubernetes as a platform, you need to have excellent understanding of your use case, even better understanding of whether you even need Kubernetes, and if yes - be ready to invest in good engineering support for the platform itself

Incentivized

There is very little planned downtime. Whenever planned downtime is necessary I'm always given lots of advanced notice and an explanation that I can pass along to my users that they'll understand. I really appreciate that Linode appreciates my commitment to reliable service to my users. It shows that they believe they've been successful when I'm successful.

Incentivized

Servers are well dimensioned and price performant. Of course one always wants more, so if they were to upgrade their hardware for the same price I'd consider moving more workloads. Networking - never had an issue. Hardware speeds - disks are fast and can grow to great size.

Incentivized

Support was excellent and fast. The documentation is extensive and helpful. I learned many things from their online documentation. I did not contact them by phone, but email took a day or less. Complex problems would probably need a service contract. I liked the friendly and polite tone of the support.

Incentivized

We got kick started with an initial walkthrough along with some free credits. The initial walkthrough helped us to understand Linode's ecosystem and start our hands on with Linode. We tried out some apps from Marketplace initially with the free credits, which not only helped us understand Linode better, but also those apps. We had implemented many such apps to our customers with Linode

Incentivized

We're a small organization. The implementation of our Linode solution was trivial. Once I justified a cloud server to my bosses over a co-location -- the co-lo wasn't as fast as our linode server in load tests -- it was a matter of moving one Linux implementation to another. Trivial.

Incentivized

It is more user-friendly than the big three cloud providers like AWS and GCP. The interface blows them out of the water; pricing is so much more competitive—no egregious bandwidth fees like AWS. As a small startup, cutting out the overhead of ultra-complex UI and pricing dramatically helps. It seems to be matched tit-for-tat with DigitalOcean, and their UI is similar in many ways. DigitalOcean has more mature capabilities, even though Linode/Akamai was founded earlier. Linode/Akamai provides better price-per-performance, though, as DigitalOcean is expensive nowadays.

Incentivized

As I said earlier also - - K8s manage the workloads better as compared to OpenStack in terms of reliability, observability & reachability. - K8s is not limited to only a single networking or storage solution as compared to OpenStack. - Networking (which is a key concept) is much simpler in K8s as compared to OpenStack. - It is possible to upgrade your applications without downtime in K8s but in OpenStack, you either have to divert the traffic or face an outage because you have to delete the whole stack & then recreate it.

Incentivized

I completely agree with the above statement. Linode provides the best option in terms of configurations and scalability. We have chosen share CPU instances many times and then moved on with dedicated CPU instances, just with a click of button.

Incentivized

• Over the years, Linode has enabled us to stop maintaining our own server hardware, and leave that up to them.
• On the other hand, Linode provides a bare machine, and requires us to provide almost all of the systems administration effort.

Incentivized

• Because of microservices, Kubernetes makes it easy to find the cost of each application easily.
• Like every new technology, initially, it took more resources to educate ourselves but over a period of time, I believe it's going to be worth it.

Incentivized