Compare the Paths

Four ways to run Labs64.IO, side by side. If you just want a recommendation: start with the Quickstart, and come back here when you need to decide what comes after it.

At a glance

  Quickstart One module Your cluster Full ecosystem
For Evaluating Exploring one service A team or production Contributing
Runs on Any Kubernetes cluster Docker Compose Your Kubernetes cluster A local k3d cluster
Software comes from Published images and charts Built from source Published images and charts Built from source
Gateway and authentication Yes, with a demo identity provider No Yes, with your identity provider Yes, with a mock identity provider or Keycloak
Data stores Bundled, in the cluster Bundled, in Compose Yours, or bundled Bundled, in the cluster
Services included AuditFlow, Payment Gateway AuditFlow The ones you choose All of them
Time to first request About 5 minutes A few minutes An afternoon for a first environment One long first build
Safe to expose No No Yes, after the go-live checks No

What each path needs on your machine

Tool Quickstart One module Your cluster Full ecosystem
kubectl ✓   ✓ ✓
Helm 4 ✓   ✓ ✓
Docker For a local cluster ✓   ✓
just   ✓   ✓
JDK 25 and Maven   ✓    
k3d and Helmfile       ✓

The full ecosystem builds images inside a container, so it needs no JDK or Node on your machine. Its dev container brings every tool in the last column.

Which one, then? 

flowchart TD
  Q{"What do you want to learn?"}
  Q -->|"Does this platform do what I need?"| A["Quickstart"]
  Q -->|"How does one service behave?"| B["One module locally"]
  Q -->|"How do we run it for real?"| C["Your Kubernetes cluster"]
  Q -->|"How do I change it?"| D["Full ecosystem from source"]

A common sequence for a team adopting the platform:

  1. One person runs the Quickstart on a laptop to see whether the platform fits.
  2. The same person runs one module to learn its configuration in detail, usually AuditFlow and its pipelines.
  3. The platform team installs it on your cluster, first with bundled data stores, then with managed ones.
  4. Whoever needs a change the platform does not have yet sets up the full ecosystem and opens a pull request.

Local defaults are not production configuration. The first, second and fourth path use well-known passwords and an identity provider that authenticates nobody. Only the cluster path, with the go-live checks done, is meant to face other people.