Microservices, Twelve-Factor Apps, and Serverless

The CNCF cloud native definition mentions microservices, serverless, and declarative APIs in the same breath as containers and service meshes. If you're preparing for the KCNA exam, you need to know what these patterns actually mean, how they differ from each other, and where Kubernetes fits in. The terms get used loosely. "Microservices" often means "we split the monolith." "Serverless" often means "someone else manages the servers." Neither definition is wrong, but neither is precise enough for the exam or for building systems.

Here's what they look like in practice: microservices decomposition in a real 10-service application, twelve-factor methodology mapped to Kubernetes primitives, and serverless computing through Knative.