At Google Next '22, GitLab launched GitLab Cloud Seed, a new open-source solution integrated in GitLab One DevOps platform that aims to simplify Google Cloud account management, deployment to Google Cloud Run, and Google SQL database provisioning.
Cloud Seed is a new capability within GitLab that simplifies the developer experience for procuring and consuming cloud services. Cloud Seed allows GitLab and Google Cloud customers to migrate to the cloud using a single platform, consolidating their tech stack without slowing down their cloud adoption process.
GitLab Cloud Seed program lead Sri Rang explained at Google Could Next '22 how teams from GitLab and Google worked together to provide what he defined "best-in-class experiences to simplify, automate, and accelerate cloud resource provisioning, deployment automation, and configuration".
Using Cloud Seed, devops engineers can generate Google Cloud Service accounts, deploy their applications to Cloud Run, Google's fully managed platform for containerized applications, and provision SQL databases directly from the GitLab web interface.
Cloud Seed is able to generate service accounts, keys, and deployment permissions as well as make that information available in GitLab CI variables, optionally using secret managers to enhance security.
Deployments to Cloud Run can be automated and support deployment previews, which allow to deploy a PR without affecting the production service to preview the change and ensure it works as expected before merging. Furthermore, it is possible to control the deployment destination based on commit, branch, and tag.
Cloud Seed supports all major SQL databases, including PostgreSQL, MySQL, and SQL Server, and makes it possible to create instances, databases, and users as well as define a background worker to carry through all database setup.
Cloud Seed is available to both paid and free users as part of GitLab One DevOps platform, GitLab's centralized toolchain that aims to tie all parts of the software development lifecycle into a single, integrated application. As mentioned, GitLab Cloud Seed is open source and currently in preview for early testers.