Frequently Asked Questions

• info Do I have to sign in? expand_more

  No. You do not have to sign in to use Meshery. Simple deploy Meshery locally and choose the Local Provider, "None", to use Meshery in single-user mode.

  Layer5 believes privacy is a fundamental human right, so every Layer5 product is designed to minimize the collection and use of your data, and provide transparency and control over your information.

• info Why should I sign in? expand_more

  You might want to sign in for the following benefits:

  • to save your work, including designs, environment configuration, user preferences, and more
  • to collaborate with others, sharing patterns, filters, pplications, policies, and more
  • to Retrieve performance and conformance test results
  • RBAC support, audit trails, and not lose activity history
  • because it's free to have an account

  Meshery offers Providers as a point of extensibility to deliver functionality beyond that of what the built-in Local Provider (named "None") offers. Meshery Remote Providers can offer any number of extensions to users, partners, and integrators to deliver enhanced functionality, using Meshery as a platform. Read more about Local and Remote Providers as a point of extensibility in Meshery.

• info What is the difference between Kanvas^BETA and the Cloud Native Playground? expand_more

  The Cloud Native Playground (aka Meshery Playground) is a managed instance of Meshery that offers a sandbox environment in which half of Kanvas^BETA functionality is enabled (Designer mode) and the other half of Kanvas^BETA functionality is disabled (Visualizer mode).

  The sandbox environment is not connected to an active Kuberentes cluster, and as such, specific actions within Kanvas Designer are also disabled. Meshery and Kanvas are feature-rich, sophisticated management applications for cloud native infrastructure. To access their full set of capabilities, simply deploy your own copy of Meshery into the environment of your choosing.

• info Are designs that I create in the Meshery Playground saved or will I look any work that I do in the playground? expand_more

  All of the designs that you have created in the Meshery Playground are saved to your user account and will be available to you each time that you return to the Playground. The designs will also be available in your other Meshery deployments.

• info Is Meshery open source? expand_more

  Yes, Meshery is a Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) project and is licensed under Apache v2.

  As the cloud native manager, Meshery is an extensible platform, offering multiple extension points within which users and partners (ISVs) can customize and extend Meshery's functionality under the same or different license(s).

• info Can I deploy Meshery / Kanvas on-premises? expand_more

  Yes, Meshery, Kanvas, and Layer5 Cloud can be deployed on-premises in minutes using Helm charts.

  With a small number of manual steps, air-gapped deployments to run Meshery without internet access is also supported.

• info Where is Layer5 Cloud hosted; where is my data stored? expand_more

  Layer5 Cloud is hosted on AWS and Equinix data centers in US-based regions. If you need to know more about the data storage and compliance, please reach out to us at hello@layer5.io

• info How do I configure data usage analytics? expand_more

  From its genesis, one of Meshery's goals is to answer engineers' questions, like "Am I running my infrastructure well? Does my configuration adhere to best practices? What is the overhead of my infrastructure relative to the value that it provides? Is my implementation performant?"

  To further the Service Mesh Performance project's collaborative research. Meshery collects diagnostics and usage data, including performance test results. See the SMP Dashboard for details.

  Help Layer5 and the contributor community improve Meshery and your cloud native management experience automatically. Use the following user preferences to control reporting of diagnostics and usage data.