Microservices simplified with NGINX app server platform

NGINX, a project started in 2002, is now a company widely appreciated for its open-source web-server platform which is rivaling the likes of Apache and Microsoft. With its position firm in the web-server space and an ever-increasing market share, NGINX is now coming up with an arsenal of enhancements to bolster its application platform technology. A lot of us are moving from monolith to microservices, and NGINX is always encouraging organizations the adoption of microservices architecture. Last week, NGINX announced the release and major updates to its NGINX application platform that features NGINX controller, NGINX Plus, and NGINX Unit. Out of these three, NGINX Unit is generally available. Let’s take a closer look at how these three can transform your application server space –

NGINX Unit 1

NGINX is very efficient when it comes to web pages and websites but what about the codes for the microservices environment. Well, here is your answer NGINX Unit 1 is the first generally available (GA) version of the NGINX dynamic web and application server. The most interesting feature of Unit 1 is its multilingual support. Currently, it supports Go, Perl, PHP, Python, and Ruby. We can expect the addition of Java and Javascript to the list. NGINX Unit will simplify the microservices management by providing us with a single instance and built-in networking capabilities that will take care of the communication between multiple applications to reduce complexity.

NGINX Plus R15

NGINX Plus R15 is an upgrade to NGINX Plus in terms of security and performance. For better security, it offers support for OpenID Connect, an enhanced API gateway that allows an improved authentication mechanism and the additional identity layer on top of OAuth 2.0 authorization. Performance improvement is the result of improved clustering capabilities for multi-instance environments with the help of load-balancing, support for the gRPC protocol which was one of the most requested features and HTTP/2 addons for server push capabilities. You can also consolidate and modify API calls using JavaScript because a single client request response can handle multiple sub-requests. NGINX Plus R14 was released in December, and the release of its successor ensures better performance and reliability for your microservices.

NGINX Controller R1

The main idea behind introducing a controller plane is to reduce manual efforts involved in monitoring and managing your infrastructure with the analysis of available real-time information. It is basically a dashboard combined with alert and management functions. NGINX Controller R1 provides a centralized monitoring and management solution for microservices and legacy applications. The dynamic APIs will help in automating the NGINX Controller workflows, while the REST APIs will enhance the developer's abilities. With the help of the Controller, new users can easily get accustomed to the environment and customize the configuration as and when required without any hassle.

This application server platform from NGINX will simplify the deployment and management of microservices. Irrespective of the type of underlying infrastructure, we can combine NGINX Plus and Unit for better application delivery and add controllers on top of it for monitoring and management. In short, this application server platform combines data and control plane with the server to facilitate your microservices expedition.