istio.io/istio@v0.0.0-20240520182934-d79c90f27776/README.md (about) 1 # Istio 2 3 [![CII Best Practices](https://bestpractices.coreinfrastructure.org/projects/1395/badge)](https://bestpractices.coreinfrastructure.org/projects/1395) 4 [![Go Report Card](https://goreportcard.com/badge/github.com/istio/istio)](https://goreportcard.com/report/github.com/istio/istio) 5 [![GoDoc](https://godoc.org/istio.io/istio?status.svg)](https://godoc.org/istio.io/istio) 6 7 <a href="https://istio.io/"> 8 <img src="https://github.com/istio/istio/raw/master/logo/istio-bluelogo-whitebackground-unframed.svg" 9 alt="Istio logo" title="Istio" height="100" width="100" /> 10 </a> 11 12 --- 13 14 Istio is an open source service mesh that layers transparently onto existing distributed applications. Istio’s powerful features provide a uniform and more efficient way to secure, connect, and monitor services. Istio is the path to load balancing, service-to-service authentication, and monitoring – with few or no service code changes. 15 16 - For in-depth information about how to use Istio, visit [istio.io](https://istio.io) 17 - To ask questions and get assistance from our community, visit [Github Discussions](https://github.com/istio/istio/discussions) 18 - To learn how to participate in our overall community, visit [our community page](https://istio.io/about/community) 19 20 In this README: 21 22 - [Introduction](#introduction) 23 - [Repositories](#repositories) 24 - [Issue management](#issue-management) 25 26 In addition, here are some other documents you may wish to read: 27 28 - [Istio Community](https://github.com/istio/community#istio-community) - describes how to get involved and contribute to the Istio project 29 - [Istio Developer's Guide](https://github.com/istio/istio/wiki/Preparing-for-Development) - explains how to set up and use an Istio development environment 30 - [Project Conventions](https://github.com/istio/istio/wiki/Development-Conventions) - describes the conventions we use within the code base 31 - [Creating Fast and Lean Code](https://github.com/istio/istio/wiki/Writing-Fast-and-Lean-Code) - performance-oriented advice and guidelines for the code base 32 33 You'll find many other useful documents on our [Wiki](https://github.com/istio/istio/wiki). 34 35 ## Introduction 36 37 [Istio](https://istio.io/latest/docs/concepts/what-is-istio/) is an open platform for providing a uniform way to [integrate 38 microservices](https://istio.io/latest/docs/examples/microservices-istio/), manage [traffic flow](https://istio.io/latest/docs/concepts/traffic-management/) across microservices, enforce policies 39 and aggregate telemetry data. Istio's control plane provides an abstraction 40 layer over the underlying cluster management platform, such as Kubernetes. 41 42 Istio is composed of these components: 43 44 - **Envoy** - Sidecar proxies per microservice to handle ingress/egress traffic 45 between services in the cluster and from a service to external 46 services. The proxies form a _secure microservice mesh_ providing a rich 47 set of functions like discovery, rich layer-7 routing, circuit breakers, 48 policy enforcement and telemetry recording/reporting 49 functions. 50 51 > Note: The service mesh is not an overlay network. It 52 > simplifies and enhances how microservices in an application talk to each 53 > other over the network provided by the underlying platform. 54 55 - **Istiod** - The Istio control plane. It provides service discovery, configuration and certificate management. It consists of the following sub-components: 56 57 - **Pilot** - Responsible for configuring the proxies at runtime. 58 59 - **Citadel** - Responsible for certificate issuance and rotation. 60 61 - **Galley** - Responsible for validating, ingesting, aggregating, transforming and distributing config within Istio. 62 63 - **Operator** - The component provides user friendly options to operate the Istio service mesh. 64 65 ## Repositories 66 67 The Istio project is divided across a few GitHub repositories: 68 69 - [istio/api](https://github.com/istio/api). This repository defines 70 component-level APIs and common configuration formats for the Istio platform. 71 72 - [istio/community](https://github.com/istio/community). This repository contains 73 information on the Istio community, including the various documents that govern 74 the Istio open source project. 75 76 - [istio/istio](README.md). This is the main code repository. It hosts Istio's 77 core components, install artifacts, and sample programs. It includes: 78 79 - [istioctl](istioctl/). This directory contains code for the 80 [_istioctl_](https://istio.io/latest/docs/reference/commands/istioctl/) command line utility. 81 82 - [operator](operator/). This directory contains code for the 83 [Istio Operator](https://istio.io/latest/docs/setup/install/operator/). 84 85 - [pilot](pilot/). This directory 86 contains platform-specific code to populate the 87 [abstract service model](https://istio.io/docs/concepts/traffic-management/#pilot), dynamically reconfigure the proxies 88 when the application topology changes, as well as translate 89 [routing rules](https://istio.io/latest/docs/reference/config/networking/) into proxy specific configuration. 90 91 - [security](security/). This directory contains [security](https://istio.io/latest/docs/concepts/security/) related code, 92 including Citadel (acting as Certificate Authority), citadel agent, etc. 93 94 - [istio/proxy](https://github.com/istio/proxy). The Istio proxy contains 95 extensions to the [Envoy proxy](https://github.com/envoyproxy/envoy) (in the form of 96 Envoy filters) that support authentication, authorization, and telemetry collection. 97 98 - [istio/ztunnel](https://github.com/istio/ztunnel). The repository contains the Rust implementation of the ztunnel 99 component of Ambient mesh. 100 101 ## Issue management 102 103 We use GitHub to track all of our bugs and feature requests. Each issue we track has a variety of metadata: 104 105 - **Epic**. An epic represents a feature area for Istio as a whole. Epics are fairly broad in scope and are basically product-level things. 106 Each issue is ultimately part of an epic. 107 108 - **Milestone**. Each issue is assigned a milestone. This is 0.1, 0.2, ..., or 'Nebulous Future'. The milestone indicates when we 109 think the issue should get addressed. 110 111 - **Priority**. Each issue has a priority which is represented by the column in the [Prioritization](https://github.com/orgs/istio/projects/6) project. Priority can be one of 112 P0, P1, P2, or >P2. The priority indicates how important it is to address the issue within the milestone. P0 says that the 113 milestone cannot be considered achieved if the issue isn't resolved. 114 115 --- 116 117 <div align="center"> 118 <img src="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cncf/artwork/master/other/cncf/horizontal/color/cncf-color.svg" width="300" alt="Cloud Native Computing Foundation logo"/> 119 <p>Istio is a <a href="https://cncf.io">Cloud Native Computing Foundation</a> project.</p> 120 </div>