Cloud-native technologies such as Kubernetes promise to be a hedge against cloud lock-in. A new open-source project, Tekton, offers a Kubernetes-native framework for quickly building CI/CD systems that run anywhere Kubernetes runs. Plus, Tekton will work with existing CI/CD servers such as Jenkins.
The Google-led project, which has had contributions from other companies, features a shared set of building blocks for creating cloud-native CI/CD pipelines. WIth Tekton, developers can build and deploy software across multiple clouds or on-premises systems. Key capabilities of Tekton include:
- Tekton Pipelines that run on the Kubernetes container orchestration platform and leverage containers as building blocks. Through Tekton Pipelines, developers combine containers to make complex pipelines. Kubernetes clusters are a first-class type with Tekton Pipelines.
- Tools for storing, managing, and securing artifacts.
- A results store API to provide insights into test and build results.
Tekton is designed to enable developers to deploy immutable images, manage version control of infrastructure, and perform rollbacks. Components are provided to standardize CI/CD tools across languages and deployment environments. These components can work with CI/CD tools including Jenkins, Skaffold, Knative, and Jenkins X, which also leverages Kubernetes and the cloud for CI/CD, providing pipeline automation.
Tekton is also designed to work well with Google Cloud Platform with specific Kubernetes tools. It can be deployed to Google Kubernetes Engine and supports artifact storage and scanning using Google Container Registry. Tekton also can be deployed across environments including VMs, serverless platforms, or Firebase.
Tekton recently was named an initial project hosted by the newly formed Continuous Delivery Foundation, along with projects including Jenkins X, Jenkins, and Spinnaker. The foundation was formed under the umbrella of the Linux Foundation.
You can download Tekton Pipelines from GitHub.
