Kuma 2.3 release with MeshTCPRoute, GAMMA support and much more

We’re excited to announce the release of Kuma 2.3. This new minor release gets us one step closer to releasing targetRef policies as defaults.

In order to take advantage of the latest and greatest in service mesh, we strongly suggest upgrading to Kuma 2.3. Upgrading is easy through kumactl or Helm.

Notable features:

• 🚀 targetRef policies are now working with MeshGateway.
• 🚀 MeshTCPRoute which enables to control traffic routing for TCP services.
• 🚀 Helm improvements with more secure defaults.
• 🚀 Possibility to skip creating default policies when creating a mesh.
• 🚀 Performance improvements on Kubernetes.
• 🚀 Add hosts selection predicates to MeshRetry.
• 🚀 Initial GAMMA routes support.
• 🚀 Continuous improvements to the look and feel of the GUI.
• 🚀 Upgrade to Envoy 1.26.

And a lot more! Check out the full release notes to see everything in this release.

MeshTCPRoute

In 2.2.0 we released MeshHTTPRoute which enabled traffic shaping and shifting of HTTP requests. In this release we’re adding the equivalent MeshTCPRoute for TCP traffic.

The usage is very similar to other targetRef policies. For example you can here do a progressive traffic routing of a service from one version to another.

apiVersion: kuma.io/v1alpha1
kind: MeshTCPRoute
metadata:
  name: tcp-route-1
  namespace: kuma-system
  labels:
    kuma.io/mesh: default
spec:
  targetRef:
    kind: MeshService
    name: frontend_kuma-demo_svc_8080
  to:
    - targetRef:
        kind: MeshService
        name: backend_kuma-demo_svc_3001
      rules:
        - default:
            backendRefs:
              - kind: MeshServiceSubset
                name: backend_kuma-demo_svc_3001
                tags:
                  version: "1.0"
                weight: 90
              - kind: MeshServiceSubset
                name: backend_kuma-demo_svc_3001
                tags:
                  version: "2.0"
                weight: 10

Note that cross zone routing hasn’t been implemented yet. This will be done in the next release (#6989).

MeshGateway support in new policy

Up until now it was complicated to use the targetRef policies with the builtin gateway (read #6560 to understand why). In the upcoming release this will be made even simpler with a new targetRef type MeshGateway which will enable you to identify a gateway by its name. You can check MADR 027 for a teaser.

Initial GAMMA support

GAMMA is an initiative within the GatewayAPI community to create common interfaces for service meshes. We believe this could ease the integration of service meshes with the rest of the Kubernetes ecosystem. This is the primary reason why Kuma has been active in this effort from the start.

In 2.3.0 we’re excited to announce support of HTTPRoute for routing inside the Mesh. It’s a simple feature but we are excited to see what people build around it!

Governance changes

The governance had not change since Kuma incubated in the CNCF. This meant that it wasn’t really a mature and thought through process. We’ve now spent significant time rethinking our GOVERNANCE. We believe it will make how the Kuma community works more transparent and welcoming to new contributors.

By the way, we are looking for production user stories, so if you have a good one please find us on Slack!

Upgrading

Be sure to carefully read the Upgrade Guide before upgrading Kuma.

Join the community!

Join us on our community channels, including official Slack chat, to learn more about Kuma. The community channels are useful for getting up and running with Kuma, as well as for learning how to contribute to and discuss the project roadmap. Kuma is a CNCF Sandbox project: neutral, open and inclusive.

The community call is hosted on the second Wednesday of every Month at 8:30am PDT. And don’t forget to follow Kuma on Twitter and star it on GitHub!