Chapter 2. Introduction to containers and orchestration with Kubernetes 11
Automating continuous delivery pipelines is a way to help operations from deploying an 
application they have little knowledge of and rescue developers from complex configurations 
and deployments. Efficient delivery means more time for innovation, which enables the 
business to disrupt the market and competitors.
Whether they are accessing a website or a mobile app, people have high expectations of the 
apps that they regularly use. As a result, companies must continuously deliver new features 
and fixes. In the past, this process was painful because an application was developed, built, 
and made available as a single, often monolithic, application.
Containerization or the paradigm shift towards microservices
Microservices is an application architectural style in which an application is composed of 
many discrete, network-connected components called microservices. Consider the following 
points:
/SM590000Large monolithic applications are broken into small services.
/SM590000A single network-accessible service is the smallest deployable unit for a microservices 
application.
/SM590000A microservice is a small application that usually houses one function. The function is 
exposed through APIs and messaging. This rule, sometimes referred to as one service per 
container, might be a container or any other lightweight deployment mechanism,
/SM590000Each microservice can feature its own DevOps pipeline, scale individually, and have its 
own database where it owns a data model.
Figure 2-1 shows how a monolithic application architecture evolves into a 
microservices-based application architecture.
Figure 2-1   Monolithic application versus Microservices application