[edvald]

I agree to some extent. One of the key value propositions of Kubernetes is indeed in its abstractions, which are mostly quite good. And I really like its declarative approach.

However, I've been dealing with its ins and outs for a while now, partly because I'm developing tooling around it, and I've found there are already a lot of idiosyncrasies in there. Some APIs have very frustrating flaws, and most annoying of all is how tightly some core functionality is coupled to kubectl. A remarkable amount of logic is embedded in the CLI, as opposed to the API layer, and if you really get in the weeds you're likely to start pulling your hair.

Which is to say, even once you get through the learning curve, you may still find yourself struggling with it as you use it. Sometimes when you declare your intent, you find that it just doesn't work, and it can take a while to figure out why. Before you know it, you're using various operators that are meant to mask some of the deficiencies in the core orchestrator, and by extension you're outside of the core abstractions. And don't get me started on Istio... (but that's a tangent).

Anyhow. If you're not trying to do anything unusual, it's a good orchestrator. Not perfect, and for sure heavy, but a good choice for a lot of use cases.

[jordanbeiber]

Pretty much my experience as well.

I’ve actually started to wrap calls to kubectl to not have to replicate code and logic taking place in the CLI.

And istio... I can’t even... envoy is awesome though!