An Oral History of the Kubernetes Revolution with Brian Grant

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Kubernetes isn’t just a platform—it’s a revolution. On this episode of Fork Around and Find Out, Justin and Autumn sit down with Kubernetes co-creator Brian Grant to explore the origins of this game-changing technology. From Google’s internal tooling to the cloud-native juggernaut it is today, Brian takes us behind the scenes of Kubernetes’ evolution, including its roots in Borg and the creation of CNCF.

Brian also opens up about his fascinating career, from debugging GPUs at PeakStream to improving Google’s threading systems. Along the way, he shares his candid thoughts on Terraform, GitOps, and the future of infrastructure management. We’re talking insider stories, tech critiques, and the cyclical nature of trends like AI—all packed into one unmissable episode. Brian is a visionary who’s shaped the cloud-native ecosystem as we know it. We can’t wait for you to hear his story and insights!

Show Highlights (0:00) Intro (0:31) Tremolo Security sponsor read (2:42) Brian’s background (6:20) What it’s like working on something great but it not being the right time (9:17) How Brian’s work from the 2000s is still important today (11:16) Why Brian said ‘yes’ to Google after previously turning them down (12:59) The history of the FDIV bug (16:49) What Brian was doing when his old company was bought by Google (20:51) How Brian’s education helped him get started down this path (23:47) Brian’s jump from Borg to Kubernetes (32:27) The effect Kubernetes has had on the landscape of infrastructure and applications (35:48) Tremolo Security sponsor read (36:47) Times Brian has been frustrated at how people use Kubernetes (41:05) The patterns Brian notices thanks to his years in the tech industry (48:04) What Brian expects to see next as manual actions to make providers work to make a comeback (54:58) Reflecting on Brian’s serendipitous journey through the tech world (1:02:18) Where you can find more from Brian About Brian Grant Brian Grant is the CTO and co-founder of ConfigHub, pioneering a new approach to provisioning, deploying, and operating cloud applications and infrastructure. As the original lead architect of Kubernetes, Brian created its declarative configuration model (KRM) and tools like kubectl apply and kustomize. With over 30 years in high-performance and distributed computing, he’s held pivotal roles, including tech lead for Google’s Borg platform and founder of the Omega R&D project. A Kubernetes Steering Committee and CNCF Technical Oversight Committee member, Brian also boasts 15+ patents and a Ph.D. in Computer Science, shaping the future of cloud and computing innovation. Links Referenced LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bgrant0607/ Twitter: https://x.com/bgrant0607 BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/bgrant0607.bsky.social Medium: https://medium.com/@bgrant0607 Hachyderm: https://hachyderm.io/@bgrant0607 Sponsor Tremolo: http://fafo.fm/tremolo Sponsor the FAFO Podcast! http://fafo.fm/sponsor