Azure Core Container Upstream Projects

This list of projects is maintained by the Azure Core Container Upstream team. This list is intended to help you make informed decisions about what projects to use (or not use) in the context of your goals (e.g. proof of concept vs. production). To make this decision you need to consider your goals, your need for formal support, the project's maturity, governance, version level, and your willingness to work in open source.

Support

Projects listed on this page are open source that Microsoft maintain or contribute to. These projects are NOT covered by the Microsoft Azure support policy. To get help please search the open issues on the project using the links in the table. To communicate with the Azure Container Compute Upstream team please use the issues in this repo. If your issue isn't already represented, please open a new one. However, if you consume one of these projects as a part of a Microsoft or Azure product or service, you may be eligible for support through that product or service.

Project list

Project Area	Project & (artifacts)	Goal	Project State & API Version	Communication	Use on Azure
Kubernetes Cluster Management
	Cluster API Azure Provider (releases) Tests	Self-managed clusters on Azure using Cluster API	CNCF: incubating API: v1alpha4	#cluster-api-azure kubernetes-sig-cluster-lifecycle@googlegroups.com GitHub issues
	Image Builder (releases) Tests	Tools for building Kubernetes disk images		#image-builder kubernetes-sig-cluster-lifecycle@googlegroups.com GitHub issues
	Cluster API Add-on Provider for Helm (releases) Tests	Use Helm charts to manage the installation and lifecycle of Cluster API add-ons.	CNCF: incubating API: v1alpha1	#cluster-api kubernetes-sig-cluster-lifecycle@googlegroups.com GitHub issues
	Cluster Autoscaler (releases) Tests	Cluster Autoscaler is a tool that automatically adjusts the size of the Kubernetes cluster.	Kubernetes: stable	#sig-autoscaling kubernetes-sig-autoscaling@googlegroups.com GitHub issues
	Cluster Autoscaler Provider Azure (releases) Tests	Azure provider for running Cluster Autoscaler on AKS and Azure self-managed clusters.	Kubernetes: stable	#sig-autoscaling kubernetes-sig-autoscaling@googlegroups.com GitHub issues
	Multi-Cluster Service APIs (MCS) (releases)	Kubernetes standard APIs for multi-cluster service controller implementations.	Kubernetes: alpha	#sig-multicluster kubernetes-sig-multicluster@googlegroups.com GitHub issues
Kubernetes Enhancements
	Windows containers (kubernetes releases) Tests	Run Windows server containers with Kubernetes	Kubernetes: stable API: N/A	#sig-windows kubernetes-sig-windows@googlegroups.com Windows Community Forum GitHub issues	AKS Windows
	IPv4/v6 Dual-Stack (kubernetes releases) Tests	IPv4/IPv6 dual-stack enables the allocation of both IPv4 and IPv6 addresses to Pods and Services.	Kubernetes: IPv6: beta Dual-stack: GA	#sig-network kubernetes-sig-network@googlegroups.com GitHub issues	Use dual-stack with AKS
	KMSv2 (blog (alpha) blog (beta))	Encryption at rest of Kubernetes data in etcd using Key Management Service (KMS) v2 API	Kubernetes: GA API: v2	#sig-auth-kms-dev GitHub issues
	Structured Authentication Configuration (blog (beta))	Structured authentication configuration in the Kubernetes API server. Initially, only a jwt configuration will be supported, which will serve as the next iteration of the existing OIDC authenticator.	Kubernetes: beta API: v1beta1	#sig-auth-authenticators-dev GitHub issues
	Structured Authorization Configuration (blog (beta))	Structured authorization configuration in the Kubernetes API serverintroducing a more structured and versatile way to configure the authorization chain, focusing on enabling multiple webhooks and providing explicit control mechanisms.	Kubernetes: beta API: v1beta1	#sig-auth-authorizers-dev GitHub issues
	Move Storage Version Migrator in-tree	Move storage version migrator in-tree to make it easy for users to perform storage migrations.	Kubernetes: alpha API: v1alpha1	#sig-api-machinery-storageversion-dev GitHub issues
Cloud Native Governance and Security
	OPA Gatekeeper (releases)	K8s native Open Policy Agent policy enforcement	Azure: GA (AKS and Arc) CNCF: graduated API: Config: v1alpha1; ConstraintTemplate: v1; Constraints: v1beta1; Mutation: v1; External Data: v1beta1	#kubernetes-policy GitHub issues	Azure Policy for AKS Azure Policy for Azure Arc connected clusters
	Secrets Store CSI Driver (releases) Builds	Integrates secrets stores with Kubernetes via a Container Storage Interface (CSI) volume	Kubernetes: GA API: v1	#csi-secrets-store GitHub issues
	Azure KeyVault Provider for Secrets Store CSI Driver (releases)	Enables mounting AKV secrets as volumes in K8s pods	Azure: GA (AKS and Arc) API: N/A	GitHub issues	Use with AKS
	KMS Plugin for Key Vault (releases)	Enables encryption at rest of Kubernetes data in etcd using Azure Key Vault	Azure: GA (AKS) API: N/A	GitHub issues	Use with AKS
	Azure Workload Identity (releases)	Uses Kubernetes primitives to associate managed identities for Azure resources and identities in Azure Active Directory (AAD) with pods based on Workload Identity federation	Azure: GA (AKS) API: N/A	GitHub issues	How to use (OSS) How to use (AKS)
	Eraser (releases)	Cleaning up images from Kubernetes nodes	CNCF: sandbox Azure: GA (AKS) API: v1	#eraser GitHub issues	How to use (OSS) How to use (AKS)
	Copacetic (releases)	CLI tool for directly patching container images using reports from vulnerability scanners	CNCF: sandbox	#copa GitHub issues	How to use
	DALEC (releases)	Produce secure packages and containers with declarative configurations	Azure: incubating	GitHub issues	How to use
Cloud Native Service Mesh
	Istio	The leading service mesh on Kubernetes	CNCF: graduated APIs: experimental, alpha, beta, stable	Istio Slack GitHub issues	Deploy Istio addon on AKS
	Gateway API	A sig-network subproject that establishes a specification for service networking in Kubernetes (ingress and service mesh)	Kubernetes: v1beta APIs: Standard and Experimental	#gateway-api in Kubernetes Slack GitHub issues	Use application gateway for containers
	Envoy Proxy	A high performance, cloud-native proxy	CNCF: graduated	Envoy Slack GitHub issues
Container Runtime
	Moby (releases)	Toolkit for app containerization		#opencontainers Moby Forums GitHub issues	Azure Kubernetes Service Azure Stack Hub many more
	Containerd (releases)	Complete container lifecycle management on Linux and Windows hosts	CNCF: graduated API: N/A	#opencontainers dev@opencontainers.org GitHub issues	Use with AKS
	Containerd runwasi (releases)	Facilitates running Wasm / WASI workloads managed by containerd	CNCF: alpha	#runwasi GitHub issues	Docker Desktop
	Containerd Wasm Shims (releases)	containerd shims for running WebAssembly workloads in Kubernetes	DeisLabs: alpha	#GitHub Issues	Docker Desktop AKS WASI Node Pools
Platforms
	Brigade	Event-driven scripting for Kubernetes	CNCF: Archived API: v2	#brigade channel on Kubernetes Slack GitHub Issues
Deployment Tools
	Porter	Package your application artifact, client tools, configuration and deployment logic together as a versioned bundle that you can distribute, and then install with a single command	CNCF: Sandbox Stable: v0.38.x Prerelease: v1.0.0-alpha	Mailing list, slack, etc Project Board	Azure Service Operator, Azure Trusted Research Environments
	CNAB Specification	Cloud Native Application Bundle Specification implemented by Porter	Spec: 1.1	#cnab on CNCF Slack Issues
Web Assembly / WASI
	SpiderLightning	SpiderLightning defines a set of *.wit files that abstract distributed application capabilities, such as key-value, messaging, http-server/client and more.	DeisLabs: alpha v0.3.2	GitHub Issues	AKS WASI Node Pools
Past Projects
	AKS Engine (releases)	Self-managed clusters on Azure	Azure: Deprecated. Consider using AKS or Cluster API Azure Provider
	Virtual Kubelet (releases)	Enable services to masquerade as kubelet - serverless	CNCF: sandbox API: N/A	#virtual-kubelet GitHub issues	AKS Virtual Nodes
	AAD Pod Identity (releases)	Enables K8s applications to access cloud resources securely with Azure Active Directory	Azure: Archived API: v1	GitHub issues GitHub Project	Use with AKS
	Service Mesh Interface (SMI) Spec	A standard interface for service meshes on Kubernetes	Deprecated; consider using Gateway API	#smi GitHub issues
	Open Service Mesh (OSM)	A lightweight, extensible, cloud native service mesh	Deprecated; consider using Istio	#openservicemesh GitHub issues

Maturity

Open source project maturity can be assessed on many dimensions including age, number of contributors, diversity of contributor employers, and many more. Two you should consider are represented in the table as:

• Project state - The first entry in the Maturity column represents the project's status. Projects in the CNCF (kubernetes, kubernetes-sigs, prometheus, etc) use the CNCF maturity model. Projects in the Azure, Microsoft, or deislabs GitHub orgs are working towards using the graduation guidelines defined in this repo.
• API or Feature Versions if relevant, are listed as the second entry of the Maturity column, and follow the Kubernetes convention except where noted

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