Microsoft has added support for the latest preview release of Kubernetes (1.29) in Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS). As a result, the company now offers the same support for this version as Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE).
With the 1.29 support (release name “mandala”), AKS offers several new features. This version has 49 enhancements, 11 of which are described as stable. Previously, it was possible for different pods on the same Kubernetes node to perform read/write operations on the same data volume. This could be a problem for applications that, to maintain data security, allowed only one pod for the same volume. Therefore, Kubernetes 1.22 added the so-called ReadWriteOncePod option. With version 1.29, this feature reaches General Availability (GA), with now thus support from Azure Kubernetes Service.
In this, AKS follows GKE, which already supported Kubernetes 1.29 on Jan. 12. Regular Google users, however, had to wait two weeks longer, until Jan. 25.
Encryption
Other improvements include the ability to add additional secret fields for CSI drivers, which within Kubernetes are responsible for mounting secrets, keys and certificates. In addition, KMS v2 encryption is now available in GA form. Several other features are still in alpha or beta form.
AI, ease of use, security
On other fronts, Microsoft is expanding its own Azure Kubernetes Service. For example, it is coming out with an AKS add-on to make running machine learning workloads easier and cheaper. The add-on is based on the Kubernetes AI Toolchain Operator (KAITO) and is specifically designed to simplify LLM deployment, for example, without too much upfront configuration work.
AKS also adds safeguards to ensure Kubernetes best practices. On the security front, AKS additionally adds trusted launch support to better protect VMs from “advanced and persistent attack techniques.
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