|
| 1 | +--- |
| 2 | +layout: blog |
| 3 | +title: "Spotlight on SIG Apps" |
| 4 | +slug: sig-apps-spotlight-2025 |
| 5 | +canonicalUrl: https://www.kubernetes.dev/blog/2025/03/12/sig-apps-spotlight-2025 |
| 6 | +date: 2025-03-12 |
| 7 | +author: "Sandipan Panda (DevZero)" |
| 8 | +--- |
| 9 | + |
| 10 | +In our ongoing SIG Spotlight series, we dive into the heart of the Kubernetes project by talking to |
| 11 | +the leaders of its various Special Interest Groups (SIGs). This time, we focus on |
| 12 | +**[SIG Apps](https://github.com/kubernetes/community/tree/master/sig-apps#apps-special-interest-group)**, |
| 13 | +the group responsible for everything related to developing, deploying, and operating applications on |
| 14 | +Kubernetes. [Sandipan Panda](https://www.linkedin.com/in/sandipanpanda) |
| 15 | +([DevZero](https://www.devzero.io/)) had the opportunity to interview [Maciej |
| 16 | +Szulik](https://github.com/soltysh) ([Defense Unicorns](https://defenseunicorns.com/)) and [Janet |
| 17 | +Kuo](https://github.com/janetkuo) ([Google](https://about.google/)), the chairs and tech leads of |
| 18 | +SIG Apps. They shared their experiences, challenges, and visions for the future of application |
| 19 | +management within the Kubernetes ecosystem. |
| 20 | + |
| 21 | +## Introductions |
| 22 | + |
| 23 | +**Sandipan: Hello, could you start by telling us a bit about yourself, your role, and your journey |
| 24 | +within the Kubernetes community that led to your current roles in SIG Apps?** |
| 25 | + |
| 26 | +**Maciej**: Hey, my name is Maciej, and I’m one of the leads for SIG Apps. Aside from this role, you |
| 27 | +can also find me helping |
| 28 | +[SIG CLI](https://github.com/kubernetes/community/tree/master/sig-cli#readme) and also being one of |
| 29 | +the Steering Committee members. I’ve been contributing to Kubernetes since late 2014 in various |
| 30 | +areas, including controllers, apiserver, and kubectl. |
| 31 | + |
| 32 | +**Janet**: Certainly! I'm Janet, a Staff Software Engineer at Google, and I've been deeply involved |
| 33 | +with the Kubernetes project since its early days, even before the 1.0 launch in 2015. It's been an |
| 34 | +amazing journey! |
| 35 | + |
| 36 | +My current role within the Kubernetes community is one of the chairs and tech leads of SIG Apps. My |
| 37 | +journey with SIG Apps started organically. I started with building the Deployment API and adding |
| 38 | +rolling update functionalities. I naturally gravitated towards SIG Apps and became increasingly |
| 39 | +involved. Over time, I took on more responsibilities, culminating in my current leadership roles. |
| 40 | + |
| 41 | +## About SIG Apps |
| 42 | + |
| 43 | +*All following answers were jointly provided by Maciej and Janet.* |
| 44 | + |
| 45 | +**Sandipan: For those unfamiliar, could you provide an overview of SIG Apps' mission and objectives? |
| 46 | +What key problems does it aim to solve within the Kubernetes ecosystem?** |
| 47 | + |
| 48 | +As described in our |
| 49 | +[charter](https://github.com/kubernetes/community/blob/master/sig-apps/charter.md#scope), we cover a |
| 50 | +broad area related to developing, deploying, and operating applications on Kubernetes. That, in |
| 51 | +short, means we’re open to each and everyone showing up at our bi-weekly meetings and discussing the |
| 52 | +ups and downs of writing and deploying various applications on Kubernetes. |
| 53 | + |
| 54 | +**Sandipan: What are some of the most significant projects or initiatives currently being undertaken |
| 55 | +by SIG Apps?** |
| 56 | + |
| 57 | +At this point in time, the main factors driving the development of our controllers are the |
| 58 | +challenges coming from running various AI-related workloads. It’s worth giving credit here to two |
| 59 | +working groups we’ve sponsored over the past years: |
| 60 | + |
| 61 | +1. [The Batch Working Group](https://github.com/kubernetes/community/tree/master/wg-batch), which is |
| 62 | + looking at running HPC, AI/ML, and data analytics jobs on top of Kubernetes. |
| 63 | +2. [The Serving Working Group](https://github.com/kubernetes/community/tree/master/wg-serving), which |
| 64 | + is focusing on hardware-accelerated AI/ML inference. |
| 65 | + |
| 66 | +## Best practices and challenges |
| 67 | + |
| 68 | +**Sandipan: SIG Apps plays a crucial role in developing application management best practices for |
| 69 | +Kubernetes. Can you share some of these best practices and how they help improve application |
| 70 | +lifecycle management?** |
| 71 | + |
| 72 | +1. Implementing [health checks and readiness probes](/docs/tasks/configure-pod-container/configure-liveness-readiness-startup-probes/) |
| 73 | +ensures that your applications are healthy and ready to serve traffic, leading to improved |
| 74 | +reliability and uptime. The above, combined with comprehensive logging, monitoring, and tracing |
| 75 | +solutions, will provide insights into your application's behavior, enabling you to identify and |
| 76 | +resolve issues quickly. |
| 77 | + |
| 78 | +2. [Auto-scale your application](/docs/concepts/workloads/autoscaling/) based |
| 79 | + on resource utilization or custom metrics, optimizing resource usage and ensuring your |
| 80 | + application can handle varying loads. |
| 81 | + |
| 82 | +3. Use Deployment for stateless applications, StatefulSet for stateful applications, Job |
| 83 | + and CronJob for batch workloads, and DaemonSet for running a daemon on each node. Use |
| 84 | + Operators and CRDs to extend the Kubernetes API to automate the deployment, management, and |
| 85 | + lifecycle of complex applications, making them easier to operate and reducing manual |
| 86 | + intervention. |
| 87 | + |
| 88 | +**Sandipan: What are some of the common challenges SIG Apps faces, and how do you address them?** |
| 89 | + |
| 90 | +The biggest challenge we’re facing all the time is the need to reject a lot of features, ideas, and |
| 91 | +improvements. This requires a lot of discipline and patience to be able to explain the reasons |
| 92 | +behind those decisions. |
| 93 | + |
| 94 | +**Sandipan: How has the evolution of Kubernetes influenced the work of SIG Apps? Are there any |
| 95 | +recent changes or upcoming features in Kubernetes that you find particularly relevant or beneficial |
| 96 | +for SIG Apps?** |
| 97 | + |
| 98 | +The main benefit for both us and the whole community around SIG Apps is the ability to extend |
| 99 | +kubernetes with [Custom Resource Definitions](https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/extend-kubernetes/api-extension/custom-resources/) |
| 100 | +and the fact that users can build their own custom controllers leveraging the built-in ones to |
| 101 | +achieve whatever sophisticated use cases they might have and we, as the core maintainers, haven’t |
| 102 | +considered or weren’t able to efficiently resolve inside Kubernetes. |
| 103 | + |
| 104 | +## Contributing to SIG Apps |
| 105 | + |
| 106 | +**Sandipan: What opportunities are available for new contributors who want to get involved with SIG |
| 107 | +Apps, and what advice would you give them?** |
| 108 | + |
| 109 | +We get the question, "What good first issue might you recommend we start with?" a lot :-) But |
| 110 | +unfortunately, there’s no easy answer to it. We always tell everyone that the best option to start |
| 111 | +contributing to core controllers is to find one you are willing to spend some time with. Read |
| 112 | +through the code, then try running unit tests and integration tests focusing on that |
| 113 | +controller. Once you grasp the general idea, try breaking it and the tests again to verify your |
| 114 | +breakage. Once you start feeling confident you understand that particular controller, you may want |
| 115 | +to search through open issues affecting that controller and either provide suggestions, explaining |
| 116 | +the problem users have, or maybe attempt your first fix. |
| 117 | + |
| 118 | +Like we said, there are no shortcuts on that road; you need to spend the time with the codebase to |
| 119 | +understand all the edge cases we’ve slowly built up to get to the point where we are. Once you’re |
| 120 | +successful with one controller, you’ll need to repeat that same process with others all over again. |
| 121 | + |
| 122 | +**Sandipan: How does SIG Apps gather feedback from the community, and how is this feedback |
| 123 | +integrated into your work?** |
| 124 | + |
| 125 | +We always encourage everyone to show up and present their problems and solutions during our |
| 126 | +bi-weekly [meetings](https://github.com/kubernetes/community/tree/master/sig-apps#meetings). As long |
| 127 | +as you’re solving an interesting problem on top of Kubernetes and you can provide valuable feedback |
| 128 | +about any of the core controllers, we’re always happy to hear from everyone. |
| 129 | + |
| 130 | +## Looking ahead |
| 131 | + |
| 132 | +**Sandipan: Looking ahead, what are the key focus areas or upcoming trends in application management |
| 133 | +within Kubernetes that SIG Apps is excited about? How is the SIG adapting to these trends?** |
| 134 | + |
| 135 | +Definitely the current AI hype is the major driving factor; as mentioned above, we have two working |
| 136 | +groups, each covering a different aspect of it. |
| 137 | + |
| 138 | +**Sandipan: What are some of your favorite things about this SIG?** |
| 139 | + |
| 140 | +Without a doubt, the people that participate in our meetings and on |
| 141 | +[Slack](https://kubernetes.slack.com/messages/sig-apps), who tirelessly help triage issues, pull |
| 142 | +requests and invest a lot of their time (very frequently their private time) into making kubernetes |
| 143 | +great! |
| 144 | + |
| 145 | +--- |
| 146 | + |
| 147 | +SIG Apps is an essential part of the Kubernetes community, helping to shape how applications are |
| 148 | +deployed and managed at scale. From its work on improving Kubernetes' workload APIs to driving |
| 149 | +innovation in AI/ML application management, SIG Apps is continually adapting to meet the needs of |
| 150 | +modern application developers and operators. Whether you’re a new contributor or an experienced |
| 151 | +developer, there’s always an opportunity to get involved and make an impact. |
| 152 | + |
| 153 | +If you’re interested in learning more or contributing to SIG Apps, be sure to check out their [SIG |
| 154 | +README](https://github.com/kubernetes/community/tree/master/sig-apps) and join their bi-weekly [meetings](https://github.com/kubernetes/community/tree/master/sig-apps#meetings). |
| 155 | + |
| 156 | +- [SIG Apps Mailing List](https://groups.google.com/a/kubernetes.io/g/sig-apps) |
| 157 | +- [SIG Apps on Slack](https://kubernetes.slack.com/messages/sig-apps) |
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