“Can I trust open source tech to be there for me when I really need it?”
Lots of organizations are asking themselves that question these days. The short answer is yes. But it’s important to remember that not all open source software is created equally, and the decisions you make can have long-lasting ramifications for your hybrid cloud environment.
With that in mind, here are some things to look for when choosing open source for your production deployment:
Control over the code: Is there an independent organization, such as the Linux Foundation or the Cloud Native Computing Foundation, that maintains the source code? Or is it controlled by a single corporate entity that could change the licensing terms and start selling it as a proprietary offering?
A vibrant, growing community: An open source project is only as good as the people contributing to it. How many contributors and Github stars does the project have? How many recent commits? Are there regular events for community members to meet, share ideas and collaborate? What about an active Slack or Discord channel? Is there an ecosystem of partners and integrations?
Consumability: The open source world is full of experimental projects that can lead to amazing breakthroughs. That doesn’t necessarily mean you can easily put them to use in a production environment. Are there major enterprise deployments you can reference? How large or complex are they compared to your project? How much custom development was required to put it into production?
Support: How can you find help with things like architecture, upgrades, lifecycle management and security patching? Where do the updates come from? How do you deploy them to production?
Open core: Is the project itself reasonably complete and usable as is, or have essential components such as high availability, dashboards and telemetry intentionally been left out to force you down a proprietary path? Is the project easy to extend and integrate?
No matter which open source software you choose, all the work it takes to configure, deploy, integrate, manage and secure it can eat away at the benefits you’re hoping to achieve.
At Platina Systems, we've taken the work and risk out of managing the best in open source infrastructure components by integrating them into a seamless platform, Platina Command Center, that solves the tough challenges around interoperability, unified telemetry, security and upgrades.
You can have a public cloud-like architecture and interface in the secure, controlled environment of your choice, with predictable, low costs and limitless scale — without having to worry or waste your scarce developer resources on reinventing the wheel.
Want to see how? Request a demo today.
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