Smart Deployments: Canary Deployments Using Flagger

Deploying applications with minimal downtime, risk, and impact on users is crucial. Canary deployments are an effective strategy for achieving this goal, and when combined with powerful tools like Flagger, they can make a significant difference. In this blog post, we'll explore canary deployments, how they work, their benefits, and how to implement them in Kubernetes using Flagger.

What are Canary Deployments?

Canary deployment is a progressive rollout strategy where new versions of an application or service are gradually deployed to a small subset of users before being rolled out to the entire user base. This approach is inspired by the canary in a coal mine concept, where miners used canaries to detect dangerous gases in the mine before humans were affected. Similarly, canary deployments help detect issues and bugs in a new version of an application before they impact the broader user base.

How Canary Deployments Work

In a canary deployment, a new version of an application is deployed alongside the existing version, and a small percentage of user traffic is directed to the new version. This allows developers and operations teams to monitor the new version's performance, stability, and compatibility with real-world traffic before deciding to roll it out further.

If the new version performs well and no significant issues are detected, more traffic is gradually shifted to the new version until it fully replaces the old version. However, if any problems arise, the traffic can be rolled back to the old version, minimizing the impact on users and allowing the development team to address the issues before attempting another rollout.

Benefits of Canary Deployments

Canary deployments offer several benefits to organizations, including:

• Reduced risk: By gradually rolling out new versions and closely monitoring their performance, this minimize the potential impact of bugs and issues on the broader user base.
• Faster feedback: allows development teams to receive real-world feedback on new features and changes more quickly, enabling them to iterate and improve more rapidly.
• Easier rollbacks: If issues are detected during a deployment, it's much easier to roll back to the previous version, as only a small subset of users is affected.
• Improved user experience: helps ensure that users have a consistently high-quality experience, as problematic changes can be detected and addressed before they impact the majority of users.

Can You Do Canary Deployments in Kubernetes?

Yes, you can implement canary deployments in Kubernetes using a variety of tools and techniques. Kubernetes itself provides built-in support for rolling updates and rollbacks, which can be adapted for canary deployments by controlling the rollout percentage and monitoring the application's performance.

However, to fully leverage the power of canary deployments in Kubernetes, it's beneficial to use a dedicated tool like Flagger, which provides advanced features and automation for progressive delivery strategies, including canary deployments.

What is Flagger?

Flagger is an open-source Kubernetes operator that automates the promotion of canary deployments using various service mesh providers, such as Istio, Linkerd, or App Mesh. Flagger simplifies the process of managing canary deployments in Kubernetes by automating the analysis, promotion, and rollback of new application versions based on configurable criteria, such as performance metrics and thresholds.

Smart Delivery in Kubernetes with Flagger

Flagger enables smart canary deployments in Kubernetes by automating the analysis, promotion, and rollback of new application versions based on configurable criteria, such as performance metrics and thresholds. To implement smart canary deployments in Kubernetes using Flagger, follow these steps:

• Install Flagger in your Kubernetes cluster, along with your preferred service mesh provider (e.g., Istio, Linkerd, or App Mesh).
• Configure your application's Kubernetes manifests to include Flagger's custom resources, such as Canary and MetricTemplate. These resources define the desired rollout strategy, traffic routing, and monitoring criteria for your canary deployment.
• Deploy your application to the Kubernetes cluster using the configured manifests. Flagger will automatically detect the new version and begin managing the canary deployment process.
• Monitor the progress of your canary deployment using Flagger's built-in analysis and monitoring features. Flagger will continuously evaluate the performance of the new version based on the defined metrics and thresholds, adjusting the traffic routing and rollout percentage accordingly.
• If the new version meets the defined criteria and performs well during the canary deployment, Flagger will gradually shift more traffic to the new version until it fully replaces the old version.
• In case of any issues or performance degradation with the new version, Flagger will automatically roll back the traffic to the previous version, minimizing the impact on users and allowing the development team to address the issues before attempting another rollout.

We got you covered

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