This project is an attempt to combine and share best practices when building production ready [cloud native](https://www.cncf.io/) managed service solutions. Cobalt's infrastructure turn-key starter [templates](/infra/templates/README.md) are based on real world engagements with enterprise customers.
This project puts a focus on infrastructure scalability, security, automated testing and deployment repeatability and most importantly, developer experience. Cobalt's intended audience is for developers. Feedback and suggestions are encouraged through issue requests. We welcome contributions across any one of the major cloud providers.
Cobalt is a joint collaboration with project [Bedrock](https://github.com/Microsoft/bedrock). One of the project goals is to predictlably create, change and improve infrastructure.
Cobalt hosts reusable Terraform modules to scaffold managed container services like [ACI](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/container-instances/) and [Application Services](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/app-service/) as a couple of examples. Bedrock targets Kubernetes-based container orchestration workloads while following a [GitOps](https://medium.com/@timfpark/highly-effective-kubernetes-deployments-with-gitops-c7a0354f1446) devops flow. Cobalt templates reference Terraform modules like virtual networks, traffic manager, etc.
Cobalt infrastructure templates are written in Terraform and can be found in the templates [folder](infra/templates). Each subfolder represents a unique deployment schema and is packaged with a set of Terraform scripts, overview and setup instructions and automated unit & integration tests.
Each template makes use of Terraform [modules](https://www.terraform.io/docs/modules/index.html) across both Bedrock and [Cobalt](infra/modules). Cobalt's module registry is categorized by cloud provider then resource type. Each modules represents an absraction for the set of related cloud infrastructure objects that the module will manage.
Cobalt Continuous Integration pipeline defintions are available in the `./devops/provider` folder. As of today, Cobalt provides a git devops worklfow [definition](devops/providers/azure-devops/templates/azure-pipelines.yml) for Azure DevOps. We welcome pipelines from other providers like Jenkins.
The easiest way to try Cobalt is to start with our [azure-simple](https://github.com/Microsoft/cobalt/tree/master/infra/templates/azure-simple-hw) template.
1. You can follow these [instructions](devops/providers/azure-devops/README.md) to create an cloud-based CI pipeline definition.
2. Our cloud deployment templates provide an configurable default setup intended for a t-shirt sized environment scenario. Pick the template folder most relevant to your use-case as a starting point. Each template folder is shipped with setup instructions.
3. It's important to implement quality assurance that validates E2E functional assertions against your infrastructure resources. Each template comes pre-packaged with some basic integration and unit tests. We encourage you to define integration tests in the `test/integration` folder of your template that's specific to your use-case.
4. Follow these [instructions](test-harness/README.md) to setup your local environment. Make sure that the repository lives in a directory that does not live within `$GOPATH`.