DevOps teams are embracing Linux containers to speed the delivery of new applications. Many of them consider containers for their ease of packaging application dependencies and portability, but DevOps teams can also use containers to bridge between existing and new applications. Running containers in production, however, goes well beyond experimenting with Docker and Kubernetes and requires an enterprise-grade container platform that automates application life cycles for developers, streamlines operations, and enforces governance and security policies at scale.

“DevOps teams use our container platform to accelerate application delivery,” said Martin Klaus, senior director product marketing at Red Hat. “Once they realize that benefit, they start using containers to modernize and augment application architectures with microservices, and then expand that use case across hybrid and multi-cloud deployments.”

Accelerate application delivery processes
Container application platforms enable DevOps teams to deliver new capabilities faster. Developers can take advantage of templates, build automation, release pipelines, A/B testing and automated rollbacks. Operations gets the control, security, and governance it needs to enforce policies and ensure compliance. DevOps teams modernizing existing applications and building next-generation applications can achieve scale-out capability, modularity, and fast deployment independently of the underlying infrastructure.

KeyBank, a super-regional bank, slashed its release cycle from three months to one week. Before adopting OpenShift, KeyBank wanted to evolve a 15-year-old servlet-based Java web app into a mobile app. The architectural objectives were to create an API layer that separated the presentation logic from the business logic and improve the Continuous Integration and Deployment process. Now, KeyBank is delivering zero downtime releases every week and automatically scaling load tests. In addition, all customer-facing applications are running as containers on top of OpenShift.

Leverage modern architecture
As software teams add new capabilities to existing applications, they’re looking at low-cost, high-performance alternatives to traditional application servers. Moving to a container-based app server model offers the additional benefit of migrating those workloads to the cloud. Whether you lift and shift existing applications, modernize them, or develop brand new applications and services, you benefit from automated container orchestration at scale.

“Customers are using container-optimized application services and frameworks to enhance, rewrite, and develop applications in the cloud,” said Klaus. “They are also dynamically provisioning and consuming container-native file and object-based storage in OpenShift that is scheduled and orchestrated the exact same way as application containers on Kubernetes.”

When developers can provision and consume storage on-demand, developers can avoid waiting for IT. They also get a persistent data layer for stateful applications and support for stateless cloud-based applications.

Travel industry technology solution provider Amadeus wanted a platform that could run applications on-site, over multiple datacenters, or through public, private, or hybrid cloud platforms. To do that, Amadeus needed an abstracted container layer on top of its cloud implementation that developers could use to build and deploy applications. Using OpenShift, Amadeus decreased system latency, improved platform availability, streamlined operations through automation, and sped the delivery of new applications.

Take advantage of hybrid clouds
DevOps teams that want to build and deploy applications across clouds are looking for an abstraction layer that provides a consistent development experience and consistent management capabilities regardless of the deployment environment.

“Ops teams need complete visibility from the application layer to the containers to the infrastructure,” said Klaus. “We have natively integrated CloudForms in OpenShift and enhanced it with container-monitoring capabilities, metering and policy management to give you that operations visibility regardless of your IT footprint.”

EdLogics, a health education-based consumer-engagement company needed a platform that could support its rapidly-growing customer base. After proving the viability of project using public cloud services, EdLogics migrated to a Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)-compliant and Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP)-certified infrastructure running in a private cloud. The OpenShift-based solution provides the scalability, reliability, and automation EdLogics needs to help consumers manage their health more effectively.

“Container platforms, microservices and DevOps are means to an end,” said Klaus. “Now it’s time to get back to basics and focus on business innovation.”

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