Kubernetes is a powerful platform that simplifies the management of containerized applications. If you’re familiar with the fundamentals, it’s time to take a step further and explore intermediate concepts that enhance your ability to manage and optimize Kubernetes clusters.

1. Understanding Deployments
   A Deployment ensures your application runs reliably by managing scaling, updates, and rollbacks.

2. Using ConfigMaps and Secrets
   Kubernetes separates application configuration and sensitive data from the application code using ConfigMaps and Secrets.

   ConfigMaps

   Store non-sensitive configurations, such as environment variables or application settings.
   

kubectl create configmap app-config --from-literal=ENV=production 

3. Liveness and Readiness Probes

Probes ensure your application is healthy and ready to handle traffic.

Liveness Probe
Checks if your application is running. If it fails, Kubernetes restarts the pod.

Readiness Probe
Checks if your application is ready to accept traffic. If it fails, Kubernetes stops routing requests to the pod.

4.Resource Requests and Limits
To ensure efficient resource utilization, define requests (minimum resources a pod needs) and limits (maximum resources a pod can use).

5.Horizontal Pod Autoscaling (HPA)
Scale your application dynamically based on CPU or memory usage.
Example:

kubectl autoscale deployment my-app --cpu-percent=70 --min=2 --max=10 

This ensures your application scales automatically when resource usage increases or decreases.

6.Network Policies
Control how pods communicate with each other and external resources using Network Policies.

Conclusion
Kubernetes has revolutionized the way we manage containerized applications. By automating tasks like deployment, scaling, and maintenance, it allows developers and organizations to focus on innovation. Whether you're a beginner or a seasoned developer, mastering Kubernetes is a skill that will enhance your ability to build and manage modern applications.

By mastering these slightly advanced Kubernetes concepts, you’ll improve your cluster management, application reliability, and resource utilization. With this knowledge, you’re well-prepared to dive into more advanced topics like Helm, monitoring with Prometheus, and service meshes like Istio.

Follow for more and Happy learning :)