Modernization to secure microservices has improved uptime and observability for critical apps
What is our primary use case?
My main use case for Red Hat OpenShift is that we had several security tools that we deployed to Red Hat OpenShift platform, specifically when we were migrating our applications from monolithic architecture to microservices, and our OpenShift platform was using some of the AWS VMs as master and worker nodes, so it was completely on AWS, and we actually set it up from scratch, setting up those projects to be used for our applications and then deploying them with Red Hat OpenShift version 4, which we started using five years back, as it was the latest at that point in time, and then we continued to operate and run our applications there.
A quick, specific example of an application I deployed on Red Hat OpenShift is a banking-based application which we moved from a monolithic architecture to a microservices architecture, and we completely deployed it end-to-end, split into 10 plus microservices, and then it was deployed to Red Hat OpenShift platform 4.
What is most valuable?
The best features that Red Hat OpenShift offers in my experience include being a pre-assembled product where Red Hat actually makes choices for you, which for example, as a CloudOps Engineer, means I don't have to explicitly go into CLI because the web-based UI is simple and helpful for debugging, and they've integrated the logging of the application within Red Hat OpenShift. I really appreciate the automated updates, built-in observability comes with pre-configured Prometheus and Grafana stack for monitoring our cluster health, and the native tooling it has such as Red Hat OpenShift GitOps, which is a Red Hat supported Argo CD, and the integration into clusters are based on role-based access control with security by default, where Red Hat OpenShift is quite secure out of the box, having those strict permissions and using Security Context Constraints, and especially the immutable OS and Red Hat OpenShift virtualization, which is something that is really helpful.
Red Hat OpenShift has positively impacted my organization primarily through observability, as for us, application uptime matters a lot when providing public-facing products consumed by customers, and hence, we're using that to keep refining our application and products through observability metrics and keeping pace with market trends, as we promised 99.99% uptime to our customers, and the observability in Red Hat OpenShift is really helping us a lot with that.
What needs improvement?
Areas where Red Hat OpenShift can be improved include the licensing being a bit complex and maybe expensive, as that is something in the hands of the organization's higher management, especially when those licensing agreements are done, and I think Red Hat OpenShift is quite resource-heavy because the control plane and default monitoring stack consume significant resources, meaning for small clusters, a large percentage of compute goes just to running Red Hat OpenShift itself, not our apps.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Red Hat OpenShift for close to six years across those different organizations.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Red Hat OpenShift is stable in my experience.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Red Hat OpenShift's scalability is really good.
How are customer service and support?
Customer support is really good because so far in our case, we have always received a prompt response, and they have been really helpful to us. I would rate the customer support a 10 out of 10.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We did not use any other solution before Red Hat OpenShift.
How was the initial setup?
Red Hat OpenShift is deployed in my organization on AWS.
What was our ROI?
We have saved a lot of time with Red Hat OpenShift.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing would suggest that it was more into a high cost, but then again, I'm an engineer, so this is taken care of by the higher management, and I don't have any definitive answer.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We did not evaluate any other solution before choosing Red Hat OpenShift because we wanted to use a licensed product for Kubernetes that has enterprise support.
What other advice do I have?
I would rate Red Hat OpenShift a 9 out of 10 overall. I choose a nine for Red Hat OpenShift because for such kind of tools, there is always room for improvement, as I already mentioned the things that can be improved in my previous answer. I would suggest that it's quite better if you're using Red Hat OpenShift for an enterprise solution, as it's really better to have the enterprise support which Red Hat OpenShift offers, and it's easy to use for Kubernetes-based applications.
Powerful Yet Challenging Transition
What do you like best about the product?
I like Red Hat OpenShift because we use it for deploying and managing our applications in containers, making scaling easy for us. The consistent experience across cloud, on-prem, and hybrid environments is really valuable, as code works the same in all environments right through to production. The transition to OpenShift solved our issues with code standardization across different machines. Its inbuilt DevOps features like pipelines and workflows are an added advantage. We chose OpenShift over Amazon EKS and Google Kubernetes Engine due to its hybrid nature and common functionality checks across environments.
What do you dislike about the product?
I don't like the high cost of Red Hat OpenShift compared to other alternatives in the market. The initial transition phase is complex and takes a lot of time to set up, which can be overwhelming. Also, it's heavy on processing, requiring more resources than we initially had.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
I use Red Hat OpenShift to deploy and manage applications in containers, enhancing scalability and compliance. It solves code standardization issues across diverse machines, and its built-in DevOps features add value. The consistent experience across cloud, on-prem, and hybrid environments is really beneficial.
Fantastic Dashboard, Needs Resource Optimization
What do you like best about the product?
I appreciate the fantastic dashboard offered by Red Hat OpenShift. Its intuitive design places all necessary functions in one location, creating an unparalleled user interface that simplifies orchestration tasks significantly. No other orchestration solution provides such a comprehensive and user-friendly console, making Red Hat OpenShift stand out in terms of usability and accessibility for managing deployments effectively.
What do you dislike about the product?
I find Red Hat OpenShift to be a bit costly, and it requires a lot of resources to start the deployment process. Additionally, the initial setup took some time to understand and get started with.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
I use Red Hat OpenShift to simplify application deployment with auto-scaling, resource management, and orchestration, making operations efficient.
Versatile, Costly but Complex Cloud Solution
What do you like best about the product?
I love that Red Hat OpenShift is built on Kubernetes, which significantly enhances my ability to streamline developer workflows. This integration allows me to leverage Kubernetes' powerful orchestration tools, providing a robust infrastructure for deploying and managing containerized applications at scale. Additionally, I appreciate the granular control it offers, enabling me to fine-tune deployments according to specific needs across hybrid cloud environments. This level of control is crucial in optimizing resource allocation and ensuring efficient application management.
What do you dislike about the product?
I find Red Hat OpenShift to be a bit costly, which can be a significant consideration when managing budgets. Additionally, even though there are numerous configuration options available, the platform tends to feel quite opinionated, which can lead to a steep learning curve for users trying to fully leverage its capabilities. Moreover, the initial setup process is somewhat complex, which can be daunting when first getting started with the software.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
I use Red Hat OpenShift for deploying and managing containerized applications at scale across hybrid cloud environments, streamlining my developer workflow with its Kubernetes foundation and granular control.
Streamlines Deployment but Complexity and Cost Persist
What do you like best about the product?
I appreciate Red Hat OpenShift for its ability to streamline developer workflows in application development and modernization. Its unified enterprise-grade Kubernetes platform simplifies complexity, automates manual tasks, and ensures consistency across deployments. I love its consistent and automated environment which allows developers to build and deploy applications effortlessly across various platforms. The initial setup is highly automated, requiring minimal user input beyond configuration, which the cloud provider and Red Hat manage effectively. This automation simplifies the process significantly, allowing for a quick and efficient deployment through the Red Hat Hybrid Cloud Console.
What do you dislike about the product?
I find Red Hat OpenShift to be quite complex, particularly when managing configurations for security settings, networking, and storage across multiple clusters and environments. This complexity can make the initial setup challenging and often requires a significant investment in training and support. Additionally, the cost associated with using Red Hat OpenShift is a concern, given the resource demands it imposes. Furthermore, there are certain integration issues which can complicate its use with other tools or systems, affecting the overall seamlessness we aim for in our workflows.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Red Hat OpenShift simplifies application development and modernization, automates manual tasks, and ensures consistency by providing a unified, enterprise-grade Kubernetes platform, streamlining developer workflows.
All-in-One Platform That Streamlines Kubernetes Workflows
What do you like best about the product?
I like how OpenShift bundles everything into one clean, integrated platform. It cuts the usual Kubernetes chaos and gives teams a smoother, more reliable path from code to production.
What do you dislike about the product?
ChatGPT said:
OpenShift can feel heavy and overly strict. It demands more resources than you’d expect, and its opinionated setup sometimes slows you down when you just want to get work done.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
It simplifies running Kubernetes by giving a secure, stable, all-in-one platform. It reduces tool sprawl, avoids constant configuration headaches, and helps teams deploy apps faster without fighting the infrastructure every day.
Effortless Containerization and Deployment
What do you like best about the product?
I appreciate Red Hat OpenShift for its seamless support in hosting our Maximo application suite, notably through its capabilities in easy containerization and simplified deployment processes with pipelines. The platform stands out for its ease of installation and maintenance, which significantly reduces the complexity typically associated with such tasks. Moreover, I find the options like auto-scaler of nodes and descheduler extremely valuable, especially as the auto-scaler adeptly adjusts the number of nodes based on utilization, ensuring optimal load management and consistent performance. This automation is crucial in maintaining a reliable performance without manual intervention. The initial setup was straightforward, facilitated by using playbooks, which helped streamline the process efficiently.
What do you dislike about the product?
I find that the monitoring features in Red Hat OpenShift could be improved. Specifically, there is a lack of inbuilt viewing dashboards that I believe would enhance the usability and effectiveness of the monitoring capabilities.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
I find Red Hat OpenShift streamlines containerization and deployment, making hosting applications easy. It supports autoscaling for performance and maintains minimal load, while installation and maintenance are straightforward.
Effortless Kubernetes Monitoring with OpenShift
What do you like best about the product?
What I appreciate most about OpenShift is that it serves as an advanced, out-of-the-box solution for monitoring our Kubernetes cluster. The range of options available for managing and viewing information is extensive, and the interface is very straightforward to use.
What do you dislike about the product?
One aspect I dislike about Openshift is that it does not offer straightforward support for ingress. Instead, it uses what it calls "routers," which are essentially just HA Proxy processes. I am not sure about SSO integration of Openshift, but it should be available.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
In my opinion, OpenShift has greatly streamlined the container orchestration process for Kubernetes. Few products offer the same combination of detail and user-friendly experience that OpenShift provides.
Has supported container-based service hosting while slower support impacts resolution time
What is our primary use case?
Red Hat OpenShift is used to host all services running on containers on specific ports for both production and non-production environments.
Red Hat OpenShift is utilized in the healthcare sector.
What is most valuable?
Red Hat OpenShift provides good value as a cloud service, comparable to other public clouds such as AWS and Azure, but it functions as a private cloud rather than a public one.
A smaller cloud running on containers enables easy deployment with the ability to scale up and scale down, and it can host multiple services on the same platform.
What needs improvement?
Red Hat OpenShift is currently running with VMware, and there are some issues on the storage side that are still being addressed.
The support from Red Hat is rated around a six or seven in those kinds of cases.
Support could improve with faster response times, as responses are currently quite slow.
For how long have I used the solution?
The team has been working with Red Hat OpenShift for over five years.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup for Red Hat OpenShift is easy to deploy.
What about the implementation team?
There are approximately two resources working on the Red Hat OpenShift cluster for deployment.
The DevOps engineer and the Red Hat OpenShift Linux engineer are the job roles required for deployment.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
There is no free open-source version available; a license must be purchased for Red Hat OpenShift.
The pricing for Red Hat OpenShift is considered quite high.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
Red Hat OpenShift cannot be compared with other options for PaaS clouds because other private services have never been used.
There is no current knowledge of other available options.
What other advice do I have?
I am not familiar with the mobile app platform for Android.
I don't have experience with VMware or AWS products at this time, although a team member may be working on the technical side.
My focus is on the management side rather than the technical side.
Microsoft tools are not being used.
The team is focused on the Linux side for the private cloud for Red Hat OpenShift.
I have minimal familiarity with Red Hat OpenShift. I don't have experience with Red Hat OpenShift Data Foundation. The technical side of Red Hat OpenShift is handled by a team member. Management tools, help desk software, or ITSMs are not being used. The overall review rating for Red Hat OpenShift is seven out of ten.
Openshift for data platform
What do you like best about the product?
Automating deploys of applications using helm charts
What do you dislike about the product?
Setting up authentication using htpasswd
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Long wait times to deploy a demo and test environment
