NGINX announced general availability of NGINX Plus R18. NGINX
Plus is the only all-in-one load balancer, content cache, web server, proxy,
API gateway and Kubernetes Ingress Controller. This versatility enables you to
simplify your architecture for delivering both traditional applications and new
ones based on microservices.
NGINX's flexibility,
portability and seamless integration with CI/CD automation tools help
accelerate enterprise adoption of DevOps. NGINX Plus R18 advances this
objective by simplifying configuration workflows and enhancing the security and
reliability of your applications.
New capabilities introduced in
R18 include:
- Simplifying
configuration workflows:
- Dynamic certificate
loading: NGINX Plus introduces lazy loading of TLS certificates. With
lazy loading, TLS certificates are only loaded into memory when a request is
made for a matching hostname. This simplifies the NGINX Plus configuration and
reduces its size as multiple certificates can be handled within a single server
block. Furthermore, you can save time and effort by automating the upload of certificates
and private keys into the key-value store using the NGINX Plus API. This is
especially ideal for deployments with large numbers of certificates or when
there are a high frequency of configuration reloads.
- Support for port
ranges for server configurations: With this release, users can specify
port ranges rather than just specific ports. Port ranges can be specified for
both HTTP and TCP/UDP applications (Stream module). This also allows NGINX Plus
to act as a proxy for an FTP server in passive mode.
- Simplified cluster management: NGINX Plus R15
introduced synchronization of runtime state across a cluster of NGINX Plus
instances. This release enhances clustering by enabling a single configuration
to be used for each member of the cluster. This is particularly suitable for
dynamic environments such as auto-scaling groups or containerized clusters.
- Modular code organization with the NGINX JavaScript
module: The NGINX JavaScript module now supports the
JavaScript import and export modules, enabling you to
organize your JavaScript code into multiple function-specific files instead of
a single file as before. This greatly improves readability and simplifies maintenance,
particularly if multiple teams are contributing JavaScript code.
- Minimizing exposure
of certificates: When managing TLS/SSL certificates for secure sites
and applications, users configure NGINX Plus to specify the certificate and
associated private key as files on disk. With this release, NGINX Plus loads
certificates directly from the key-value store where they reside in memory.
Keeping secrets off the filesystem makes it difficult for an attacker to obtain
the private key for a server certificate.
- Support for opaque
session tokens: NGINX Plus supports OpenID Connect authentication and
single sign-on for backend applications. With this release, NGINX Plus supports
opaque session tokens issued by OpenID Connect. Opaque tokens contain no
personally identifiable information about the user so that no sensitive
information is stored at the client.
- Enabling clients to
reconnect upon failed health checks: NGINX Plus active health checks
continually probes the health of upstream servers to ensure traffic does not
get forwarded to servers that are offline. With this release, existing client
connections can be terminated when an active health check fails. This enables
client applications to reconnect, at which point they are proxied to a healthy
backend server, thereby improving the reliability of your applications.
To start your free trial of NGINX Plus R18 along with NGINX
Controller, visit
https://www.nginx.com/free-trial-request-nginx-controller.